My inspiration to provide instructions for making your own cucumber maki stems from a sushi class Mr. Pinky Bean and I recently attended. My expectations may have been too high going into the class, as I naively expected one three-hour session to turn me into a sushi master. Indeed I figured that after an afternoon of learning from the best, we would invite friends over and wow them with our culinary expertise.

In reality we were the messiest pair at the table and I'm still finding sticky rice in places no one would ever voluntarily put it. Slightly embarrassed by the mess I was making, I tried to discreetly push some of the excessive amounts of rice that had ended up on the table onto the floor in hopes that no one would notice. In the end all I accomplished was coating the bottom of my shoes in the stuff, ensuring that I left a little trail of rice in my wake at every other place I visited for the duration of the day. 

You can substitute the cucumber in this roll for plain avocado or attempt California rolls by including avocado and cooked crab meat if you don't follow a vegan or vegetarian diet. I should also point out that though this video is accurate and in keeping with what I learned in the class, do not in any way expect your roll to look like this if this is your first foray into the wonderful world of making your own sushi. A more likely scenario will have the seaweed in your seemingly perfect roll pop open after about 30 seconds, spilling the aforementioned excessive amounts of rice all over your table. Also make sure you wet your hands more than once if necessary otherwise you'll end up with more rice stuck to your hands than actually in the roll.

Despite looking like the Creature from the Rice Lagoon, learning to make sushi was the most fun I've had in awhile, and I re-learned the valuable lesson that practice (hopefully) makes perfect!

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