- A watermelon, a nori sheet and wasabi
walk into a restaurant, run into a vegan,
and now they're sushi.
(laughs)
(upbeat music)
I have a quick wit sometimes.
All I smell is vinegar.
Most people, when they hear vegan sushi,
they think cucumber and
avocado rolls, which is great,
if you hate taste.
But vegan sushi can be
so much better than that
and I, in my travels along
the interwebs, saw a lot
of people making watermelon
sushi, and I went to Planta,
if you saw my video there
you saw that I tried
some delicious watermelon
sushi, and I wanted to see
if I could recreate it at home.
We're gonna try and turn
watermelon into tuna.
(upbeat dance music)
All right, when I saw
this on the internet,
I saw it done a couple different ways,
I mean, I tried it at
Planta, I've seen a couple
of videos of people do it,
there were a lot of marinades
and things involved,
but when you breakdown
what tuna tastes like, and I
asked my fish eating friends
if they could describe tuna,
what would it taste like.
And most people said that it
was buttery, slightly salty,
softness; so why would
you marinade a watermelon
in tamari and vinegar, with the
flavor that you're going for
is slightly salty butteriness.
So I decided to keep it easy for me,
keep it easy for you guys,
and actually not marinade
this at all, I am just
gonna slice this guy down,
I'm gonna cook it at a low
temperature, in the oven,
for about three hours, anywhere
between two and three hours,
you kind of have to
eyeball this, and I'm just
gonna rub it in olive oil and sprinkle it
with a little bit of salt and see if I get
a texture and flavor that resembles tuna.
All right, to throw this
together, you need a watermelon,
you need nori sheets, you
need water for your fingers,
as well as some rice
vinegar, Siracha, vegan mayo,
green onions, some sesame
seeds that we're gonna toast,
of course you need some wasabi,
and of course some ginger.
First thing I'm going to
do with this watermelon
is just cut the rind off,
so I'm just gonna slowly go,
oops, not like that, don't do that.
Just gonna do down, and
cut all this white bit off.
And clearly, this is
more of a novelty food,
I don't think I would
ever take this much time
to prepare something
like this, this would be
something I would do
special for a dinner party,
not something I would
casually throw together
on a Wednesday night.
I am most concerned about
the fact that it's still
gonna taste like watermelon.
I've dehydrated watermelon
in a dehydrator before,
and you still get this really
distinct watermelon flavor,
so I'm a bit concerned about
that, I'm also concerned
that it's just not going
to dehydrate in a way,
like I'm not gonna get the right texture,
and I looked up what Planta
does, or what they say
they do to their watermelon,
and they literally just
cook it in the oven, they dehydrate it.
And I'm just not convinced that
that's all it's gonna take,
but I'm also not convinced
that marinading it
is the way to go, so
this is gonna be truly
a trial and error situation here.
All right, I'm gonna slice
this guy down the middle,
we're gonna do one inch
steaks, if you will,
something like that.
All right.
I'm just going to rub
some olive oil on here.
And that hopefully will give
us a nice, fatty consistency,
and flavor, buttery almost, if you will.
This little guy; (bubbles popping)
ooh, that was a fun sound.
Then I'm just going to lightly salt
the watermelon both sides.
And then I'm just going
to cook these in the oven
at 180 degrees fahrenheit
for anywhere between two,
two and a half, to three hours.
You kind of have to eyeball
this, it's different every time,
apparently, and depending
on the watermelon,
how much moisture there is, and whatever,
so just, when you get
the desired consistency
that you want, take it out.
All right, I've just
taken the watermelon tuna,
it's called that, out of the oven, I have
some larger slices here,
and then some thinner ones.
I mean, it definitely
changes the texture of it.
I feel like, when I see, I cut a fish,
it does kind of look like this.
This one really looks
like a cut of tuna to me.
Also this one kind of, I
mean, if you didn't have
these seeds here, it does
look like a cut of meat.
I don't know, does it look like sushi?
I don't know, I wanna taste it.
It doesn't taste like
watermelon, right away,
but then there's a little bit
of a watermelon aftertaste.
I don't know what this tastes like.
Who's had sushi most
recently in their life?
- [Cameraman] Does it remind
you of the sushi texture,
at least at Planta?
- It does remind me of the sushi texture,
it reminds me of the look.
When I do the spicy tuna roll situation,
when you have all the
spicy mayo, whatever,
I think it'll be pretty close.
I'm gonna do some nigiri rice,
little lumps. (laughter)
We're gonna make sushi, all right?
Just, that's what we're gonna do.
I need to make sure that it
doesn't stick to my fingers,
so I have some rice vinegar
here, and a bowl of water.
So I'm just gonna add the two together.
And that's gonna make sure that the rice
isn't sticking to my
fingers, and my hands.
I have my bowl of rice
here, this is sushi rice,
how do you shape it?
I've never made sushi before.
Good thing I have four of these, because,
this could go either way, here.
I mean, it looks pretty;
- [Cameraman] I'm not gonna
lie, it does look like tuna.
- So I definitely understand
why people do this
for 10 years, because this not easy
to cut something this thin.
It's, homemade, it's a DIY charm.
Hey, that's not too bad.
- [Cameraman] That looks pretty realistic,
when you think about it.
- [Candice] The more thinly
you slice it, the more
- [Cameraman] Transparent it comes,
- Transparent it gets,
so that's interesting.
I wonder if it would make
a difference if I cooked it
for longer; this is what
I'm going to use, I think,
for the spicy tuna rolls,
because I don't wanna waste them.
These are my screw ups.
Okay, now that I've figured
out what I'm doing here,
I'm gonna do this a couple different ways,
I'm gonna do just the rice,
and then the tuna on top,
then I'm gonna do some
with wasabi, so it'll be
rice, wasabi, tuna,
then I'm gonna make some
spicy tuna rolls.
It's getting it to be super
thin, that's difficult.
This is ideal, if I could
get a large piece like this.
This is the hardest I've
ever worked in my life,
I think; I don't have the
knife skills for this,
I don't have the patience for this.
I am going to make some spicy tuna rolls,
the first thing that you need to make that
is of course, spicy mayo.
So I have some vegan mayo
here, we're gonna add
some sesame oil,
and then some Siracha, and I'm
just gonna mix that together.
So the amount of Siracha
really is up to you,
I would start at about a
tablespoon and go from there,
it's really just your tolerance to heat,
what you can handle.
I like it spicy, so I'm making it
a bit spicier for myself.
(watermelon peeling apart repeatedly)
I cut up a bunch of the
watermelon tuna here.
I'm going to add the vegan spicy mayo,
and I kind of eyeball that.
Some green onion; you want
to keep some for garnish.
And then you're just
gonna mix it all together.
If this doesn't work out,
we're making hand rolls.
All right, I have my
wrapped bamboo sushi roller.
I have my nori roll
here, or not nori roll,
nori sheet, and I have my
sushi rice, so I'm just
gonna squish the sushi
rice going into this
water, vinegar solution,
in between so it doesn't
stick to everything.
I remember on John's
Instagram I made fun of him
so hard for the ugly sushi
that he made, a month ago,
and I'm kind of eating my words right now.
Do I have to do it all
the way to the edge?
I don't know what to do.
I'm gonna take the toasted sesame seeds
that I toasted and just,
casually sprinkle them on.
Ooh, ah, okay.
And, nailed it, and we're done,
no just kidding.
So we want the spicy watermelon
tuna on this side, right?
And now do I just roll it?
I'm scared; okay.
Ha ha; oh, it's spilling out the sides.
I made a mess. (laughing)
My patience for this is shot,
so Molly's gonna try one;
cause you make sushi at home.
- I have made sushi at
home, but it's always
been ugly, so I'm just
going to try my best.
- If Jena Verbals can make corn on the cob
but the corn bone as a
hotdog I can make ugly sushi
that tastes good.
- Can we just turn this into
a poke bowl or something?
(laughing)
- Guys, it's for when you're
carb loading. (laughing)
- [Cameraman] So you're
doing it with the seaweed
on the outside.
- [Molly] Yeah, I think it might have
better structure roll quality.
- [Candice] This is
why I don't make sushi.
I've spent six years on
YouTube and I've never
made sushi, and this is why.
- [Molly] There's no
filling in that one either,
what am I doing? (laughing)
Tadaa.
- [Candice] They're pretty.
- [Molly] They're not. (laughing)
- It's fine, it's definitely a variety.
(upbeat new age music)
All right, so after some fun
attempts, here's our sushi.
The watermelon itself,
when you cook it down,
it is red, but then you thinly slice it
and it turns more like an
orange color, so I guess
you need to probably
interchange this between
tuna and salmon; that's
not why we're here,
we're here to taste test it.
So I'm going to get a little
bit of wasabi, all right,
oh god, oh god, well then.
We've had one hell of a day here.
I'm gonna go down to my food to eat it.
I have much, much wasabi.
All right, let's try this guy.
So you don't really notice
the flavor of the watermelon
at all when it's just on its own.
The spicy tuna rolls, I think, I prefer,
the nagiri just tastes like rice,
with wasabi, and something
fatty thrown over top.
I think I definitely
prefer the spicy tuna roll
version of like a mahi roll.
Hm hmm, yeah.
So I don't think I would ever
make sushi at home again.
I think this is definitely
more if a novelty thing.
I'm just not good at it,
if you can roll sushi
and you're super good at
it, definitely try this.
It looks beautiful, I
think if you're having
a dinner party, it's
something that's really going
to impress your guests,
me personally, I just,
I don't have the patience to do this,
and I don't have the finesse.
This is why I don't
bake cakes, this is why
I don't do intricate little
things on my channel,
because I don't have
the patience for this.
It's beautiful, I loved looking at it
after I was done, but it
took too much time for me.
For the watermelon, I
would definitely salt it
a bit more, I think it
does need a little bit
of saltiness to
counterbalance the little bit
of watermelon aftertaste that
you do get when it's just
on it's own; when it's in a
roll, you can't really tell,
you're just looking for a texture, thing.
So it's great, I wouldn't
change it at all for that,
but I think it's a good start
in terms of vegan sushi,
and moving forward in the
world of meat and seafood.
So let me know if you
would try this recipe,
by leaving me a comment in
the comments section below.
If you like this video
make sure to give it
a big thumbs up, and also let me know
what you want me to try out
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hit that subscribe button.
And you'll see my face, twice a week,
every single week; bye.
