Shallot and Asparagus Sushi Rolls

A few months ago I was talking with someone about cooking. The conversation was brief and at some point I had mentioned that I was going to go have Sushi. He asked me if I had ever tried to make my own. In my mind I immediately dismissed the idea and thought to myself, Sushi isn't something you make: it's something you buy - like coffee. Then I noticed that when I did go out for Sushi I couldn't find a single restaurant with a Shallot and Asparagus roll. Quite naturally I decided I was going to learn how to make sushi. This is what I came up with.

Ingredients:

3 cups of Sushi rice
As much Sashimi grade Salmon as you can handle
1/4 lb of Asparagus blanched
1 sliced Shallot
Nori (dried seaweed in sheets)
Wasabi

Instructions: 

The ingredients list for this dish is a little difficult to write out. I don't actually know how much Sushi you will want to make. It's better to have an abundant amount of rice though. If you don't use it for this you will use it for something else. Here's how to make Sushi Rice: http://allrecipes.com/recipe/perfect-sushi-rice/. I followed that recipe basically so you can too. I feel sort of strange writing out a recipe that isn't my own. As a disclaimer I would like to state that in no way am I a Sushi chef. I only briefly (and I do mean briefly)  looked at recipes online. This is probably not the best technique. This is my first attempt, and I think it turned out pretty well. Once you have the rice you want to have a cup of warm water with a little bit of vinegar in it. Dip your hands into it. This makes the rice not stick to your hands. Once you do that start picking out rice from your bowl and spread them into a square on your Sushi mat. I used a piece of parchment paper to keep the food from being stuck to the mat. In most restaurants I've been to I've seen the Sushi Chefs use plastic wrap. Once you have your square of rice laid out on your mat you should compare the size and shape of it to your Nori. The Nori should overlap by about a quarter of an inch on one side. This is going to be the part of it that tucks underneath the ingredients as you roll it. About 15% of the way up the Nori you want to begin to lay out the things you want in your Sushi. Obviously I used blanched asparagus, chopped shallots and salmon. It's even pretty good if you add some wasabi into the roll.  Now begin to roll. As the Nori comes across your ingredients (blanched asparagus and shallots, right?) you want to tuck that little tab of Nori underneath it. Continue rolling it. It's a little tricky to not get the parchment paper rolled into the roll. A good way I noticed was to keep pulling the paper back as you were rolling forward. Once you're to the end you're done.

Just like that

Cutting Your Roll:

You should start in the dead center. Once you have two pieces you again cut in the dead center of each section. Continue this process until you have eight equal-sized pieces. If you start at one end and continue you will end up with uneven sized rolls.

Eat Sushi!