Homemade sushi (and 'vegetarian snails')

I'm enjoying these school holidays much much more than the last one. Which is possibly because we'd just had a holiday recently and so are not burnt out, or because the weather is warmer and not so rainy, or a mixture of both. I'd also like to think, though, that I'm getting a bit better at working out how much activity they need to keep them happy without overdoing it and making myself stressed and tired along the way. Do you identify with that?

One organised activity we did have on last week was a kids cooking class run by our local council, which was great fun. They made 3 dishes, including sushi. I'd never made this before but after watching them I thought surely if kids can do it then I can! I thought we'd give it a go as a little holiday activity of our own.

So off we went to the fantastic local asian grocery store I've posted about before for some supplies, including this lot:



It's always an interesting excursion with the kids, who love seeing all the different things including the fresh chicken feet in the butchery section - which I walk past rather quickly! The thing that caught my eye this time was the 'vegetarian' section of the freezer. As a vegetarian, I don't want my food to smell, look or taste like meat, but obviously not everyone shares my view, as the following packs show. I've always found the 'mock' foods fascinating but I thought this took it to another level. I couldn't resist whipping out my iphone "dum-de-dum... I'm just checking my phone, click click click" to show you:









and my personal favourite - vegetarian snails!



Anyway... the sushi making was lots of fun. It was also very, very messy - imagine extremely sticky rice, small pieces of vegetables, bowls of water (for wetting the seaweed sheets) and extremely excited 5 and 2 year olds! The Mr, who is known here for his love and tending of clean floors (an interesting pursuit with 3 kids under 6 - hmm!), would have had heart failure if he'd seen it! But go girls! You did a great job x