Take All The Makings Of A California Roll To Make A Filling And Refreshing Salad

California roll may have murky origins, but it remains one of the most popular types of sushi in America. Stuffed with real or imitation crab meat, creamy avocado, and crunchy cucumbers, this particular roll offered Americans unfamiliar with Japanese cuisine an accessible way to try new flavors, and Americans have been in love with it ever since. Not only do the ingredients offer the perfect balance of bold and nuanced flavor, this is also an excellent choice for those who feel some kind of way about consuming raw fish, despite the fact that properly prepared sashimi is very safe to eat.

If you frequently crave these flavors but haven't mastered how to roll sushi like a pro and can't justify the cost of a weekly trip to your favorite Japanese restaurant, there's another way to enjoy the sweet, meaty crunch of crab and cucumber together — the California roll salad. The concept is a fairly simple one: Rather than rolling up all the usual California sushi ingredients in a neat tube of white rice and toasted nori, you toss them together in a bowl, garnished with all the typical sushi accompaniments.

The idea is to create a sushi-inspired grain bowl with stovetop steamed white rice as the base, topped with hearty slices of real or imitation crab meat, chopped cucumbers, diced avocado, and crumbled strips of nori paper. This is the simplest version of the dish, which you can then drizzle with soy sauce and a light squeeze of wasabi paste.

While the basic components of a California roll are pretty tasty on their own, assembling this recipe as a salad also allows you to pack in the flavor and add additional ingredients to create a truly refreshing and filling summer repast or light weekend lunch. For instance, you can skip the nori paper altogether and build your dish on top of some wakame salad — a Japanese seaweed dish dressed with soy sauce, mirin, sesame oil, and garnished with sesame seeds. It's available at most lunch counters that sell sushi, and it's much cheaper than a typical roll.

It's also perfectly acceptable to build your salad on a bed of tender butter lettuce, peppery arugula, juicy baby spinach, or even classic shredded iceberg. You'll definitely want to add dried nori, however, as that sharp brine is essential to the overall flavor. It's also okay to add additional veggies, especially crunchy ones like shredded carrots, scallions, or bell peppers. Fresh edamame is also a good add, as it's full of protein and complements crab very well.

Last, but not least, we need to discuss dressing. It's cool if you want to douse your dish in low sodium soy sauce, but creating a more nuanced dressing takes just a few minutes and offers a way to squeeze in those last few classic sushi flavors. Think kewpie mayo whisked together with soy sauce, a touch of wasabi paste, pureed ginger, and a little furikake along with sesame oil.