Happy Belated Chinese New Year
So, we’d had a fun grown-up party way back in 2002 celebrating the Chinese New Year with good food, friends, games… it was so fun I decided then and there I’d make it a tradition. I think we did have one in 2004, before Burke was born, but it’s not really been as traditional as I’d hoped. At any rate, sometime around mid-February, we had an Asian Celebration of sorts as a family. We’d totally missed the holiday, but decided to celebrate with good food anyway. The menu included Chinese Stir Fry, Korean Kimchee, and Japanese sushi. Here are photos of the kids making candy sushi. I’ll make a second post with a recipe and photos of Conan and I making KimChee.
Our Inspiration: Veggi Sushi. I think Keane tried some pickled ginger, but that’s as far as that experimentation went.
Candy Sushi
Ingredients:
marshmallows, margarine, rice crispies
fruit snacks, gummy worms, swedish fish, pink mini marshmallows
fruit roll ups and/or fruit by the foot (green looks more realistic, but we like the taste of red)
So you make a batch of fairly gooey rice crispy treats and spread them in a well-greased pan.
Then add the candy. Since we made veggi sushi for Conan and I, the kids used VegiTales fruit snacks for the veggies, and pink mini marshmallows for the pickled ginger. Then you cut between the rows of candy, and roll them over so the candy is in the middle.
Unwrap and peel the fruit roll up, and stretch it around the crispy log. The ends will stick together.
Finally, slice them up and watch the kiddos actually enjoy sushi! 
You can also make the ngiri sushi using the same ingredients. Just cut the remaining rice crispy batch into squares, place a swedish fish on top, and wrap a piece of fruit by the foot or slices of fruit roll up around it.
And a picture of the baby girl for those who like that kinda thing.
Looks good! We were planning on trying the candy sushi sometime in the future, how did it turn out?
Really good! As long as you like rice crispy treats, fruit roll-ups, and fruit snacks… the funnest part to me was just making it. It definitely looks more identifiable as “sushi” if you use the green roll ups. The ngiri style ones ended up kind of crunchy because the website we used made a big fuss about needing to make them thicker than the California Roll style to make it more authentic so I left it in the pan too long while we made the rolls, then spread those out to about 1 1/2 inch thickness. Hope that makes sense. Anyway, I had to reheat them so they’d be gooey enough to spread by that point, which is what made them so crispy. Next time I think we’ll just spread them all out at once and call it good so they’ll still be nice and chewy.
The candy sushi is REALLY cute idea! And it sounds super yummy right now
I think I might have to pick up some rice crispies at the store later.
What a great idea. Looks like lots of fun. We’ll have to remember this for next year — or whenever Simon is old enough to get involved.
The veggie sushi look so good to me right now… So yummy!