Harumaki – It doesn’t need to be spring to eat them
In all of my previous posts, I shared my experiences, both good and bad on cooking dishes that I had made several times. But now, I’m on dishes that I’m making for the first time. This means, I’ll need advice from my readers because I will be making LOTS of mistakes.
This week, I attempted to make harumaki. I wouldn’t say it was a complete disaster. It was edible. I want to make them again, but I would like some advice first.
Let’s talk about what harukami is before getting into the details of my first attempt. Harumaki are spring rolls. Haru means spring and maki means roll. Like many other dishes in Japan, spring rolls originated from China, but has evolved to fit the Japanese palate. Spring rolls are consumed in many Asian countries and is pretty popular here in the US.
So, what went wrong with my first attempt? At first I thought I was doing okay. The recipe called for pork, bean 
sprouts, carrots, bamboo shoots, and green onions. I wanted to make a veggie version, so I purposely left out the pork. However, my intention was to include everything else. As usual, I forgot something – bamboo shoots. It wasn’t until I finished cooking the vegetables that I realized I had forgotten them. Oops!
Next – wrapping the filling. I successfully wrapped them, not ripping a single wrapper, so I thought I was back on track and doing well. But then I started to cook them. Here’s where it went downhill. The directions stated high heat, but I went with medium heat. Even at medium heat, it basically burned them. What’s the deal – were the directions wrong? Should I have gone with low heat? Then there was the seriously hot oil that was splattering everywhere. Specks of oil kept landing on my hands and damn was it hot! I thought at some point the spring rolls were going to burst! Is that due to the heat too?
The last flop – although the spring rolls appeared crispy they were actually a bit soggy in the middle. Should I have cooled the filling before wrapping them? Does it make a difference? Or is there something else I’m missing?
Overall, it wasn’t a disastrous attempt. Both my husband and son ate them and said that they were pretty good (maybe they were being nice). Any advice would be helpful? Any readers out there?
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