Voila! Some photos from an amazing sushi night this past July, as Dan and I were traveling through British Columbia. Kelowna, B.C. was our first stop, where we stayed for five days lakeside at our friend's wonderful apartment. Although we wined and dined downtown at Kelowna's finest (The Rotten Grape had a fabulous gluten-free pizza crust), I asked if at some point during the visit we could make sushi and we did, as a celebration of sorts, on our final night.

Gluten-free tempura - sea scallops,
sweet potato and asperagus

Balsamic Shitake Mushrooms

Sashimi from The Codfather 

The fresh pacific salmon found out in BC is a darker colour, richer and tastier. We bought our salmon and tuna sushi grade at The Codfather, the best fresh fish store in the city according to our hosts. During my last trip out west, a road trip up the coast of California, I toured, wined and dined at Francis Ford Coppola's vineyards. A pattern seems to be emerging here.

Although I'm primarily a red wine drinker, usually ignoring proper pairings, we had a couple of bottles of The Summerhill Vineyard's Ehrenfelser, with notes of honeysuckle, orange blossom, cantelope and peach.

We bought rice flour from the local grocery story and were able to whip up gluten-free tempura. Tempura is one of the main reasons why I now enjoy making sushi at home with friends instead of eating out. When those crunchy shrimp arrive at a restaurant, sizzling straight from the deep fryer and enveloped in glutenous batter, well, it's a little hard to handle. So we do it - fait maison.

Here's the recipe for gluten-free tempura. Don't be fooled - a deep fryer is unnecessary!

1/2 cup rice flour
1/2 cup corn starch
1 teaspoon of baking soda and baking powder

The final product, with Okanagan wine

pinch of salt
1 egg
2/3 cup of ice water (the water must be ice cold - it functions as the binding agent in both gluten-free and glutenous tempura recipes)
Vegetable oil - enough for two inches at the bottom of the pan

You also need patience. Deep frying without a deep fryer can yield delicious treats, but be careful.

Mix all dry ingredients together in a bowl suitable for dipping your vegetables or seafood in. Add the egg and ice water. Heat your oil in a wok or deep frying pan until the oil is hot but not spurting all over the place! Using tongs, dip each piece of veg or seafood in the batter, coating generously, and fry on each side for about 1 minute.

I like to keep all my tempura hot on a low temperature in the oven until all the sushi has been made. This works well when you have guests over for dinner so you don't have to be standing at the stove all night long.

*The shitake mushrooms featured in this blog entry are also fantastic, but I have to make them again (this weekend) before I post the recipe! They were AMAZING in sushi rolls.... TBA....