Now I'm not sure where to post this because I mentioned it in a couple of places. I used to have a brain, where did I leave it?
My neighbors' sushi party was a huge hit. We co-hosted it. Hubby and I spent the day making nege maki (something for the true midwesterners who might not even try sushi), rice, and doing the cutting prep work for the sushis that interested us. Then we went over, bamboo mat and rice in hand, and C (husband), hubby, and I made sushi while D (wife) made soup and finished up getting her house in order, for an hour before the first guests were to arrive. I was very, very pleased, and I hope C&D were (they're very inexperienced party-throwers, very nervous about it, so doing it as a sushi party was a huge move ... I wouldn't have the courage to throw a sushi party in Galena, and I love throwing parties!). I thought we made about 3X the amount of sushi we needed, but over half of it was eaten, whoa!!! All of the sides went over well. And Sake was a huge hit!! It was a sort of block party, and one neighbor is a locally-famous cheesecake baker. So you know desert was a hit. But I simply was amazed at how much people enjoyed the sushi. We did no raw fish (small midwestern town ... can't get it fresh enough), and I made sure that half the sushi would be pure vegetarian (cuke, avocado, asparagus, etc). I think hubby's "formed" (I don't know the right word, the kind where you sort of make a cake of rice, then place something on top of it) sushi with shrimp was a huge hit (nothing unfamiliar!!!), but the rolled sushi went well. The Chicagoan part of the party (about 1/3 of Galena is "sophisticated" people from Chicago) were thrilled, which really made us feel good.
OK, now the downside, which isn't much.
#1 The nori seemed tough
#2 The rolls were too big (too much rice)
Hubby thinks the #1 problem was because we made the sushi up in advance and refrigerated it (in advance is an hour at the most). I have a hard time buying this simply because in Hawaii and many other places I've been to sushi buffets where the sushi was not made right in front of me, and I don't remember the nori being tough. We looked at four different books and didn't find anything we'd missed. #2 I think is just experience.
Gone on too long already. Let me know if you come up with anything, because this is a repeater sometime in the future.