Snacking State-by-State Mashup 2: Denver Omelette Roll and Delmarva Roll

Sushi takes a while to make, so I don't plan to make much of it in the near future. So to use up the rest of that sushi rice I decided to make a few more maki rolls - one of the many California recipes I tried out - out of some ingredients from my Colorado, Connecticut and Delaware posts.

Both rolls require making some sushi rice, the procedure for which you can find in my post for Southern California. I had enough sushi rice left for a little more than two rolls.

The mash-up recipes: Denver Omelette Roll and Delmarva / Clambake Nation Roll


Serves 1 or 2

Ingredients (state flag indicates State-by-State post where ingredient was featured. Ingredients with no flag were not specifically used for any one post):

sushi rice

sushi nori

rice wine vinegar (worked fine for me, though technically you should use rice vinegar instead)

sesame seeds

a few strips red bell pepper

1 egg

a few strips ham steak

a few strips chicken breast

3 oysters

6 to 8 whole baby clams

a few slivers peach

a few pieces avocado

wasabi mayonnaise

tempura batter:

1 cup flour

1 cup ice water

1 egg


After preparing the sushi rice, place it on a slice of nori on your bamboo sushi mat - this time I just put the bamboo mat in a gallon-size ziploc bag instead of saran wrap. Sprinkle with sesame seeds, and carefully flip over the nori so it is facing up and the sushi is facing down.

Maki Roll #1: Denver Omelette Roll

Next come the roll making itself. For the first roll, I wanted to revisit that first Denver omelette I made. In a way, I deconstructed it, got rid of the cheese, and put it in a roll.


Into this roll go the following: about half of a small one-egg omelette, a few strips of ham steak, and a few strips of red bell pepper. Green bell pepper is more authentic, but I don't enjoy eating it, so it's out. A little avocado on top (maybe I should have put it on after rolling it up instead of before), and then a little wasabi mayonnaise complete this roll.

The Denver Omelette Roll

Maki Roll #2: Delmarva (or Clambake Nation) Roll

The second roll I made used ingredients from my Connecticut and Delaware posts - clams, oysters, chicken and peaches (all found in Delaware, and the clams and oysters also grow in Connecticut). Both states are in the RAFT Nations' "Clambake Nation", spanning coastal New England, New York City, New Jersey and much of the Delmarva Peninsula. A catchier name, however, may be the "Delmarva Roll", which is why I'm trending towards that one. Call it Fred for all I care though. The name's not that important.

For the Delmarva Roll, you'll need to make a tempura batter. This is fairly simple, so long as you use ice cold ice water. I just filled a bowl with water, stuck it in the freezer and occasionally broke the top if it froze over, until I needed it. Then mix it with a cup of flour and a beaten egg. Dip whatever you want to deep fry in the tempura batter. For example, for this roll I tempura-fried the clams and freshly shucked oysters. yes, the oysters met their end very quickly in the middle of fast-fried tempura batter. PETA will not like this recipe.

Tempura clams, tempura oysters, and tempura crunchies, better than what you get at Long John Silver.

Into this roll go the following: the tempura clams (I did eat a few on the side - you'll use about 5 or 6), the tempura oysters (I used 2 and ate the third. I couldn't help it), small slices of peaches (about four) and a few slivers of cooked chicken breast. Again, roll it up, and top with a few more thin slices of peach.

The Delmarva Roll, or Clambake Nation Roll

As with the California roll I made a while back, these rolls were quite filling - so much so, in fact, that I felt the need to bite into some of the roll slices, resulting in the rolls falling apart. I think the Denver Omelette roll turned out the better of the two. It really was like eating a little Denver omelette inside a thick layer of rice and some wasabi mayonnaise. The Delmarva roll turned out less successfully in my view. Strange as it seemed to me, the chicken, oyster and clam competed for attention instead of complementing, which strangely led to one big mish-mash blur of blended flavors. Perhaps the crispy tempura coating masked the flavor of the shellfish? It was not a bad roll. I just wish the various meats had not competed with each other so much. This was perhaps a more successful attempt at maki rolls than the last time. But it is a tedious process, and I think I will leave the sushi making to the sushi chefs.