Vegan mofo chopped challenge 2014 part 1 sweet heat sushi

The final product

I have been battling a nasty cold for the past week (I actually think I may have bronchitis and am making a doctors appt first thing in the morning), and will take any help kicking it's ass that I can get. So when I was up having a crazy coughing fit, unable to sleep in the middle of the night, I decided to go for the chopped challenge after all. I julienned 4 radishes, and chopped up 2 plums. Threw about 1/8 of a cup of coconut vinegar in a pan, 1/4 cup of water and let it boil in a sauce pan for around 20 minutes. You'll know it's done when the radishes are sweet, tangy, still crisp, and a lovely red violet to fuchsia tone. They resemble pickled beets really. After they're done, strain them over a bread pan into cheese cloth, reserving the plums (in retrospect, I should have just put the plums in the cheesecloth to save a few steps while pickling). Put the radishes in the fridge for about a half hour to cool and slice 1/3 of a block of extra firm tofu. Put the tofu in the bread pan, sprinkle with 10-12 slices of pickled jalapeños (mine were grown by lil man last year, and pickled by me, and they are HOT! I think pickling them with a couple of ghost peppers definitely upped the heat a little bit)  and broil for 20 minutes, then flip and broil for another 15-20, or until most of the sauce is absorbed (the tofu should be mostly purple by that point.) meanwhile, make 2 cups worth of oolong tea at double strength (approx 4 bags for the 2 cups water), after the tea has steeped, take out 1.5 cups and add to 1 cup of jade pearl rice. See below pic for reference, I found it at whole foods. 

It only takes about 20 minutes for the rice to cook ( I followed pkg instructions substituting the tea for the water). Once cooked, transfer to non metallic bowl, and start fan cooling, add a few splashes rice vinegar, and about a tsp sugar, and stir/fan like crazy. When it was cooled, and the tofu was done, I julienned about 1/3 of an average carrot, and opened up the soy wrappers.

I found them in an Asian marketplace, but I've seen others post on Instagram that they have seen them at whole foods. I opted for the turmeric yellow wrapper, to add a little more color to my roll. I layer it out on a piece of parchment and covered about 2/3 of it with the sushi rice. I had enough rice left over to do a second roll. 

After the rice was in place, I put a row of the plum and coconut vinegar pickled radishes, followed by a row of the carrots, strips of the tofu, and strips of the jalapeños salvaged from the tofu broil., then I rolled it up.

Then I sliced it up, and ate it up :) The good thing about being sick, is that you don't have to share the food when you cook ;)