Easy Sushi Bake

This super easy sushi bake recipe is a creamy, crunchy, melty, and steamy way to enjoy sushi any night of the week. It’s like a California sushi roll, but baked in a casserole.

To make the dish, just layer some warm sushi rice as the base of your casserole.  Top it with some furikake, imitation crab, Kewpie mayo, cream cheese, and sriracha.  Throw it in the oven for just 10-15 minutes and then serve it with some cool, crunchy vegetables and umami-packed seaweed.

What Is Sushi Bake?

Sushi bake takes everything you love about a California roll, deconstructs it, and puts it into a warm and melty casserole.  It’s the easy and lazy way to make sushi on a Wednesday night.

The dish is not traditional by any means.  But it tastes good.  And that’s what matters.

Sushi bake comes from the Philippines, when recipes started to pop up online back in 2015.  The dish started trending during the pandemic, after a Filipino celebrity nail artist reportedly sent some sushi bake casseroles to local celebrities.

Fast forward to today, and just check out Tiktok to see the craze.

What Makes It Special?

1. It’s easy to make. Most people don’t make sushi at home since it’s time-consuming.  Sushi bake makes sushi easy.  There’s no bamboo mat to be found and no tedious rolling involved.  And the ingredients are super forgiving.  Feel free to switch it up.  Tuna instead of crab?  Three times more mayo?  Go for it 🙂 

2. It’s fun. Serve sushi bake at your next party and just see the reaction.  People will talk.  People will love it.

3. It’s nostalgic and modern at the same time. Casseroles are vintage Americana and always seem to remind me of childhood.  But this one has sushi.  So yeah.  2020s all the way.

How to make Sushi Bake

1. Make the rice.  Prepare sushi rice according to the rice’s instructions.  After the rice is finished (and while it’s still warm) add on a mixture of rice vinegar and sugar.  Mix the rice to evenly distribute the vinegar mixture.  Be super gentle with your rice to ensure that you’re not mashing it up, and use a rice paddle for the mixing process if you have one. 
2. Spread in a casserole.  Add your cooked rice to the bottom of a casserole dish.  Spread it around in an even layer.
3. Mix crab with other ingredients.  Shred and chop your imitation crab into bite sized pieces.  Mix the crab with room temperature cream cheese, Kewpie mayo, and a bit of sriracha.
4. Top your casserole.  Add half the furikake on top of the rice.  Then add all of the crab mixture in an even layer.  And finally top the crab mixture with the other half of your furikake.
5. Bake.  Bake in a 450° oven for 10-15 minutes.
6. Eat.  Serve alongside seaweed snacks, cucumber, avocado, and more sriracha.  Just scoop a bit of the casserole on top of a seaweed snack, top with slices of cucumber and avocado, add a bit of sriracha, and pop it in your mouth.

Three tips for making great sushi bake

1. Rinse your rice before cooking.  Rinsing your rice before cooking removes the starch, resulting in more toothsome rice grains that don’t stick together.  This step takes just a bit more time, and I promise that it’s a key to making great, restaurant-style sushi rice.
2. Kewpie mayo is key.  Kewpie mayo is highly, highly recommended.  If you can’t find it, I have an easy, two-minute substitute recipe provided later in this post.
3. Eat your sushi bake right away.  Embrace warm sushi and enjoy your creation right after it’s done baking.  If you allow the casserole to sit for too long, you’ll lose that melty goodness.  If It’s starting to get cold while you’re eating, just pop it in the oven again for a few minutes.

Ingredients

Sushi rice.  You can’t have sushi bake without rice.  Eats All Day recommends Nishiki Premium Medium Grain Rice as the de facto classic.  But any sushi rice will do.

Furikake.  Furikake is typically a mixture of sesame seeds, seaweed, herbs, fish flakes, and salt.  It’s hugely popular in Japan, and has started to make its way to the United States. You’ll likely be able to find it in the Asian section of your local grocery store.  Even Trader Joe’s carries it, so you know it must be good.

Kewpie mayo.  The iconic Japanese mayonnaise brand that adds depths of richness, tanginess, sweetness, and umami to any dish.  Kewpie is different from North American mayonnaise in a few ways.  First, it uses only egg yolks (rather than whole eggs), adding fat and richness.  Second, it uses rice vinegar in addition to other types of vinegars, giving it that trademark zing.  And finally, it uses MSG, providing that unmistakable umami flavor.

Imitation crab.  You know what?  I’m not afraid to admit that I LOVE imitation crab.  I don’t care that it’s not really crab and I don’t care that it’s imitation.  It’s actually made from real fish, so it counts as a seafood.  It has a fresh, slightly “seafoody” taste that works so well against creamy flavors like mayo, cream cheese, and other dairy products.  You can also just eat it plain as a snack. 

Cream cheese.  Cream cheese is an essential part of this recipe.  It adds an absolutely necessary creaminess to the dish that melts down into the rice, creating a truly melty situation.  You may find some recipes for sushi bake that don’t call for cream cheese.  But trust me, it absolutely improves the taste and texture.  

Seaweed snacks.  Yep.  Another thing you can find at Trader Joe’s.  You can substitute the larger nori wraps by cutting them into smaller rectangles, but I recommend the seaweed snacks here as they’re a bit crispier than nori.

What kind of rice do I need?

Eats All Day recommends Nishiki Premium Medium Grain Rice as the standard for all our Japanese recipes.  This rice is so good that I use it for most other types of East Asian recipes like Chinese, Korean, and so on.

However, any kind of sushi rice will do for this recipe.  Make sure your rice is labeled “sushi rice”, “medium grain”, or “short grain” and you’re good to go.  

Do look for Asian brands and avoid rice styles from the Americas, Europe and so on.

Should I rinse my rice?

The short answer is… YES!

Rinsing rice is such a simple and quick step that you can take to create restaurant-style sushi rice.

The rinsing process removes excess starch from the rice grains, which prevents your cooked rice from sticking together and becoming a mushy mess.  Rinsed rice is more toothsome and the individual grains will maintain their consistency.

To rinse rice, put it in a bowl, add cold water, stir it around, and drain the water.  Do this a few times until the water runs clear.  Clear water = no starch.  No starch = quality rice.  

Do I need Kewpie mayo?

You don’t need Kewpie, but it definitely adds more tang and umami to the recipe. 

I’d highly recommend getting some Kewpie and trying some other recipes with it like this Japanese Potato Salad or these Japanese inspired brussel sprouts.

If you can’t find Kewpie and want to get real fancy, you can make a substitute.  Here’s a quick recipe:

• ½ cup North American mayo
• 1 tbsp rice vinegar
• 1 tsp sugar

Mix all ingredients in a bowl until well-combined and smooth.

And if you don’t want to make this substitute, feel free to just use any other mayonnaise.  Don’t let it hold you back from making this recipe and enjoying the glory of sushi bake.

How to serve sushi bake

Serve your casserole alongside seaweed snacks, cucumber, avocado and more sriracha.

Think of them as mini-tacos that you can put together right at the table.  Just scoop some sushi bake from the casserole dish, dollop it on your seaweed snack, and top it with fresh vegetables and some more sriracha.

You can get creative with your toppings if you’d like.  Scallions, eel sauce, sesame seeds, and even bacon all come to mind.

Sushi bake variations

Sushi bake can be endlessly customized.

Spicy salmon 

Substitute imitation crab with diced salmon.  Bake the casserole for about 15 minutes to ensure that the salmon gets cooked through.

Crab, bacon and honey

Add some cooked and crisped bacon with the imitation crab mixture.  And then add a bit of honey for contrasting sweetness.  Up the sriracha.  I think bacon + imitation crab is an epic combination, on par with peanut butter and jelly.

Tuna melt (with cheese)

Believe it or not, sushi rolls with cooked, canned tuna are quite popular in Japan.  You can find this quick snack at almost any konbini (Japanese-style convenience stores such as 7-11).  Lean into this classic and substitute canned tuna for the imitation crab. Top it with shredded mozzarella cheese to add some tuna melt vibes.

What to serve with sushi bake

• A vegetable, such as these sweet and salty Kyoto Style Sweet Potatoes or this classic Japanese Potato Salad.
• Japanese Pickled Celery. A simple, 10-minute pickle adds needed acidity to your meal.