Sushi is one of the most popular dishes in the world, and for a good reason: it’s delicious and versatile, but take-out sushi is not keto-friendly. But you can make delicious, low-carb, and healthy keto sushi rolls with the right ingredients.
Carbs In Sushi
The exact amount of carbs in sushi depends on your choice of ingredients and how you prepare it–but for the sake of argument, let’s say you have a small piece (4 oz.) of California roll with avocado and cucumber topped with sesame seeds. That would add up to about 12g net carbs from the rice alone (not including soy sauce).
Yes, we have an excellent keto sushi recipe that uses cauliflower rice instead of regular rice grain. Alternatively, you may opt for sashimi or nigiri.
Takeout sushi rolls are not keto-friendly because they’re made with rice. You can make a keto-friendly sushi roll by replacing the rice with cauliflower, avocado, and other low-carb vegetables.
Find our keto sushi rolls recipe here.
What are the healthiest toppings to use when making keto sushi?
The toppings that you use can make or break your sushi. If you don’t have any experience making Japanese food, it’s best to stick with simple toppings that are easy to find at any grocery store. These include tuna, salmon, avocado, chicken, cucumber, and cauliflower rice (just finely chopped cauliflower).
Shirataki noodles like the one we use in our keto chicken noodle soup are also a good option if you want something different than meat or fish. They’re made from konjac flour and look like glass noodles when cooked.
Certain types of sushi rolls can be made keto-friendly.
- Cucumber, avocado, and salmon: This is a simple sushi roll you can make at home or order at a restaurant. It’s very low in carbs and calories, but it has plenty of fats from the avocado and salmon.
- Cucumber, avocado, and tuna: Another simple sushi roll you can easily make at home or order at a restaurant. It has similar nutritional stats to the previous one; however, there’s less fat from the tuna than salmon because it’s leaner meat (and also less protein).
- Cucumber, avocado, and shrimp: Shrimp has almost no carbs or sugars, so this roll will be very low in carbs when compared to other types of sushi rolls like those with imitation crabmeat, which contains both carbs/sugars as well as actual seafood products such as fish eggs (roe), shellfish meat, etc…
Conclusion
We hope we’ve given you a better understanding of making keto sushi. It can be tricky, but there are some great options if you know where to look. The most important thing is to remember that the key is replacing rice with cauliflower rice and leaving marinated meats and imitation meats out of your keto sushi rolls.
