Sushi Bake (Broiled Pan Sushi)

Sushi bake is an Asian fusion dish with origins in Hawai’i. Layer sushi rice, furikake, imitation crab or fish, and mayonnaise in a casserole dish. Bake until golden brown and serve with sheets of nori. It’s like a potluck version of a California roll. Edit: This post has been updated in 2023 in order to include more accurate information about the invention of sushi bake than what has been spread on Tiktok.

What is Sushi Bake?

Sushi bake, also called Pan Sushi or Broiled Sushi, is essentially a sushi casserole. In a large baking dish, you layer sushi rice, furikake, some sort of flaked fish or imitation crab. Then you top with a sauce, mine is Kewpie mayonnaise and sour cream, and broil until golden on top. To serve, you can cut it into squares or just scoop with a spoon and use it as a filling with sheets of roasted seaweed, similar to temaki sushi.

Who Invented Sushi Bake and When?

If you Google “Who invented sushi bake?” most of the top answers will say it was invented by someone named Mimi Reyes in the Philippines in 2015, but this is absolutely false. Japanese Americans and other locals in Hawai’i have been making sushi bake for decades. I have two recipes for sushi bake in my old Japanese church cookbook which dates from 2009, and those who submitted the recipes were grandparents who certainly were making sushi bake long before then. I can remember eating sushi bake at potlucks when I was younger, and I’m 33 years old at the time of writing this post!

While I cannot find any definitive answer for who created sushi bake and where it came from, my guess is that it most likely came as a result of Japanese immigration to Hawaii, which is no surprise. So many of the Asian fusion dishes that I grew up eating in the Japanese American community seem to originate with the Asian immigrants who first came to Hawaii. Hawaii Magazine has a really great article about the immigration of various Asian ethnic groups to Hawaii, and the impact they’ve had on the evolution of Hawaiian culture.

Sushi Bake Variations

Ever since sushi bake went viral on Tiktok, there have been tons of recipe variations popping up on the internet.

Which is great!

If you’re looking for variations from BEFORE Tiktok, here is what my family has typically done. All the recipes in my old cookbook start with a bed of rice and a layer of furikake. Some include produce, like avocado and takuan, that you would find in a California roll. One has the protein and spread on top of the rice; another has the protein sandwiched in between two layers of rice and wrapped in seaweed, like a spam musubi.

My recipe uses flaky imitation crab as the filling, and a mixture of sour cream and mayonnaise for the spread, similar to a California roll. However, you can easily customize the filling to your taste! You can use smoked salmon, canned salmon, canned tuna, spam, ham, Portuguese sausage, baked tofu… The list is endless.

For the spread, the mix of sour cream and mayo is pretty standard, but you can use all mayo or all sour cream if you want. This recipe puts the spread on the very top layer so that when you broil it, it gets nice and toasty on the top.

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♬ Sushi – Osaka

And then for veggies, I served avocado, takuan (that’s pickled daikon), and cucumber on the side. You could also use thinly sliced scrambled eggs or pickled ginger. Pretty much anything else you like in your sushi is fair game.

How to Serve and Eat Sushi Bake

Along with the veggies, I serve the sushi bake with small sheets of nori (seaweed). You can either use the sheet nori that you would use to make sushi rolls or musubi and cut it into quarters. OR you can use the Korean style roasted seaweed squares. I actually prefer the latter, as it has a yummy sesame flavor, but I happened to have some extra nori sheets that I needed to use up when I photographed this recipe.

To eat, plop a spoonful of the sushi bake onto the seaweed and add any of the sliced veggies you want. Technically when you make a hand rolled sushi, the Japanese style is to roll it into a cone shape. But often I just fold it like a taco and stuff it in my mouth.

My two year old daughter, who goes to Japanese school, saw me do this and she yelled at me for not rolling the sushi into the correct shape. Oops. Beware of the sushi police.

By the way, I scaled my recipe down to fit in an 8×8″ baking dish. This is the perfect size to feed my immediate family. Double the recipe to fit in a 9×13″ casserole dish, and you’re all set for a potluck.

More Japanese Hawaiian Recipes

Looking for more of these fusion Asian recipes? Check these out:

• Easy Homemade Mochi (Chi Chi Dango)
• Somen Salad
• Furikake Chex Mix
• Japanese Macaroni Salad

If you liked this post, you may like to check out these recipes:

• Portuguese Sausage Musubi
• Instant Pot Zippy’s Chili
• Japanese Fried Beef Wontons