These Cucumber Rolls are fresh, crunchy, and reliable for an straightforward kitchen-made sushi night. Made with seasoned rice, crisp veggies, and spicy mayo, they’re simple, satisfying, and entirely doable at home.

If veggie sushi is your thing, don’t miss my vegan sushi, avocado roll, and sweet potato roll!

Cucumber rolls drizzled with spicy mayo.

Reasons This method is a Worth making

If you love sushi but don’t want to deal with raw fish (or the price tag), these cucumber rolls are the reliable solution. They’re fresh, crunchy, and surprisingly straightforward to make at home — no sushi bar required. With short-pickled carrots, creamy avocado, and a drizzle of spicy mayo, this is the kind of recipe that feels impressive but is entirely doable, even if you’ve never rolled sushi before.

Raise your hand if you love sushi! I sure do and Worth keeping going out for sushi, but it can be crazy expensive. I feel like every time we go out for sushi, it’s a minimum of $60 for two people. I decided it was time to learn to make sushi at home and started with this vegan sushi roll. I was surprised by how straightforward it actually is to make from-scratch sushi and it turned out so flavor-packed!

Fresh & well-seasoned: Crisp cucumber, creamy avocado, and tangy pickled carrots make every bite pop.
Especially simple: Don’t be intimidated to make sushi at home! You simply need a mat, some rice, and a few fresh ingredients.
Entirely customizable: Add your regular veggies or swap in tofu for extra protein.
Fun to make: Rolling sushi at home is easier than you might think and a unique meal to prepare for your friends and family!

Bowl of rice near steps of avocado and carrots.

Ingredients you’ll need

Simply a few simple ingredients and you’re well on your way to a flavorful vegetarian roll! Here are some notes on the key ingredients. The full list and measurements can be found in the recipe card at the bottom.

Speedy pickled carrots. These are especially savory and straightforward to make with matchstick carrots, apple cider vinegar, sugar and salt.
Spicy mayo. Optional, but deeply good! This is a simple mix of mayo, sriracha, soy sauce and lime juice.
Sushi rice. You surely need to use short grain rice for this dish. I’ve experimented with long grain rice and it does NOT work out well.
Nori sheets. You can find these at most grocery stores and they’re relatively inexpensive! If all else fails, you can most certainly find them on amazon.
Filling. Pickled carrot, cucumber, and avocado is what I used for this cucumber roll. Feel free to use any regular ingredients, though. Radish, marinated tofu, and mango are all great options!

How to make a cucumber roll

Making a cucumber roll is truly straightforward! There are three components to this vegetarian roll: the rice, filling and spicy mayo dipping sauce. Here’s a short rundown of the process, but for full instructions, reference the recipe card at the bottom of the post. If you’d like to see a visual tutorial of the process, check out my video in my vegan sushi post.

Tips for making sushi at home

For the mat: Aside from the ingredients, set out a sushi mat. You can get one on Amazon for simply $4 (affiliate link) and I highly recommend it, if you plan to make sushi at home regularly. I’ve also seen them at Target and World Market. It’s possible to roll sushi WITHOUT the mat, but I’ve found that it’s much harder to get a tight sushi roll.

Slicing the ingredients: I recommend slicing the filling ingredients thinly, so that everything will fit nicely in the center of the cucumber roll.

Cover the mat: Before rolling the cucumber roll or any sushi roll, I like to cover my rolling mat in plastic wrap for easier cleanup.