Roasted Seaweed Snacks

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For years we have been buying roasted seaweed snacks, but then I learned you can make your own at home!  I love seaweed and so do my kids, and this is a really healthy snack.  If you have ever eaten plain seaweed sheets – the kind you would use to roll sushi with – you know it is thick, tough, and gets chewy when it gets wet.  Roasted seaweed is crispy and salty.. as you can see from my photos below, it makes a big flaky mess once it is roasted!

To start, you need plain seaweed sheets.

As you can see, I have quite a collection of seaweed (full size sheets) that I have accumulated from making homemade sushi.  I buy these at the grocery store, Asian grocery stores, and Amazon.com.  You can find a variety as far as how many sheets come in a pack, and some are marked organic.

All the ones I buy have perforations for making sushi (that is fine).

I usually make a big batch at a time – around 20 sheets – but you can make as much or as little as you like!  Each sheet will be cut into about 6 pieces.

Start by brushing the shiny side of the seaweed sheet with some oil.

(*Note – I actually tried roasting seaweed sheets by heating and spreading oil in a pan with a spatula, and it worked fine and tasted amazing, but I would say it came out much greasier than this method of brushing the oil on).

I use a pastry brush so that I can get good, even coverage, but I have also seen it done by hand while wearing plastic gloves.  The first time I did this, I was very conservative with the oil, but I felt like I didn’t have to work so hard to use so little oil for later batches).

After brushing your sheet of seaweed with oil, sprinkle with some sea salt and add to your stack.

Heat your stove or skillet to a medium temp.  Put your seaweed in the pan with the shiny side UP.  Then place a sheet on top of it with the shiny side DOWN, and flip after about 30 seconds.  Repeat until your stack is done (roasting the rough sides as you flip them over).

Here, there are two sheets in the pan, facing each other with the shiny sides inward.

Roasting time can take a little learning and patience.  I still over roast some sheets (in my opinion), which look a little brighter green to a light brown color.  Although they taste a little too toasted to me, we still find them edible.  My kids said they didn’t mind eating these ones ones at all.

Once your seaweed sheets are roasted, stack them neatly and cut.  I cut them up the center (the long way), and then in thirds.  If you have ever bought roasted seaweed snacks at the store, this is the size I have always seen them.

My kids love these, so they tend to gobble up quite a few before we get around to storing some for later!  You can eat them plain or put a little bit of rice on each.  My 5 year old likes when I made homemade “sushi” with just rice and sushi, so she likes putting a little spoonful of white rice on each little roasted piece of seaweed as a snack.

I have heard that you can freeze these, but I pack some in bags and try to use within a week or so, and they seem to store fine.  I send these to school with the kids, and it makes a tasty, healthy snack.

Enjoy your roasted seaweed!