Photo by Hep Svadja
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I first saw laser-cut sushi while reading Designboom and it really stuck in my mind. So beautiful!
So I figured out how to re-create the process. Since the laser cutter does all the work, I mostly just had to think about what design I’d like to generate in Adobe Illustrator. It did take a few tries to get the pattern centered properly, and to get the laser cutting right without burning the seaweed.
1. Creating Your Design
Your pattern could be anything, but it should be sized to fit your nori, and designed with repetition in mind, so you can copy/paste in your drawing program. I took inspiration from simple geometry and the Japanese sakura (cherry blossom) design.
I didn’t need to cut my nori sheets to size, before or after the process, but I left about a ¼” margin so I could hold the nori down with some weights during cutting.
2. Laser-Cutting Seaweed
Photo by Anthony Lam
Set your laser cutter’s power to a low setting. The cutter I used has settings from –100% to 100% power, so to be safe I set it at –50% to avoid any potential fires or charring of the nori.
I set the speed at “standard,” because if it were too slow it would possibly start burning. Test your laser cutter to find the right mix of speed and power.
TIP: Experiment with layering a sheet of paper above or below your nori to mitigate the laser’s powerful touch.
3. Rolling Sushi
Experiment with different margins and patterns. Mine are decorative but not very strong; they’re suitable for maki rolls or inside-out rolls. But a pattern that leaves more of the nori intact could be strong enough to wrap and hold hand rolls. Happy rolling!
Cool idea! Do you think there might be problems eating nori off of a laser cutter that has been cutting plastics and metals?
I was wondering the same thing. Would definitely help to layer the nori between sheets of paper.
The laser would cut the paper into confetti – and the aggressive ventilation systems would likely ingest the resulting pieces into the fans. It might be hard to peel off the very thin/fragile paper afterwards.
When Anthony built this, he layered it with at least one sheet of paper. I’m not sure about any confetti details, but I do know that he got some dang pretty nori.
I’d be most concerned at the “interesting” chemical residues left on the food…this is not an “obviously safe” thing to do.
I have a couple of large laser cutters – and early on, I tried laser-etching sugar cookies and laser cutting/etching Hershey bars – but in every case I tried, the taste was so severely impaired, that the results were inedible. Lasered sugar cookies looked great – but tasted like burned toast. The chocolate had a similar burned flavor – but, in addition, simply melted and re-formed rather than cutting cleanly as I’d hoped.
I guess seaweed already has a fairly strong/bitter flavor – so maybe the flavor change isn’t so noticeable – but lasering food (in general) seems to be a bad idea.
An additional problem is that lasering many materials can produce toxic fumes, carcinogens or even acids that eat away at the machinery…so experimentation has to be done with extreme caution!
To pick a couple of examples, you can cut and etch genuine leather (although it stinks afterwards) – but if you try to do the same thing with fake leather, the result is an extremely nasty mix of chlorine gas and concentrated hydrochloric acid vapor – which will destroy the laser cutter – and possibly your eyes and lungs.
Similarly, you can happily laser-cut Acrylic, Kapton and Delrin plastics – but ABS produces cyanide gas, HDPE and polycarbonate both melt and catch fire, fibreglass produces toxic fumes…unless you understand the chemistry, experimentation is dangerous.
So beware – this is not an “obviously” good/safe thing to do.
For sure– anything lasered will taste *terrible*. Trust me– I’ve tried lots of things :) The temperature is so high, the vaporized residue is nothing like what you’d get cooking with fire. Pretty, though!