Onigiri

Onigiri are rice balls they are a common packed food option in Japan and depending upon a lot of factors can serve for any meal. Like sushi they are hand packed rice that are wonderful plain but can be dressed up with nori (the sheets of toasted seaweed that wraps sushi) or sesame seeds.

They can also be filled with all sorts of yummy additions. A traditional filling is pickled plums called umeboshi. But just about anything works. Mini meatballs, well drained western style pickles, canned tuna fish with a little mayo to bond and salt to flavor.

The onigiri I made today were filled with chicken teriyaki, crab with a little mayo for bonding and a little Old Bay and rosemary for flavor, omelet with sauteed onions, and azuki which is a sweet red been paste and used most frequently in Japanese deserts.


1) Prepare sushi rice, any short grain rice CAN be used but sushi rice is your best bet. You will want to wash the rice until the water runs clear and follow cooking instruction on package. A rice cooker makes this flawless.

2) Heat some rice vinegar and dissolve sugar into it, add a very little bit of soy sauce. The proportions to this is basically done to taste, this is then pored over and gently mixed into the hot rice. Start by adding very little at a time. This is just to add some flavor too much can water down the needed stickiness of the rice.

3) In a bowl mix cold water and rice vinegar use this to keep your hand wet while handling the rice or else it will stick to you and not itself.

4) take a small mound of rice and shape it into whatever shape you like a ball as is implied by the name is the simplest to do.

You can find a good alternative to this method at www.justhungry.com They recommend using salt and water rather than vinegar and water. This is an common alternative but one that I don't particularly like.

This is a traditional plain onigiri shaped into a triangle, with nori wrapped around the bottom. This one is the simplest to do as there is not need to worry about the filling causing the rice to break apart, but the flavor of the rice is the only thing here so this is where the vinegar, sugar, and soy sauce mix really shines the most.

This one I filled with the azuki and was probably my favorite. I love azuki and make my own from kidney beans. As this was the first of the filled that I tried today I simply made it round as it was easy to manage while I got the feel for the rice. The nori is shaped like flowers, as nori comes in stiff sheets like paper and so can be cut with scrap booking paper punches to dress up the onigiri.

This is made with the omelet. The omelet is made very thick by western standards then cut into cubes or rectangular prisms. I wanted the omelet to be visible from the out side so it was shaped in a flattish circle rather a full sphere. This technique is really lovely when the filling has a bright color as well a red or green really pops against the rice.

These were filled with a crab mix, this was a big deviation from the japanese flavores but appeals to the Maryland palet. The really nice thing about the crab I used also is that it was a white and sitcky filling so I could over fill and risk having the filling mix with the rice with out it showing through the rice or causeing the onigiri to crumble. The nori is cut with a scrap booking paper punch just as the flowers for the azuki onigiri were.


The chicken teriyaki onigiri showed its filling the way the omlete did however it was shaped into a triangle. It also has sesame seeds. I would have much prefered black sesame seeds for the visial contrast. If I had more time or forethought I would have toasted the sesame seeds in a dry frying pan, this would serve to both bring out the flavor as well as to darken there color.

I really hope you decide to give this a try it is a great picnic food and really very tasty.

Thanks for visiting!