My mom used to pack rice balls for me as an elementary school kid for lunch way before the sushi craze swept the nation and way before there were sightings of Alice Waters toting around onigiri. Having these balls of rice wrapped in "black stuff" was actually a source of shame and anxiety for me everyday in elementary school. When the 12 o'clock bell rang for lunch, most were ecstatic about busting into their PB&J sandwiches and partaking in Fruit-by-the-Foot trading sessions. I would dread the fact that when I unzipped my cloth lunch bag, I would get a waft of salt, rice and sea. Because I was already painfully shy to begin with, my lunch consisting of black balls and dried fish pushed me further into being a recluse.
"Ew! Why are you eating black stuff!" my classmates would shout. Confession: I threw away my onigiri sometimes just to avoid the humiliation. I am very sorry Mom.
Years following my elementary school experience, I didn't have a pleasant impression of onigiri - I had reached my quota early on.
It wasn't until I was in college when I visited Japan and its ubiquitous comibini, that I experienced a wonderful reunion with onigiri. Packaged to perfection, and prices at around ¥120, they were efficient and affordable.
Fast forward to the present.
Fall semester started yesterday for my husband, who is currently taking ESL classes. To save money I suggested I would pack a lunch for him. This was a bit monumental for me. I have never packed a lunch for someone other than myself and today I broke that barrier.
I decided to proudly make onigiri.
Ingredients (for about 8 onigiri)
2 cups fresh steamed rice
1 can tuna
3 tbsp Japanese mayonnaise
salt
Seaweed
1.
Make rice
2. Make filling. My filling was canned tuna and kewpie mayonnaise. For one can of tuna, I add about 3 tablespoons of mayonnaise.
3. Prepare a little bowl full of water and sprinkle in about a teaspoon of salt into it. This bowl of water will be used to wet your hands so rice doesn't stick all over them.
4. Once the rice is done steaming, stir it around so that it cools down so that you can handle it without burning the palms of your hands.
5. Rub plenty of salt on your hands. Grab a handful of rice.
6. Mold into a ball.
7. Press into the middle so that you create a little space that will allow you to insert the filling.
8. Put the filling into the hole.
9. Close up the hole the best you can. You might need to pile a little bit of extra rice over the hole to cover it completely.
10. Onigiri are usually molded into a triangle shape. Mold the onigiri into a triangle shape by place the ball in the palm of one hand, while using the other hand forming a "V" with your thumb and other fingers in an L shape.
11. Wrap the onigiri in saran wrap.
12. When eating, wrap the onigiri in some seaweed. You can wrap it up entirely or do what's shown in the picture at the bottom of the page.
My mom used to pack rice balls for me as an elementary school kid for lunch way before the sushi craze swept the nation and way before there were sightings of Alice Waters toting around onigiri. Having these balls of rice wrapped in "black stuff" was actually a source of shame and anxiety for me everyday in elementary school. When the 12 o'clock bell rang for lunch, most were ecstatic about busting into their PB&J sandwiches and partaking in Fruit-by-the-Foot trading sessions. I would dread the fact that when I unzipped my cloth lunch bag, I would get a waft of salt, rice and sea. Because I was already painfully shy to begin with, my lunch consisting of black balls and dried fish pushed me further into being a recluse.
"Ew! Why are you eating black stuff!" my classmates would shout. Confession: I threw away my onigiri sometimes just to avoid the humiliation. I am very sorry Mom.
Years following my elementary school experience, I didn't have a pleasant impression of onigiri - I had reached my quota early on.
It wasn't until I was in college when I visited Japan and its ubiquitous comibini, that I experienced a wonderful reunion with onigiri. Packaged to perfection, and prices at around ¥120, they were efficient and affordable.
Fast forward to the present.
Fall semester started yesterday for my husband, who is currently taking ESL classes. To save money I suggested I would pack a lunch for him. This was a bit monumental for me. I have never packed a lunch for someone other than myself and today I broke that barrier.
I decided to proudly make onigiri.
Ingredients (for about 8 onigiri)
2 cups fresh steamed rice
1 can tuna
3 tbsp Japanese mayonnaise
salt
Seaweed
1. Make rice
2. Make filling. My filling was canned tuna and kewpie mayonnaise. For one can of tuna, I add about 3 tablespoons of mayonnaise.
3. Prepare a little bowl full of water and sprinkle in about a teaspoon of salt into it. This bowl of water will be used to wet your hands so rice doesn't stick all over them.
4. Once the rice is done steaming, stir it around so that it cools down so that you can handle it without burning the palms of your hands.
5. Rub plenty of salt on your hands. Grab a handful of rice.
6. Mold into a ball.
7. Press into the middle so that you create a little space that will allow you to insert the filling.
8. Put the filling into the hole.
9. Close up the hole the best you can. You might need to pile a little bit of extra rice over the hole to cover it completely.
10. Onigiri are usually molded into a triangle shape. Mold the onigiri into a triangle shape by place the ball in the palm of one hand, while using the other hand forming a "V" with your thumb and other fingers in an L shape.
11. Wrap the onigiri in saran wrap.
12. When eating, wrap the onigiri in some seaweed. You can wrap it up entirely or do what's shown in the picture at the bottom of the page.
Comments (35)
Since I felt sort of guilty about throwing the onigiri away I kept them. They would come back home, smashed in my backpack and then I would just throw them under my bed. Child logic is so weird…
Couple weeks later, one of the Bop posters on the wall by my bed would fall off and I’d have to crawl under the bed to get it.
Little bits of paper, ponytail holders, hair… and rammed in the corner would be a pile of sweaty, moldy, saran-wrapped rice balls.
Remember?
Worm – Hahahaha, I totally remember. I can’t believe you or Mommy wouldn’t smell them. Did you end up throwing them away in the trashcan in your room?
Sakura – Dried shiso powder and umeboshi sounds SO good for an onigiri. I definitely want to steal that idea.
is there a variation of ingredients so you can also pack this for your mexican husband…a japanese burrito so to speak.
Thank you so much for making onigiri. I have a favor to ask you. Make onigiri with white rice instead of brown rice, please. When I was a child, my mom used to make onigiri with brown rice. It looked dirty, so I shamefully hid my onigiri. My friends’ onigiri looked totally shiny white. That’s so beautiful and yummy. Make my school days shiny.
Our poor moms… they tried! I used to throw my lunch out too! Except mine was more often cha-han (fried rice) or “chicken rice” (with ketchup) featuring all of the previous night’s leftovers, with a fried (semi-runny) egg on top. Sounds good now, but pb&j seemed so much better then. I, too, had a traumatic aversion to cha-han for years after!
And try trading dried-fish-and-almond snack packs for fruit roll-ups during snack time!!
Loved this post too— and all the comments with them. I heard moms with preschoolers in Japan these days get totally stressed out making their kids’ bentos ultra-cute and creative (otherwise the kids get teased by the others or even worse, other moms begin to talk about what a lazy ass mom you are!). And loner kids in college are eating bentos in the bathroom (stall) during lunch to avoid being seen eating alone! Bentos tell so many tales… and oh, it’s great that you’re making bentos for your hubby. I love biting into an onigiri made by someone I know— sooo good! I’m sure they’re the highlight of his school day :)
Man Washi, you’re pushin’ it. Yoko’s never gonna make you another onigiri again!
Pay- what were your lunches like? What would your mama pack for you?
Yoko, what are you gonna say about your husband’s request. Healthy rice doesn’t work for him!!
mei chen, I have an idea. I cook 1lb of ground beef, 1 chopped onion, add 1.5 jar of salsa, then add hoison sauce. Since hoison sauce has cinnamon, it adds sweetness and cinnamon flavor, and surprisingly VERY good. I usually serve them instead of regular chips and salsa. Put them in the center of onigiri. That’s so taco rice meets China.
I think this is the most comments one post got in the history of Umamimart! Congrats Yoko on such a simple yet brings back all our childhood memory, post.
Yoko- WELCOME TO INTERNET VALIDATION. Ha.
But god, it’s so depressing how we ALL threw our lunches away. Blame the 80s!
Mucho amor for our mamas, who took such good care of us. WE LOVE YOU.
Washi – Haiga mai is the only rice we have in this house. DEAL with it! Kayoko is right, you are definitely pushing it.
Mei – Thanks for your comment. I think this is probably one of the ONLY places, if not the only place you will actually get a bomb-ass answer for a Mexican variation on an onigiri. Genius – thanks Yamahomo! Mmm taco rice…
Emi – Your cha-han lunch does sound good. I remember my dad making fried rice with ketchup. That is very nostalgic. RE: competitive moms and bento in Japan – Yeah I noticed there were so many books at the bookstores in Japan that featured bentos with panda bear shaped nori and other uber-elaborate touches. The sausage octopus seemed passe in these books. That’s so sad about kids eating in bathroom stalls! I don’t know if I could ever bring myself to eat in a public bathroom, even in Japan where they are so clean.
Damn. I never threw riceballs away – they were too good. But, I grew up where there were a lot of J-A people, so maybe it was different.
All the anti-Japan racism did to me was make me politically anti-American. I was raised to love the country, flew the flag, and all that, but the racism just put a real anti-American streak in me. Some days, like when I saw the mobs protesting the “ground zero mosque”, it really came out again. F*CK Amerikkka. Destroy all nations. Seriously.
Other days, I feel pretty pro-America, even a little teary eyed at the idea of the democratic system, like I’m living in a Capra movie.
I feel really bad for the Muslim and Arab kids out there. I hope they don’t get a burning desire to hate this country.