Have you ever tried a rice ball? Rice balls are sold everywhere in Japan. But have you cooked a rice ball by yourself? I show you how to cook a rice ball with your hand keep clean.
Rice ball “Onigiri”
A rice ball is called Onigiri in Japanese. Nigiri means squeeze or press. Usually when you make a rice ball, some fillings like baked salmon or very salted pickled plum called Umeboshi on top of some steamed rice and add some stemed rice on the fillings. In other words, wrap the filling with steamed rice. Then form the rice into circle or triangle with both hands. Rice ball is generally cooked with japonica rice. Japonica rice is glutinous and more sticky compared to indica rice. So when you form the japonica rice into a rice ball shape, a lot of rice stick to your both hands. Generally you get your hands wet to prevent the rice from stickeng to your hands. However some people care about a rice ball cooked with other people’s bare dands.
How to cook a hygienic rice ball
First put food wrap on the table, spread some rice on it. Put any fillings if you want. I put Umeboshi (pickled plum).
Then cover them with rice.
For an important point, coat them with salt. I reccomend the bottle of salt that your hand doesn’t get sticky and the salt on the picture is Low-sodium.
Wrap the rice up in the cling film. And form it into triangle.
In the end, open the plastic wrap and roll the rice ball with dried seaweed. After that cover it with the food wrap again to form it. There are cut dried seaweeds at the Japanese supermarkets. It’s very usefull and delicious!!
Summary
One of the typical Japanese food is about rice ball. Japanese people are used to having rice balls because Japanese mothers cook rice balls for boxed lunch, rice balls are sold everywhere in Jpanese supermarket or convenience stores. It’s easy to cook and easy to eat! There are many kinds of tastes like tuna mayonaise, salmon, bonito flakes or salted plum. Let’s try to cook a rice ball!
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