Recipe for Oni-Giri (Japanese Rice Ball)

Ingredients for Oni-Giri (Japanese Rice Ball):
1 rice
1 nori (seaweed)
1
seasoned rice vinegar
1 smoked salmon
1 wasabi
paste
1 salt
1 sugar

Oni-Giri (Japanese Rice Ball) preparation instruction:
This Recipe is for the
picnic rice balls that someone mentioned. They are
easier than sushi,
don't require a mat, etc. Don't shy away from making
these. You don't
need to use raw fish. Indeed, these particular rice balls,
called
Oni-giri do not usually contain raw fish. These can be made with
smoked
salmon or not as you wish.

To season the vinegar, add some salt and
or sugar to taste. I don't like
the sugar myself and leave it out. I
also water down the vinegar a little
bit. If you don't like vinegar, you
can just use salt water or even just
plain water.

The Nori may be
purchased in toasted sheets ready to use. It is widely
available. I've
found it in local grocery stores here in North Carolina.
Cut the sheets
into 4 - 5 cm wide strips.

The rice should be a sticky variety, like
Kokuho Rose, but I have made
these successfully with standard American
medium grain white rice. Prepare
as for steamed rice, allow it to sit in
the pan, covered, after cooking for
about 1 hour before lifting the
cover. Dump the rice into a bamboo
vegetable steamer or a wooden salad
bowl, something that will absorb some
of the moisture. Fan the rice while
GENTLY tossing it a few times. This
cools it so it can be handled and
removes the excess moisture.

Have the salmon ready in 4 cm strips
with as much wasabi dabbed on it as
you'd like. Once the rice is cool
enough to handle you can begin. Wet your
hands with the vinegar. Grab
some rice in the palm of one hand. Push a
strip of salmon into it. Form
the rice ball by clasping your hands together
GENTLY. The idea is to form
a nice triangular ball with flat faces. It's
fun. You also don't want
to handle them too much. You don't want to squash
the rice grains just
stick them together. Once you've shaped the ball. Wet
one side of the
Nori strip with the vinegar and wrap it around the flat
faces of the rice
ball.