Onigiri is a very common Japanese dish that looks like balls or volumetric triangles of rice with a variety of fillings. Most often, onigiri are wrapped in dried seaweed, lettuce, and sometimes in an omelet or thinly sliced \u200b\u200bham.

A bit of history

Onigiri were originally exclusively peasant food, which the commoners took to work in the fields. Since old Japan was an exclusively agrarian country, this type of food became widespread. Even aristocrats began to take the prototype of onigiri - tondziki - when going on a picnic or hunting. In our time of blurring boundaries and the increased interest in national characteristics, art and cuisine of different peoples, onigiri, like sushi, pizza or pancakes, are known in almost every corner of the world.

By the way, these rice balls do not belong to sushi in any way, since only fresh rice is used for its preparation (unlike sushi).

Common to all recipes

Before preparing the rice balls, you need to properly prepare the rice. The groats are thoroughly washed under running cold water until the flowing liquid is clear. The washed rice is boiled in salted water. It should become soft, but not boiled. When ready, drain the water, put the rice in a colander and let it cool slightly.

In most cases, when making rice balls, the recipe for making them requires dried seaweed. They can be replaced with more readily available herbs such as parsley, arugula, mint, or sorrel. Many recipes and tips on how to make rice balls use a filling that is not mixed with rice, but nested inside. This is done simply: a deep hole is made in the ball formed of rice, where the desired mixture is carefully placed with a teaspoon. After that, the groove with the minced meat must be closed up. The ball is slightly crumpled and rolled in the hands to compact the finished onigiri.

The simplest onigiri

Such rice balls can be prepared even by a person who is very far from cooking. Sauce on freshly cooked rice for 15 minutes. wrap something warm (blanket, blanket, terry towel), finely chop the greens, warm up the sesame seeds for 5 minutes in the oven. Add greens to steamed rice, salt if necessary. Form into balls, roll in sesame seeds, serve with any sauce.

Onigiri and vegetable sauce

And here are the other rice balls, Japanese. Their recipe is as simple as the previous one, and the highlight is the sauce.

Form balls from the cooked rice, roll them in flour and fry evenly in oil. For the sauce, cut hot red peppers, zucchini, bell peppers, leeks into strips and fry them in vegetable oil. After that, pour in a quarter of a glass of classic soy sauce, salt, add spices to taste, squeeze out the garlic - a couple of cloves - and simmer for 5-7 minutes. Place the onigiri in the vegetable sauce and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring gently.

Rice balls with cheese

Let's move on to the next dish. These original Japanese rice balls (a recipe in which rice is successfully combined with cheese and capers) will demonstrate the peculiarities of the Far Eastern cuisine and become a table decoration.
For 300 g of rice, 100 g of cheese, 1 clove of garlic, 3 lemons, black pepper, vegetable (preferably olive) oil, capers, and parsley are required. Add the zest and juice of one lemon, finely chopped parsley, crushed garlic, pepper, salt to taste, grated cheese and pre-cooked rice to the olive oil. Mix everything very carefully, form balls, put them on thin lemon circles, decorate with capers on top.

Free balls

Carefully beat the egg, two tablespoons of sugar, salt to taste and a pinch of cinnamon, add about 100 g of flour, mix thoroughly. Add previously cooked rice and knead the dough. Roll up rice balls and deep-fry, turning regularly and gently. Put the finished onigiri on paper napkins and sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Onigiri with minced meat

Chop one small or half of a medium onion and fry in olive oil, then add 200 g minced meat (preferably mixed, for example pork and beef) and a quarter glass of wine (dry white). With regular stirring, wait for the wine to evaporate, add a tablespoon of tomato paste, water - so that the liquid covers all the minced meat. Season with salt, pepper, basil or oregano.

Simmer over the lowest heat for 40 minutes, then take out with a slotted spoon and transfer the minced meat into one container and drain the sauce into another. Pour some of the sauce into the prepared rice, making sure that the mixture does not turn out to be too liquid, add a couple of tbsp. tablespoons of grated Parmesan and an egg, mix thoroughly. Form rice balls by placing a little minced meat and a small piece of cheese in the middle, dip them in a beaten egg, roll them liberally in breadcrumbs and fry in olive oil until golden brown.

Such balls are also made with liver (chicken, turkey, rabbit, beef). The recipe is similar, except that the selected liver is fried in sour cream sauce. Then the liquid is decanted, and the liver is passed through a meat grinder.

You can make balls with minced meat and a simpler recipe. In this case, minced chicken is taken: the fillet is passed through a meat grinder, salted and fried in vegetable oil. When ready, cheese is added to the minced meat, everything is mixed until smooth. From the finished rice porridge, balls are made into which the resulting minced meat is embedded. The balls are also dipped in an egg, rolled in breadcrumbs and fried, even deep-fried.

Onigiri with umeboshi

Umeboshi - the so-called dried Japanese plums, in fact - the salted (pickled) fruits of the Japanese apricot. This is a recipe in which the rice balls are filled with two types of filling: salmon and umeboshi.

Already cooked and slightly cooled rice is divided into two parts. Triangular onigiri with umeboshi are formed from one half. These products are wrapped with one strip of nori seaweed. Grilled salmon, peeled from skin and bones, knead until smooth and mixed with the second part of the rice. From the resulting substance, onigiri are created of the same triangular shape, but they are not wrapped in algae, but sprinkled with sesame seeds. Usually 2 balls are put on one serving - with salmon and with umeboshi.

It should be noted that onigiri made according to this recipe are formed quite large, for example, for 4 servings, that is, 8 units of balls are a kilogram and a quarter of rice and 200 g of salmon. They are relatively large and differ from conventional products in their shape. But in essence - the same thing.

I would like to add at the end: Japanese cuisine is quite simple in execution, products (even seaweed) are available and inexpensive. So feel free to experiment and have an unforgettable Japanese evening.

Japanese cuisine is not only healthy, but also varied. In addition to the famous sushi, onigiri rice balls are no less popular, in which, unlike sushi and rolls, the filling is inside the rice, and resembles a pie. There are few simple and easy-to-prepare dishes in Japanese cuisine such as and.

The cuisine of the land of the rising sun is fundamentally as complex as the French. When cooking, the Japanese take into account all the subtleties to the smallest detail. Temperature of water, food, hand temperature, mood and health of the cook. They carefully select seafood and sauces. The Japanese traditionally drink a variety of green and white teas after each meal. But then there was one of the dishes that you can cook at home without any problems on its own, it does not require a lot of effort and great skill, unlike making sushi, this dish is onigiri. These rice balls are prepared with various fillings, while the Japanese eat onigiri without sauces by wrapping a rice ball in a nori leaf. Many people mistakenly believe that this dish is one of the types of sushi, which is wrong. Onigiri - were invented as a way of storing ready-made rice, the warriors going on a campaign wrapped balls in seaweed and took them with them on the road. But sushi is a way of storing fish and seafood, fish is wrapped in rice, and rice in seaweed, and in this form they can be taken on the road.

They are all cooked differently. Some form a rice cake, put the filling in the middle, put some more rice on top, and form balls. Others form balls and insert the filling into the center and then reshape as desired. Over the years, onigiri recipes have become more varied, and fillings have become more interesting and exotic. So, you can make sweet onigiri by adding pineapple, mango, kiwi, pickled peaches as a filling. To make the dish exotic, add avocado and olives to the filling. In Japan, onigiri is served not only in the classic version, they are fried in oil and over an open fire. You will hardly find this simple and tasty Japanese dish in Russian restaurants, it is not as popular as in Japan. So make the onigiri yourself.

Original Angry Birds Style Onigiri

Having tried it once, you will understand that there is nothing difficult about it. The process of making rice balls is very simple and does not require much effort. The main ingredient is rice, you need to take round rice, which is easy to mold and contains a lot of starch. It is best if you find Japanese varieties of rice for onigiri. Many shops offer sushi rice, which is ideal for onigiri as well. If you prepare this dish as a dessert, then by all means serve good green tea with it. While enjoying the dish and washing it down with delicious tea, you will immerse yourself in the atmosphere of Japan, where sakura blossoms in beautiful gardens and huge lotus flowers delight the eye and intoxicate with their delicate and tart aroma.

Onigiri are as popular in Japanese cuisine as sushi. These delicious koloboks reached our countries quite recently. This is one of the few Japanese dishes that cooks faster than sushi, and even easier. Sauces and fillings can be selected to taste.

Rice balls "Onigiri"

For cooking you will need (based on 8 servings):

Preparation:

1. Rinse the rice in running water until the water is clear.
2. Transfer the rice to a saucepan, cover with 5 cups of water, bring the water to a boil, over high heat. Stir the rice occasionally.
3. Reduce heat, cover the pot, and cook the rice for 15 minutes until the water is completely absorbed into it.
4. After the rice is cooked, leave it to stand under the lid for another 15 minutes (so that it swells even more). Then cool it down.
5. Wash the cucumber and cut into large cubes ().
6. Also cut the cream cheese and lightly salted red fish into cubes.
7. In a separate bowl, dissolve about 1.5 cups of water and salt (about 1.5 teaspoons of salt).
8. Dip your hands in a slightly salted solution before working with rice.
9. For 8 servings, divide the rice into 8 portions.
10. With wet hands, mold a small ball of rice, make a small depression and place a fish, 1 olive per 1 rice ball, cheese, cucumber (combine products to taste).
11. Then shape the onigiri into a triangular, cylindrical, or round shape.
12. Sprinkle the onigiri with sesame seeds and wrap in nori leaves.
13. Serve on a platter with pickled ginger and soy sauce.

Simple Japanese dish ready.

Total cooking time: 1 hour

A traditional dishJapan

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Different ways to make onigiri

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Onigiri is a very common Japanese dish that looks like balls or volumetric triangles of rice with a variety of fillings. Most often, onigiri are wrapped in dried seaweed, lettuce, and sometimes in an omelet or thinly sliced \u200b\u200bham.

Recipe
Rinse the rice under running water until the water is clear. Place the rice in a saucepan and cover with 4.5 cups of water. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to low, cover. Cook until all liquid is absorbed, 15-20 minutes. Let the rice stand still under the lid for about 15 minutes, so that it swells and softens properly. Then cool completely.

Dissolve 1 cup of water and salt in a bowl. Dip your hands in the solution before handling the rice. Divide the rice into 8 pieces for 8 onigiri.
Divide each part of the rice into 2 parts. Make a neat groove in one half
ling and put in it 1 teaspoon of the filling (bonito). Cover with the other half of the rice and squeeze lightly to close the filling inside. Gently shape the rice into a triangle (traditional shape). You can also make oval or round (balls). Wrap the onigiri with a strip of nori and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Onigiri Rice Balls Recipe From Scott Jurek's Eat & Run + Raw Chiya

So, in the original, in Scott Jurek's book, the recipe was:

Rice balls (Onigiri)

The first time I saw these rice cakes wrapped in seaweed was when I asked a Japanese runner what he had with him for the race. I'm glad I asked because rice is a wonderful food for lowering body temperature, especially in conditions like Death Valley. Rice is carbohydrates, onigiri are not too sweet, and they are soft and easy to digest. It is a wonderful source of electrolytes and salt (from seaweed), and rice balls have always been a convenient snack in Japan. And now they can be found in any Asian supermarket.

I remember how, with joy, I treated my friends to rice balls and how everyone admired their taste. In general, rice is not very popular in my family, therefore, I rarely cook it. But with these rice balls everything changed, as my family also liked them.

How to make rice balls with cheese

Products:

• Rice - 1 glass
• Cheese - 150 grams
• Onions - 1 pc.
• Eggs - 3 pcs.
• Breadcrumbs (flour, semolina)
• Salt, spices to taste

Step-by-step recipe for making rice balls

First, we need to boil the rice until tender. Cover the rice with water and cook for 15-20 minutes. If a little liquid remains, then the excess water must be drained off. Leave the rice to cool slightly for now.

In the meantime, while the rice cools, peel the onion and chop finely.

Fry the onions in a skillet until golden brown.

Grate about 50-70 grams of cheese on a coarse grater. Cut the rest of the rice into small squares.

Put onion, eggs in rice, salt, add spices and mix everything thoroughly until smooth.

Now you need to form cakes from minced rice, in the middle of which put a piece of cheese and wrap in a cake, forming a ball. To prevent minced rice from sticking to your hands, you can moisten your hands in cold water.

When I was making rice balls, I skipped this step. And it was necessary to moisten the rice balls in a beaten egg and only then roll them in breadcrumbs (I took semolina instead of breadcrumbs, but flour can be used).

In the classic recipe, the balls are fried in a lot of oil, so you can do that too. I decided that this would make the dish too greasy, and to be honest, I try to eat fried as little as possible, so I put my rice balls in a baking dish and sent them to the preheated oven for 20 minutes.

As for the filling, here you can use whatever your heart desires. If you want to put fried minced meat instead of rice, or you can put a piece of sausage or mushrooms with the rice. It all depends on your imagination and taste preferences.

That's all, our rice balls with cheese filling are ready, as you can see, making them is not difficult at all. It is better to serve the dish hot with sour cream, or with ketchup. Enjoy your meal!

Rice balls, or onigiri, are a common Japanese dish. You may have even seen how heroes feast on them in Japanese films or anime, changing onigiri with different fillings with each other. You can try to touch the culture of the mysterious eastern country and cook one of the varieties of rice balls.

Cooking rice balls: video recipe

Rice Ball Ingredients

There are many options for making rice balls, because you can use anything as a filling: fish, meat, cucumber, avocado, pickled vegetables and fruits. The main thing is that the filling is not sweet. Try a traditional Japanese recipe with salmon and pickled umeboshi plums. This dish can be great for Japanese diets.

To do this, you will need:

• 7 cups sushi rice
• 4 pickled plums;
• a piece of grilled salmon (you can use any other red fish, tuna and even canned fish, the main thing is not to get carried away with raw seafood);
• a tablespoon of salt; - nori seaweed;
• sesame.

If you can't find pickled plums, use any other filling: cucumber, shrimp, canned corn.

How to make rice for Japanese balls

First, prepare the rice, from which you will later create balls. First, soak the rice in cold water for 15–20 minutes, then rinse it thoroughly, cover with water in a ratio of one to two and put on fire. Cook the rice over low heat until tender (as a rule, it takes 10-15 minutes after the water boils). Remove the pot from the stove and let the rice cool. To make onigiri, it must be hot, but not scalding your hands.

If you wish, you can add spices you have to the rice to add a spicy flavor to the dish.

How to make onigiri

Pour a tablespoon of salt into a shallow cup, bowl, or simply on a separate plate. Separate one eighth of the rice and transfer to another container. Make a hole in the center of this pile of rice, place a plum (or whatever filling you choose to use instead of umeboshi) and then cover it with rice on top, moisten your hands with water, take a small amount of salt and rub it into your palms. Remove the plum rice and form into a bun. It should be tight enough and hold its shape well. Make four pickled plums onigiri. Take a nori sheet, cut it into four strips and wrap them around the balls.