Recently I have been craving Onigiri.  It has been years since I have made any and I’m not sure what has brought on the sudden craving. Over the weekend, I went to Daiso, a Japanese store that sells a lot of random supplies for $1.69.  I got a few onigiri tools.  While they can be made without the tools, the tools do help in making pretty shaped ones.

I bought a heart shape, triangle shape, and star shape.

You can use these as rice scooper, scooping directly into your pot of rice.  Then you mash the cover on top of the rice, squeezing it down into the shape.  On the backs of these shapes there is a lever you push in to help release the rice when you are done.  This is really useful because the rice is so sticky.

There are different things you can do with the rice balls.  You can add fillings in the middle, you can decorate the outside with seasoning, you can wrap them in nori (seaweed), etc.  I usually like to put shredded pork in the middle or just have a rice seasoning around the outside.

I wanted to make different ones, so I bought a shredded fish filling and some different rice seasonings.

Typically the rice seasoning contain some nori, sesame and some other flavors. The purple one contains plum.  The pink one has some seafood.  And the brown one has bonito flakes.

I ended putting the shredded fish filling in the middle of the triangle shaped onigiri.  The heart shaped and star shape ones don’t have a filling and are only seasoned with the rice seasoning.

There is so much you can do with rice balls.  So many different fillings, seasonings, designs. It’s like playing with your food. Heh. I used to eat these a lot when I was little.  Eating them now brings back a feeling of nostalgia.