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[mr2mike]

Being thestudent bachelor that I am, I'm often on the lookout for budget snacks and stuff that are easy to make (since I dont have a lovely lady to cook anyting for me), rice being cheap and easy (I have an automatic rice cooker, I can't make stove top rice, weep for me) and this particular day, everything I have left except ingredients for another dinner and some oatmeal, I tried making some rice balls.

For a first time, turned out pretty good they did, even if I went a little cheap on seasonings. hey, what could I have expceted from white rice with only a little parsly and celery salt.

I once ran acros a site the suggested adding tiny bits of fish, wich seemed like a good idea, but I'll need to pick some up next time I replenish the fridge, but while the shopping isn't done I thought I'd ask for suggestion of comon ingredients that work well.

And also, what's the shelf life for these things? I could start packing them to snack @ college when the cafeteria is serving pineapple ham (ack!) or some other horrible, horrible meal.

 

[Draff]

Shelf life probably isn't too long.
I guess you could wrap it in seaweed for starters.
I like furikake with rice which shouldn't be too expensive
Typically, people put sour or salty ingredients like salmon, umeboshi

Otherwise you can make the ones like at the conbini and add fish and mayo

 

[belgurdo]

Dead samurai; a nice sword; varying amounts of mystical focus.



...




wait. That's Buddha-giri. My bad

 

[mr2mike]

hmmm... seaweed would take some lookin' for...

what's furikake? http://www.quickspice.com/cgi-bin/SoftCart.exe/scstore/japanesefoodfurikake.shtml?E+scstore those things? sesame seeds I can do, but the rest, 'cept the fish varieties are probably a no go. I'm dealing with north american supplies here, in a market that doesn't really have a big asian population so I'm missing out on a lot of import products that would be a given in a big population centre...

Umeboshi probably is impossible too

This guy that had gone to japan a couple of times told me about a little tiny grocery store hidden somewhere in the tightly packed buildings of western lower town that had nothing but asian ingredients... I'll have to try and find it I guess, then the problem is gonna be reading the labels

But thanks, I had forgotten about sesame seeds. score one more ingredient! Yay! Fish + mayo also sounds rather good, but how would you go about adding th mayo? put it in th rice and make the balls or make the balls and then add the mayo? or add it inside the balls, like a stuffed doughnut?

 

[Kobun Heat]

Tuna salad.

 

[Cherubae]

Perhaps a sprinkle or two of curry spice? That would give it some flavor.

Back when I was younger, we use to make rice and place it in cereal bowls. Then pour in a little milk and top it with cinnamon and sugar. Very yummy

 

[cloudwalking]

hmmm... seaweed would take some lookin' for...

last time i was at my local super wal-mart, they had seaweed in the asian food section. you could take a look there.

 

[Kobun Heat]

Seaweed at Wal-Mart...

 

[cloudwalking]

Seaweed at Wal-Mart...

:lol

it was sheets of dried seaweed, pretty much the same as this (different brand though). i almost bought it but i have no idea how to make anything with it.

 

[warabi-mochi]

Well, the 'seaweed' you're looking for is called nori. It shouldn't be too difficult too find these days, check the asian section or the sushi section(if it's separate) of most larger grocery stores.

As for ingredients inside, the more traditional ones are grilled salted salmon or other types of fish, umeboshi diced up and mixed with sesame seeds, or pickled Japanese vegetables. Really though, you can use whatever you want inside, especially if you're limited in what's available. So if shrimp are easier to find and are fairly cheap where you are, go for it. Fry them up in your favourite way, cut them into smaller pieces and stuff them inside. Same goes for beef, chicken, pork, vegetables, etc.

As for the mayo with fish, you'd mix the fish and mayo together first, and then place them inside the onigiri. The nori goes around the outside of the finished onigiri. Generally speaking, you're not going to be mixing ingredients into the rice, but having them inside 'like a stuffed doughnut' as you posted earlier.

 

[MrSingh]

grilled salmon. (salted)

 

[Blackace]

grilled salmon. (salted)

me and YellowAce agree

 

[mrklaw]

sea chicken (tuna) with mayo. You need the nori to give it some bite, and it goes really well with the tuna.

Also umeboshi onigiri is nice, but not too much