Grill pork Onigiri

Onigiri

Onigiri means "Gripping" in English, the word is referred as rice ball in English and it is a traditional rice meal in Japan, its shape is to beautify the lunch box and also for the purpose to stuffed with various seasoned ingredients, such as sour plum, Salmon Flakes, and salted fish roe.

Most of the rice ball are seasoned with a sprinkle of salt or soy sauce while gripping it To shape), then topped with sesame seed and julienned Green Shiso(Perilla) and wrapped with dried seaweed. The traditional Onigiri is triangle or cylinder shape and a sour plum is stuffed in the center of the rice ball, it is the sign of the poor old days, which the local have only rice and sour plum to eat.

As time passed, the Onigiri has turned itself to the famous food in Asia, not only by its attractive shape, but also the ingredients to cooked with it, such as meat, poultry and seafood, the varieties of the rice ball have become enormous if compared to the old days, furthermore the seasoning has no longer dominated by the salt, sauces have come to the replacement in modern onigiri.

Onigiri in Japan.

Onigiri is a famous food in Japan until you could buy it at any convenience store just like the fried chicken, with various filling and flavor, the store even provides their customers a microwave oven so they can heat up the Onigiri and enjoy it while it is warm, especially in the day of chilling Winter.

Furthermore, the Onigiri is also best to make for the picnic or hiking. The onigiri provides the best carbohydrates and nutritious in the minimum space in the lunch box as the onigiri are big enough to fill with various seasoned ingredients, you can even stuff a mini salad and dressing inside the rice ball as long as the filling doesn't burst out.

The grill pork onigiri

Grilled pork onigiri

Cook Time

Prep time: 10 min

Cook time: 10 min

Ready in: 20 min

Yields: 2 people / 4 rice ball

Ingredients

• 4 slices               Thin pork loin
• 2 tablespoon      (A) Soy sauce, to marinate the pork slices
• 2 tablespoon      (A) Sugar, to marinate the pork slices
• 3 tablespoon      (A) Cooking alcohol / sake, to marinate the pork slices
• 1/2 tablespoon   (A) Grated ginger (with juice), to marinate the pork slices
• 4 pieces              Green shiso (perilla)
• 200 grams          Cooked Rice, Grip the rice into cylinder shape for every 50 grams
• As need              Roasted Sesame, for garnish

Cooking method

1. Marinate the sliced pork loin in a pan and marinate with the group (A) ingredients.
2. Roll the rice ball with the green shiso leave and wrapped with the sliced pork loin.
3. Heat a tablespoon of oil in the frying pan, then begin to fry the pork rice ball over medium-low heat, brown every side of the meat then remove all the meat rice ball from the frying pan.
4. Pour the marinade sauce and glaze it (Cook until the sauce is thick), then put the seared rice balls back to the pan and caramel them with the thickened sauce.
5. Arrange the glazed rice balls on a plate and sprinkle with sesame seeds.

Grill pork onigiri.

Marinate the pork, then roll the rice ball with perilla.

Then wrapped with the marinated sliced pork loin.

Brown the pork loin.

brown every side then remove the rice ball from the pan.

Heat up the marinate juice until thick.

Glaze the rice ball with the thick sauce.

What is the good Onigiri

A good Onigiri should be soft and fluffy after shaped (gripped) and should be served when it is warm, as we know, cooked rice becomes harder when it is cooled , which lower than human body temperature.

The rice and the shaping are the main factors to decide a quality of a good rice ball, that is the person who makes it. At first, the rice should be cooked with lesser water than usual, to produce a steam rice that is slightly hard, this is because the rice will then be gripped, it is ideal to make it a little harder than normal cooked rice, but it is still cooked, just a little harder as possible. Second is the way of gripping (Shaping), the cook who has experience in making the rice ball could make the product quickly, this mean fewer grip are taken during the shaping, this is because the cooked rice is soft and it will collapse if over gripping.

Finally, the gripping is very important when making the Onigiri, the over gripped product will tighten the space between each rice and form a hard rice ball, furthermore, the rice will lose its texture and become sticky when it is collapsed.