Rice Balls Quotes

“At Iris's direction, we enjoyed all sorts of skewered bits. While most yakitori places serve various cuts of chicken and a few vegetables, the menu at Yakitorino was all over the place, and nearly everything was good: breaded and fried beef cubes on a stick; fried lotus root; pork jowl with miso; shishitō peppers. But Iris and Laurie's single favorite dish at Yakitorino was neither meat nor vegetable and was not served on a stick. "If you'd really left the ordering up to me," Iris said to me recently, "we would have had nothing but yaki onigiri."
Yaki onigiri are plain, triangular rice balls (no fillings or nori wrapper) cooked on a hot charcoal grill and brushed with soy sauce or miso. The sauce on the outside caramelizes as the rice becomes charred and crispy and gives off an aroma of popcorn. The interior of the ball heats up and drinks in just a hint of sauce. It is a riot of flavor and texture made with two completely ordinary ingredients.”
― Matthew Amster-Burton, Pretty Good Number One: An American Family Eats Tokyo

“I never expected he'd use a French cooking technique on common rice balls.
He's completely unconfined by country or style.
What an amazing freestyle cooking!
Not only that, Poêle is a technique made for cooking ingredients with thicker skins and rinds.
Both seer fish and salmon have good, thick skins, making them the perfect fish to use!
Soma realized that immediately...
... and then adjusted his dish to accommodate.
The pure white rice looks almost like little, gleaming flakes of snow.
The dark seer fish pushes its way up proudly through all that white...
... like the vitality of spring itself!
With this one simple dish...
... he has portrayed the moment of spring's beginning.”
― Yuto Tsukuda, Food Wars!: Shokugeki no Soma, Vol. 2

“Mmm! This is so yummy! It's salt and spring onion flavored, right?"
"Yep! I boiled some chicken tenderloins and dressed them with salt and spring onion sauce. I spread the sauce on the outside of the rice balls too!"
"Yum! The salty flavor really whets the appetite!"
"The body especially craves salt after exercise too."
"Aah, is this kombu? Seaweed is a rice ball staple! Tsukudani kombu and... cheese?!" *Tsukudani means foods simmered in soy sauce and mirin.*
"Right! The heavy sweetness of tsukudani foods goes really well with cheese."
"Okay, let's see what the last one is! Yum! The garlic flavor is awesome!"
"Those are my honey-garlic pork rice balls.
I boiled some pork belly until it was soft... and then I let it marinate with some garlic for a day in a mixture of miso, cooking saké, and honey. It's super awesome with rice, so I thought I'd try making rice balls with it.
I brought barley tea and green tea. Take your pick!"
AAAAH
"This is the brilliance of Megumi's cooking. It calms and comforts the heart of whoever enjoys it."
"The chicken tenderloin isn't too dry, and the pork is perfectly tender. All of these are carefully and deftly made.”
― Yuto Tsukuda, Food Wars!: Shokugeki no Soma, Vol. 2

“So for the first course, we have flounder sashimi served with green onions and momiji oroshi, or daikon radish with chili pepper."
The fish was delicate and subtle, with a nice, firm texture. What followed after this opening course was an onslaught of fantastic nigiri, small balls of pressed sushi rice with various toppings, served two at a time so I could fully appreciate each perfect morsel.
Sea bream was followed by sweet shrimp, tamago, yellowtail, salmon, soy sauce-braised octopus, crab, grilled eel, and the final two pieces were otoro, or tuna belly. The richest, fattest, most melt-in-your-mouth pieces of tuna I'd ever had.”
― Mia P. Manansala, Arsenic and Adobo

“Hmm. A grilled miso rice ball and a grilled soy sauce rice ball...
But what is this covered in dried seaweed?"
"When we think about the rice ball and its connection to the Japanese climate and culture, the existence of fermented food is something we can't ignore. Eating fermented food on a daily basis is a unique trait of the Japanese culinary culture.
The most famous of the fermented foods are the soy sauce and miso. Seasonings that the Japanese diet cannot do without.
We coated one of the rice balls with soy sauce and the other with miso...
... and grilled them over charcoal."
"The slightly burnt scent of the soy sauce is so appetizing."
"The grilled fragrance of miso is irresistible to a Japanese person. And this we can only taste in the form of a rice ball too."
"Another fermented Japanese product that we must not forget about is natto. Natto is a little tough to put inside a rice ball as it is...
... so we've minced it along with diced green onions. It has been flavored with soy sauce and Japanese mustard.
And to add some punch to it, we coated the rice ball with roasted shredded seaweed. By shredding it, the flavor of the dried seaweed becomes far better than just coating the rice ball with a sheet of it.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“Seafood is also something we cannot do without as a country surrounded by sea. And the rich variety of seafood is often used in rice balls.
The first one is a classic rice ball, with salted salmon. It's slightly different since the grilled salted salmon is broken down into flakes...
... and mixed into the rice together with chopped green onion...
...then made into a rice ball and wrapped in roasted dried seaweed."
"Ah, the salmon has been mixed nicely into the rice, so it has a very rich taste."
"And the flavor of the green onion gets rid of the fishy scent of the salmon, making the rice ball taste even better."
"This will be great to have in a lunch box."
"The next rice ball is coated with shredded dried seaweed just like the last one, but the filling is different. It's sea urchin, but it's not raw sea urchin or the typical bottled sea urchin. It's sea urchin shiokara."
"Sea urchin shiokara?"
"Most of the typical bottled sea urchins have been steeped in alcohol. It's probably because they're easier to make and easier to eat.
But in the old days, sea urchin was often made into shiokara. If you salt the sea urchin and let it age and ferment, it becomes far richer tasting compared to a raw sea urchin or the alcohol-macerated sea urchin.
Nowadays, that sea urchin shiokara has become very rare, and many people don't even know what it tastes like. So I've decided to use it as a filling for the rice ball."
"Ooh, it has such a rich taste."
"By being fermented, the sea urchin has developed a completely different flavor along with the original flavor it had.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“The filling for the rice ball is the wasabi leaves and stem marinated overnight in soy sauce.
You make that into a rice ball using sushi rice...
... and wrap dried seaweed around it to create a rice ball the size of a ping-pong ball.
Meanwhile, you create a barazushi. Ingredients like grilled saltwater eel with sauce, kohada marinated in vinegar, kanpyo, steamed shrimp, steamed abalone and others...
...are all chopped up...
...and mixed into the rice.
Then use the small rice ball you made beforehand as the next filling...
... to create a larger rice ball.
And then you coat it with thin strips of grilled egg.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“The last one is a fun rice ball.
The filling is ground black sesame and walnuts flavored with sweet honey. We made a rice ball out of that...
... and coated it with kinako soybean powder."
"Huh... a sweet rice ball."
"I've never seen a rice ball coated in kinako."
"Ha ha ha... this is fun."
"The black sesame and walnut isn't just sweet--- it also has a wonderful scent. Come to think of it, this really is the taste of Japan."
"The taste of good old Japan too."
"Sesame, walnut, powdered soybeans and honey. The combination of these sweet flavors...
It soothes the heart, doesn't it?"
"This really is like a dessert.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“The first one is red bean rice ball. Red beans and sticky rice were often steamed together to create red bean rice on celebratory occasions. It was considered to be a feast in the olden days.
Many areas in Japan still carry on the tradition of making red bean rice whenever there is something to celebrate. In that sense, I think you can say red bean rice is deeply rooted in the Japanese soul."
"That's right. I made red bean rice along with other foods when the framework of my house was completed."
"It feels very festive for some reason."
"I like the salt and sesame seasoning on it."
"The next is a hijiki rice ball. You cook the rice together with the hijiki, thin fried tofu and carrots...
...flavor it with soy sauce and make a rice ball with it.
The hijiki rice is the typical Japanese commoners' food that mixes riches from the sea and the soil together. A rice ball made of hijiki rice is one of the original Japanese foods with a long continuing history."
"Aaah. This brings back memories."
"It makes us realize that we're Japanese. It's a flavor we must not lose."
"The last rice ball of the past is dried seaweed. Dried seaweed is one of the most familiar seaweeds to the Japanese, apart from konbu, wakame and hijiki.
And the way to fully enjoy the taste of the dried seaweed...
... is to make seaweed tsukudani and use that as the filling for the rice ball.
For the tsukudani, you simmer top-quality dried seaweed in sake and soy sauce. Once you learn its taste, you will never be satisfied with eating the dried seaweed tsukudani that's commercially available."
"It tastes nothing like that one we can buy at the market."
"It's refreshing, yet has a very strong scent of seaweed."
"It's interesting to see the difference in flavor of the tsukudani filling and the seaweed wrapping the rice ball."
"Red bean rice, hijiki rice and dried seaweed tsukudani rice balls...
These are flavors that will never fade away as long as the Japanese are around.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“The first one is paella-style takikiomi gohan rice ball. You chop up white meat fish, clams, shrimp and squid and fry them in olive oil with garlic and saffron. And in a different pan, you fry finely chopped tomatoes, onions and green pepper in olive oil.
You mix those two together and cook them with rice using a broth made from beef shank and chicken bones.
Then you make that into a rice ball...
... and wrap it in Parma ham."
"Oh my! It sure is something to make a paella-style takikomi gohan into a rice ball."
"But when it's wrapped in Parma ham, they match perfectly."
"It's completely Western, but it still tastes like a rice ball."
"This is a surprise. And the judges seem to like it too."
"Next is a rice ball coated in pork flakes. This is a pork flake you often see in Chinese cooking. You cook the lean pork meat in soy sauce seasoned with star anise until it becomes flaky.
The filling inside is Dongpo pork--- a Chinese dish made of pork belly that's been slowly braised."
"Ooh, the soft Dongpo pork came out as I bit into the rice coated in the sweet and salty pork flakes!"
"Ah, the flavor and texture are superb!"
"This combination is just wonderful! "
"You've made Dongpo pork into such a great rice ball, it's making me cry. It looks Chinese, but it's very much a Japanese rice ball."
"Now the judges are taking his side..."
"And the last is a deep-fried chicken rice ball. You deep fry chicken that has been marinated in soy sauce with ginger and garlic...
...and then use that as the filling of the rice ball...
... then coat it in red shiso seasonings."
"Ah, the rich taste of the deep-fried chicken is something the young people will like. And the red shiso seasoning creates a refreshing aftertaste.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“The first one is stewed hard clam. You stew the hard clam in soy sauce until it's rather salty...
... and then you place it inside the rice ball...
... and wrap it with dried seaweed."
"Huh, stewed hard clam?"
"Stewed hard clam is what you eat in sushi, right? Why's that the future?"
"Next is a matsutake rice ball. You cook the matsutake you picked during the season and simmer it until it's salty...
... then preserve it. That becomes the filling for the rice ball."
"The scent and flavor... it brings back the joy of being Japanese."
"It's good... but why is this the rice ball of the future?"
"The last one is a katsuobushi rice ball. You shave a katsuobushi from makurazaki as thinly as possible...
...then you flavor it with soy sauce...
... and place it into the rice ball.
Finally, wrap it in dried seaweed.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice

“These rice balls represent the responsibilities we have for the future."
"The responsibilities we have for the future?!"
"Let's start off with the stewed hard clams. In the past, they could be found anywhere. But nowadays, most of the hard clams are being imported because they can no longer be caught due to land reclamation and pollution. Hard clams from the sea nearby have now become a rarity.
Stewed hard clams are an important cultural asset that has been passed down to us since the Edo Period. But at this rate, the hard clams will be lost, and the stewed hard clams will disappear from the menu of the future.
The same with matsutake. The production of matsutake is going down every year because the mountains are not looked after with care. People hardly go to the mountains to take care of them because of the decrease in population in the mountainous regions, as well as the decrease of people who use wood as fuel. At this rate, domestic matsutake will also disappear from our tables.
And then there's the katsuobushi. How many households have their own katsuobushi shaver these days? MSG and ready-made easy seasonings have become the mainstream of cooking. The most basic Japanese tradition of using katsuobushi and konbu to make dashi is starting to disappear. Even when you use katsuobushi, you use something that has already been shaved and packed."
"He's right. Young people who have experienced shaving a katsuobushi are a minority nowadays."
"In the old days, shaving the katsuobushi was the children's job."
"The current Japanese culinary culture is one of the richest in the world. But at the same time, we are continuing to lose something we are not meant to lose. And that is not right . It is our responsibility to pass on the important cultural elements from our ancestors down to the future.”
― Tetsu Kariya, The Joy of Rice