August 10th, 2010 by Dawn Becker

When I went to Tokyo I became addicted to onigiri the very first time I tried it. Onigiri is a ball or triangle-shape of Japanese rice wrapped in nori (roasted seaweed sheets) stuffed with fillings like spicy tuna, umeboshi (pickled plum), and other savouries. You could find these tasty gems almost anywhere including convenience stores like 7-Eleven. It was at Ueno Station that I had my first onigiri and it was filled with fresh ikura or salmon roe. Biting through the crunchy seaweed and discovering that the divinely tender rice housed a healthy spoonful of salty bulging salmon eggs was sheer delight and my first delicious food memory of Japan.

In Toronto, we are fortunate to be able to get our hands on onigiri at a few places. My favourite by far are the ones you can find at Sanko, the Japanese food and gift shop located at Claremont and Queen Street West. Pictured above is a small sample of the variety that are available. My favourite isn’t shown – the organic eggplant – because that version never makes it all the way home. More than likely I’ll be trying to drive and shift gears while I undo the cello wrapper with my teeth all without breaking the nori sheet. As soon as the cello is off, I have to eat the onigiri right away while the seaweed is still crunchy.

Here is a close up view of the instructions for removing the cello. Done this way, the nori sheet stays intact, folding around the rice so your hands don’t get messy. Essentially, Step 1 is to peel back the tab at the top and pull it completely around the onigiri and off. Step 2, while holding the onigiri with your left hand pull the right side of the cello off. And finally, Step 3, remove the remaining cello wrapper completely and then take a bite. Think about doing that while driving with one hand and using your teeth. It’s doable.

You can also find the Korean version of onigiri, called gimbap or kimbap, at P.A.T. Central in the Bloor Street Koreatown. Next to Sanko, these onigiri are a pretty good runner up. Julian is fond of the kimchi beef and Cole likes the spicy chicken. Korean gimbap is usually made with laver which are roasted seaweed sheets that have been seasoned.

If you’re at P.A.T. Central and they’re sold out of gimbap, you might want to pick up what you need to make your own at home. All you need is some short grain Japanese rice (or even easier, buy some pre-cooked takeaway rice from a nearby restaurant), a plastic holder that you can use to pat the rice into a triangle shape available in the kitchen utensils aisle, pre-packaged seaweed in cello sheets, shown below, and whatever filling you like. I would then probably make a second stop at the St. Lawrence Market to pick up a jar of salmon roe or sushi-grade fish for the filling.

Manpuku and their new restaurant, Harapeko, located at 160 Baldwin Street, both have onigiri on the menu. The version at Manpuku is usually served while the rice is still warm and they only seem to offer what tastes like a mild tuna salad. Still it hits the spot and the rice is always perfectly tender. There were a couple more choices at Harapeko, such as mentaiko or salted cod roe shown below, but primarily Harapeko is all about the Japanese sandwich pocket so their onigiri suffers a little in quality.

Tokyo Kitchen also has onigiri on it’s menu but they make a version that only uses a thin strip of nori wrapped around the rice as an accent. To me, I need the crunch of the full sheet of fresh nori so I’d skip that and choose one of the other mouth-watering choices on the menu if I was there.

At T&T Supermarket, they offer a two-pack of onigiri for a steal at $2.99 per pack pictured above. I am usually a big fan of T&T but here you really get what you pay for. The T&T onigiri is one item YOU CAN AND SHOULD SKIP. I took one bite of the spicy salmon onigiri and immediately spit it out. The spicy salmon mixture was sour but worst of all the rice was hard. It definitely seems to be an attempt to use up old salmon and stale rice and it doesn’t work.

If you’ve had the misfortune of trying onigiri at T&T Supermarket I hope you will give onigiri another try at a different place. They can be amazing and if people start eating them regularly and asking for interesting fillings, we are sure to see more and better options offered elsewhere in Toronto.