Japanese Seasoned Rice Balls (Onigiri!) + Giveaway Winner!

You guys this is kind of silly! But this next post is the REASON we started blogging in the first place. It was three years ago and Jenn and I were looking at blogs and found a bento box blog. We then proceeded to look at a billion more bento box blogs, yeah we were kind of obsessed. They were just so adorable and little and there were pandas...

So that's where we discovered Onigiri (a popular japanese rice ball snack), and we were actually planning on making them for our first post ever. But they just fell apart because we used brown rice instead of white sushi rice. Lol trying to make it healthy! I think we used it for sushi later on. So now we finally get to post them!! Three years in the making people-

So Onigiri is pretty much like the sandwich of Japan, they sell them everywhere. It's just seasoned rice with a filling inside rice shaped into a ball or triangle or any other shape, and wrapped in nori or topped with sesame seeds/other topping.  So simple and so good!

For the rice the best kind to use is sushi rice! Just cook it based on the instructions and put it onto a cutting board or into bowl, until it gets to room temperature.

Add salt, vinegar, and sugar if desired, like regular sushi rice, (we only used salt). You could also add sesame seeds if you like!

This is the super amazing, delicious chicken salad that's really easy to make!

Chop up leftover chicken, and vegetables, cook in some soy sauce once chicken is heated up, put in bowl, add mayonnaise, chipotle powder, garlic powder and lemon juice. Holy smokes! You won't be disappointed. If you're wondering what the long thin things are, they're the egg noodles from the leftover chicken.

For the fillings let your imagination go wild! If it can go with rice then it's a-ok! We filled them with this super amazing chicken salad but there's lots more options!

Filling options:
Mashed yams w/ soy sauce
Shrimp Tempura
Umeboshi plum (traditional)
Leftover chicken
Peanut Satay chicken
Salmon
Tuna salad
Guacamole!

Once you have the fillings and your rice, you can commence the assembly:
Wet your hands, take a 1/4 cup of rice and form into a patty, add 1 tsp of filling in the middle, fold patty in half like a pierogi, then shape into a ball.

I topped mine with sesame seeds and a japanese chili pepper seasoning!

Makes at least 12 balls.

Aren't they just the cutest!

Adorable! We loved snacking on these through out the day. It's the ultimate portable snack.

Also, we hosted a giveaway for a copy of our e-book and asked you what you do with avocado!

The randomly drawn winner is.....coconutandberries! Congrats!! We will send you our Simple Sweets e-book right away! Hope you enjoy the recipes!