おにぎらず - Onigirazu

The latest craze in blogosphere seems to be onigirazu: onigiri turned into a sandwich-form. It's such a great invention, as during my years of my onigiri love I've thought about countless onigiri fillings and later on I've had to abandon them because of their unsuitability to fit inside it or stay inside it. 'Onigirazu-ing' adds instantly countless options that I'm almost baffled what to choose. This time I chose soft-cooked egg (needs some improvement still) with asparagus and tuna-mayo with avocado and lettuce. My technique for wrapping them up also needs some improvement :D

Onigirazu (makes 8 pieces, when cut in half / serves two to four)

Freshly cooked, hot Japanese rice made from 180 ml uncooked rice (see instructions to cook perfect rice here)

 

80 g tuna (preferably in brine, drained weight)

2-3 tsp mayonnaise, preferably Japanese e.g. Kewpie

optional: a dash of Japanese soy sauce, a tiny knob of wasabi, or to taste

1/2 avocado, in slices

lettuce

 

4 small asparagus stalks, cooked for 1-2 minutes

2 cooked eggs (if hard-boiled, I suggest halving them for ease of filling up the onigirazu)

salt

 

To wrap: 4 nori sheets

Drain the tuna (very carefully esp. if using tuna in oil). Combine it with mayonnaise (and soy sauce and wasabi, if using). Place a nori sheet with a corner pointing up (the shiny side facing downward). Wet your hands and rub some salt on your palms. Take 1/8 of the cooked rice and spread it in the middle of the nori sheet with salt-rubbed hands. Leave enough nori around the rice, so that in the end you can fold all four corners around the fillings (like en envelope). Spread half of the tuna-mayo filling and avocado slices on the rice, and top everything with another rice layer (remember to rub some salt to the rice.)
Fold each corner of nori sheet tightly around the fillings (with the help of a cling film) and let them overlap in the middle. Let the onigirazu rest around 5 minutes before taking the cling film away and cutting the onigirazu in half (easier with a wet knife).

Tip 1. If you're using "long" ingredients as a filling, it makes a difference in which direction you halve the onigirazu (I made myself a memory rule to fold the nori so that after cutting the topmost nori stays whole (like cutting the envelope horizontally): fold first the corners that will wrap the asparagus (or other long-ish things) into a bundle and lastly those where they are pointing.

Tip 2. If you like your nori crisp, then I'd stick to onigiri...

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