What Is...Onigiri?

We've decided to create a "What is...?" section to answer some of our most frequently asked questions.
What exactly is Onigiri? The term "nigiru" in Japanese means to form with one's hands. Nigiri refers to sushi (because the rice is traditionally formed and molded with the sushi chef's hands). Onigiri ("beautiful nigiri") is the delicious snack made from rice usually in a triangular form. The picture above shows an Onigiri sandwiched between a piece of crisp seaweed and stuffed with pork inside.There are tons of creative ways of preparing Onigiri. This yummy Onigiri is pan-fried to give a crispy exterior, then smothered with a sweet miso paste, then sprinkled with bonito flakes.
One of our most popular Onigiri mold from Japan is this traditional three triangular shaped mold. For a whimsical take on Onigiri, check out our mold with three different shapes.

Green Tea Iced Cupcakes

Our thanks to Debbie, our resident baker, for making these yummy matcha green tea iced cupcakes from the Cupcake Blog. Below is the icing recipe, but you can see the original recipe here.

Matcha Green Tea Icing
-2 sticks butter
-8 ounces or 1 package of Philly cream cheese
-3 cups powdered sugar
-2 tablespoons green tea matcha powder

1. Bring butter to room temperature by letting it sit out for 1 or 2 hours.
2. Beat butter and cream cheese at medium speed until creamy.
3. Sift 3 cups of powdered sugar and 1 tablespoon of matcha powder into the butter/cream cheese mixture and beat to combine.
4. Taste. Add more matcha if desired.

Matcha Essentials

We are a one stop shop when it comes to Matcha tea ceremonies. This is our ever popular 30g tin of Uji Matcha from Japan.

The essential 120 tine finely curled bamboo whisk makes the tea frothy and delicious!The whisk can be found in this Japanese matcha bowl set, which includes a whisk, matcha scoop (chasaku), and glazed bowl.

How to Make Matcha

We get questions all the time about how to make Green Tea Matcha, so we've uploaded a video made by one of our customers, R.Uchiyama. Of course, Matcha and its benefits can also be enjoyed in a more simple way with just a cup of boiling water and a pea sized amount of Matcha.

Homemade Sushi

Last night, we made a batch of premium Calrose Japanese Grain Rice from Australia and thought the plump, pearl like rice was too gorgeous to just ate so we made some homemade sushi. We soaked the rice grains for about 30 minutes before washing it (very carefully and slowly, making sure we dont break the grain of the rice).
We grilled some more of that incredible Washugyu beef, searing in the flavour with my all time favourite Fauchon Fleur de Sel. We also made a smoked salmon sushi with a tad of wasabi.

Chinese New Year Lunch

It's tradition to have lavish meals for Chinese New Years, but here, it's tradition to have a big sushi lunch. Our thanks to Brian of SushiWoo for making this year's most delicious sushi lunch (pictured here on our teppenyaki plate). You can find SushiWoo sushi at Michaelangelo's and Garden Basket in Toronto.

Upscale Washugyu Beef

Mooo-ve over Kobe Beef. The soft, butterlike "massaged" beef from Japan was once the king of the cows in the high-end luxury, meat market. The beef is from fine bred Japanese hormone-free cattle raised in "stress free" environments. The cattle are raised using "natural rearing techniques". The claim: that all this produces the finest quality beef in texture and flavour, so much so that even Nobu & Megu in New York have bought into the craze.

We bought a chunk of this famous Washugyu beef to try it for ourselves. It was a whopping $55 for a 7"x3" piece. We seared it on a hot pan, and used light Memmi sauce for dipping (see picture above). The verdict- the beef was indeed soft as ever and tasted the way beef should taste, but would I buy another $55 piece of hormone free beef?