Spam Musubi Recipe

Spam Musubi is a popular dish reminiscent of the much more well-known Japanese onigiri. While it can be found across many countries adjacent to the Pacific, such as in China, Korea, or Japan, it’s most often found in Hawaii. For residents of the state, nothing beats the taste of an authentic hawaiian spam musubi.

Spam masubi is incredibly delicious and easy to make, so if you’re interested in trying something new, then here is a spam musubi recipe you’ll have to try out.

What Is Spam Musubi?

Spam musubi is a tasty treat consisting of spam rice seaweed that takes a square shape and involves placing a sheet of nori (seaweed) around a piece of spam that’s laid on top of a compact block of rice. It’s great for any number of occasions, whether it’s for lunch, parties, or just as a midnight snack.

Although it can be made any number of ways, it usually comes lightly dressed with a spam musubi sauce that infuses the dish with a non-overpowering, yet still discernible punch of sweet, umami, and savory flavor that strikes a decent balance that’s not too light and not too heavy.

Product by: SmallRecipe.com

Categories: Main Meal

Serves: 8 Prep Time: 25 minutes Cooking Time: 5 minutes 5 minutes

Nutrition facts: 283 calories 12 fat

Rating: 5.0/5

( 1 voted )

Ingredients

Musubi is a relatively straightforward thing to make, but there definitely some important details to pay attention to if you want it to turn out extra delicious. But, before we go into the steps on how to make it, let's first take a look at the ingredients you'll need on hand:

* One full container of spam (12 oz.)
* 2 tablespoons of oil (preferably vegetable)
* 2 tablespoons of sugar
* 2 tablespoons of soy sauce
* 1 tablespoon of water
* 6 tablespoons of rice vinegar
* Several nori sheets cut into halves or thirds
* 4 cups of short-grained white or sushi rice

Instructions

How to Make Spam Musubi

There's a lot of wiggle room when making musubi that can make a huge difference when it comes to creating a specific flavor profile and presentation. For instance, you can use less rice if you want a stronger tasting musubi or more rice if you're interested in a lighter result; it's really up to you how you want your musubi to taste. With that important caveat out of the way, here's how you can get started:

* First, start off by cooking the amount of rice you'll need. Exactly how you cook it will depend a lot on what kind of rice you're using. It should definitely be short grained, so it can easily stick together, but other than that, you'll have to see the cooking instructions on the packaging to see how to proceed.
* Once the rice is cooked, add the vinegar and set it aside to cool.
* Take your block of spam and cut it lengthwise into sheets that are about half an inch thick.
* Add oil to a non-stick pan and then place it on medium heat, later putting in the spam sheets and cooking both sides until they are nice and crispy.
* Mix together the water, soy sauce, and sugar together until they are well-incorporated, then place the mixture into the pan, giving the entirety of the spam slices a healthy coating. Cook until the liquid is reduced and the spam has a nice caramelized coating on top.
* Next, cut your nori sheets into either halves or thirds. If you cut it into halves, it will cover the entirety of the musubi, but with thirds, much of the rice and spam will be visible; which one you go with is up to personal choice.
* You'll then need to the prepared rice into a corresponding "spam-like" shape. The easiest way to do this is to have a musubi mold, but if you don't have one on hand, then a good substitute is to simply use the spam container to get the right shape. Pack and flatten out a portion of rice then place the spam container opening over it, removing excess rice around the edges to get the musubi form you're looking for.
* Finally, lay out a strip of nori, then place a section of rice down directly in the middle and then add the spam on top of that. Next, wrap the nori around the entire thing. There should be enough moisture to keep the nori sections sticking together, but if there isn't, add a little bit of water between the nori sections and they should start to congeal.

Notes

Nutritional Profile

Serving Size: ~8 oz.

Calories: 283

Fat: 12g

Saturated Fat: 4g

Cholesterol: 25mg

Carbohydrates: 41g

Sugar: 10g

Sodium: 830mg

Fiber: 1g

Protein: 8g

Helpful Tips

While the whole recipe isn’t overly complicated, a lot of the end result is dependent on technique rather than the ingredients used. There’s no need to get super fancy about it, but it’s a good idea to keep the following things in mind.

When cooking the spam in the pan, make sure the heat is on medium, gravitating towards the lower side. The goal of this step isn’t really to cook the spam, but to give it a super crispy coating that will cut down any greasy flavor and provide a good backdrop for the musubi sauce.

Of course, if crispy spam isn’t to your liking, then you might ask can you eat raw spam ? The answer to this is yes, you can, but it’s probably not going to be ideal from a texture or flavor standpoint. If you’re dead set on it though, you can marinate the spam in musubi sauce as an alternative to cooking it.

How you pack the rice together is also important. The key is to create a level of density that’s somewhere between extra thick and fluffy. If it’s not packed together well enough, it will start to fall apart, and if there’s too much rice the overall texture will be a bit heavy.

Getting Everything Together

Spam musubi can be unbelievably delicious and it’s good to have it at least once. It’s great for any number of occasions and the overall flavor and texture create a unique combination of characteristics that you’ll be hard pressed to find in many other foods, so give it a try!