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Vegan Unagi Onigiri

September 23, 2020 by Lisa Le 4 Comments

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 These vegan unagi onigiri (vegan fish rice balls) make for a delicious portable lunch! It’s very kid-friendly and super cute too :)

Vegan unagi onigiri in a bento box on top of a napkin, with another layer of onigiri behind

Fall is here, which means it’s the best time to go hiking. And besides beautiful views, the smell of crunchy leaves, and beautiful trees to peep, you need epic hiking food! I’ve made these vegan unagi onigiri for lunch after tubing during the summer, but it’s perfect for a compact bento box to bring on a hike (or for work or school lunches). The more you make them, the better and faster you get, and it’s easy to make a batch of this if you’re making lunches for multiple people (i.e. children).

My mom would make plain rice balls to eat when we were feeling lazy for dinner, so these would be easy as an “interactive” dinner as well, but I don’t have kids, and when my brother was a kid he didn’t enjoy getting his hands dirty so meals like this were not his favourite.

Close up of 8 onigiri in the bento box layer, on top of a striped grey napkin with chopsticks

I’ve found myself missing sushi a lot lately and wanted more variety than just cucumber and avocado rolls and simple miso onigiri, although I did really enjoy this vegan chicken salad onigiri but I’m still not that great at making sure they keep their shape in the triangle form. I recently bought umeboshi (Japanese pickled plums) for more traditional onigiri as well, so I’m sure you’ll see some of that pop up on the blog or Instagram soon!

two layers of onigiri bento diagonally across the photo

If you want to see how I made these, be sure to check out my YouTube video, or a very quick and simplified version on my Instagram.

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Yield: ~2 servings

Vegan Unagi Onigiri

Vegan Unagi Onigiri

Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Total Time 1 hour

Ingredients

For the Unagi Sauce

  • 1/4 cup (60 mL) tamari
  • 1/4 cup (60 mL) seasoned mirin
  • 1/4 cup (50 g) white sugar

For the Onigiri

  • 1 cup (160g) of short grain rice, cooked
  • 1/2 cup (125 mL) frozen corn, blanched and drained
  • 1/2 cup (125 mL) frozen peas, blanched and drained
  • 1 scant cup of vegan fish, panfried (you can sub smoked tofu, fried tofu, or baked tofu)
  • 1 tbsp (15 mL) seasoned mirin
  • 3 tbsp (45 mL) of unagi sauce
  • 2 tbsp (30 mL) furikake (or 2 tbsp of shredded nori + 1 tsp toasted sesame seeds)

Instructions

  1. Make the unagi sauce by combining tamari (or soy sauce), seasoned mirin (a type of Japanese sweetened rice wine), and sugar. Cook over medium heat to dissolve sugar for about 5 minutes until reduced to half the liquid amount (you should have about 1/3 cup).
  2. If you're using vegan fish like I did in the video, slice into 1/4 inch pieces and panfry on each side until crisp. Cut into pea-sized cubes.
  3. To make the onigiri, combine cooked rice, drained peas and corn, diced vegan fish, 1 tbsp mirin, 2-3 tbsp unagi (start with 2, taste, then add more if you want more), and 2 tbsp of furikake. Mix well until everything is evenly seasoned.
  4. Use a piece of plastic wrap to form 1-inch rice balls, press just until the rice sticks to each other (avoid breaking the rice). Place in bento box on a sheet of nori, shiny side up. Alternatively you can use silicone mini-muffin molds to separate the onigiri.
© Lisa Le
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Filed Under: Appetizers & Sides, Gluten-Free, Lunch, Vegan recipes Tagged With: bento lunch, hike, lunch ideas, onigiri, vegan bento, vegan onigiri, vegan unagi onigiri

About Lisa Le

Lisa is the thirty-something, nerdy, procrastinating, feminist blogger and photographer behind The Viet Vegan. She loves spicy foods, noodles, and food in bowls.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Carolyn Dabney says

    November 17, 2020 at 9:05 AM

    Can anything be substituted for the unagi sauce?

    Reply
  2. Carolyn says

    November 18, 2020 at 8:38 PM

    When searching for unagi sauce I found out it is made from eels. Since I can’t find it anyway I think I’ll substitute my homemade teriyaki sauce. Do you think that will work or is there something better?

    Reply
  3. Carolyn says

    November 19, 2020 at 6:54 AM

    I don’t know how I missed that you gave a recipe for the unagi sauce. I went straight to the body of the recipe. I’m so sorry! Now I can make this, it looks like such a great recipe! Thank you!

    Reply
    • Lisa Le says

      November 20, 2020 at 1:55 PM

      Oh sorry I didn’t have a chance to answer your comment before haha, yes, I’m glad you found the unagi sauce recipe :D

      Reply

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