Musubi for Lynn

o-musubi made with barazushi. YUM!

The other day I posted a picture on facebook of a picture of my lunch musubi made with some barazushi I made with hapa rice (brown and white rice). Barazushi is sushi rice with seasoned veggies. I used dried shitake mushrooms, carrots and string  beans with pickled ginger.

An friend from my old neighborhood who now lives in Texas saw the picture and asked for the recipe. I decide instead of just email it to just her, post it to share with whoever would like. It's a bit complicated but so good. I hope the recipe doesn't scare her off. Enjoy!

Barazushi Musubi
Makes about 6–8 musubis depending on the size

Sushi rice, see recipe below
Seasoned  Shitake Mushroom and Carrots, see recipe below 
1/4 to 1/2 c string beans, julienne and blanch
1/4 c pickled ginger, sliced thin
nori
salt

Sushi Rice
3 c of cooked rice, short or medium grain rice [I mixed half of white and brown rice]
1/2c rice vinegar
6 T sugar
1 1/2 T salt
Combine vinegar, sugar and salt and heat till sugar and salt is dissolved. Cool vinegar mixture. Then toss with hot rice. Don't over mix or mash the rice.

Seasoned  Shitake Mushroom and Carrots
6-8 dried shitake mushrooms, soaked in hot water until tender, squeeze out excess water then sliced thin
1/2 c julienne carrots
1 1/2 c dashi (you can dried dashi base, I used hondashi I got as the Asian food store, if you can't find it, I think you probably can substitute water or vegetable stock)
2 T sale
12 salt
1T Shoyu

Combine dashi, sake and sugar with mushrooms and carrots and cook for  5–6 minutes. Add salt and shoyu and cook over low heat until tender and sauce evaporates. 

Barazushi
Combine sushi rice, mushrooms, carrots, string beans and ginger. Be careful not to over mix so rice doesn't come a sticky mess. At this point, you can serve the rice. You also can add thinly slice nori and thin one egg omelet sliced thin.

Musubi (rice ball)
You can make with plain rice and add a little filling in the middle. My favorite umeboshi ( pickled salted plum). It goes perfect with rice and the nori. You also can add pickle ginger or seasoned tuna. 
Cut nori into strips of 1-1 1/2" strips [I used giant strip because I was too lazy to cut at 6am in the morning)
The amount of rice depends on how big you want it. I think I use about 1/2 c

Wet your hands, sprinkle salt [with the barazushi rice, I sprinkled just a little because it is seasoned already]. Place the hot/warm rice in salt hands. At this point, you can add a filling into the center of the rice mound. Then start shaping it into triangular shape by cupping and pressing your hands around the rice. Once you get it into the shape you want, add the strip of nori around the rice and press the into the musubi. 

And there you have it, the perfect hand food!