My brother grew up in Hawaii and about seven years ago my sister-in-law started making a feast of Hawaiian food; because it can be a bit time-consuming, she made it on Christmas day, when there was plenty of time and a few friends could come over. I was lucky to be able to be in town that year and share the delicious meal with them. Over time, the tradition has grown – this year about 30 people of all ages, backgrounds, and connections (or lack thereof) to Hawaii joined the festivities. This was also the year when the amazing Allison Robicelli wrote about Hawaiian Christmas for Food & Wine Magazine. This was the first year I was able to make it to New York in years, I was thrilled to get to help figure out and make this delicious vegan musubi.
All the eats so ono it broke da mouth.
4 cups rice, precooked
2 Tablespoon mirin/sweet sake
Extra Firm Tofu, sliced
Teriyaki Sauce
Hawaiian Seasoning Salt (onion flakes, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, garlic, parsley flakes)
Nori (seaweed) Sheets
Marinate tofu slices in teriyaki sauce (enough to ensure that all slices are covered) for at least 2 hours (up to overnight – the longer you marinate, the more taste the tofu will hold). Spread tofu on a baking sheet and bake at 400 until brown, flip to brown on both sides.
Prepare rice in a rice cooker with mirin (to the instructions of your rice cooker). For sticky rice, you really do need to use a rice cooker and not make it stove top. Put rice in refrigerator until it is cool enough to handle.
Press rice into musubi mold; if you don’t have a “proper” musubi mold, improvise (here we used a plastic storage container top. Gently pop pressed rice out of mold and sprinkle Hawaiian Seasoning Salt over the pressed rice and then a slice of tofu.
If using a musubi mold, wrap the whole block of rice and tofu in a sheet of nori, then slice into equal sized pieces. If using an improvised mold, cut the nori into strips and wrap each piece. Use water to seal the nori around the rice.
4 cups rice, precooked
2 Tablespoon mirin/sweet sake
Extra Firm Tofu, sliced
Teriyaki Sauce
Hawaiian Seasoning Salt (onion flakes, salt, pepper, red pepper flakes, garlic, parsley flakes)
Nori (seaweed) Sheets
Marinate tofu slices in teriyaki sauce (enough to ensure that all slices are covered) for at least 2 hours (up to overnight – the longer you marinate, the more taste the tofu will hold). Spread tofu on a baking sheet and bake at 400 until brown, flip to brown on both sides.
Prepare rice in a rice cooker with mirin (to the instructions of your rice cooker). For sticky rice, you really do need to use a rice cooker and not make it stove top. Put rice in refrigerator until it is cool enough to handle.
Press rice into musubi mold; if you don’t have a “proper” musubi mold, improvise (here we used a plastic storage container top. Gently pop pressed rice out of mold and sprinkle Hawaiian Seasoning Salt over the pressed rice and then a slice of tofu.
If using a musubi mold, wrap the whole block of rice and tofu in a sheet of nori, then slice into equal sized pieces. If using an improvised mold, cut the nori into strips and wrap each piece. Use water to seal the nori around the rice.