Although Japanese food is mainly raw fish, crude vegetables and rice, there are many ways of combining them into different forms of sushi, and each combination has a name and special preparation. This list shows the most popular sushi types among the occidental people.

Hashi

Those are the wooden chopsticks used to eat Japanese food. It is said that the contact with metal from fork and knife may corrupt the sushi taste.

Nori

Algae sheet used to bind the rice with the raw fish.

Gari

It's sliced ginger. Japanese eat it between one sushi and the next to clean the taste, so the first sushi doesn't interfere with the taste of the next one.

Wasabi

It's a condiment made from the powder of the root of the plant above. This spicy condiment usually is mixed in the shoyu sauce and enhances the fish taste.

Sashimi

Mainly, raw fish slices. The popular ones are salmon and tuna, and the noble part is the fish's belly. For someone who is just beginning to appreciate Japanese Food, the taste of sashimi may need some getting used to.

Nigiri-Zushi

It is a slice of raw fish over a little amount of pressed rice seasoned with vinegar. It may or may not be tied by a nori stripe.

Temaki

A tiny piece of raw fish wrapped in seasoned rice and enrolled in a nori cone. In Japan it is sold in cigar shape, but there are many places where it is a cone sushi.

Oshizushi

Oshizushi is very much like a Nigiri-Zushi, but the whole piece of fish and rice is pressed inside that wooden box.

The final result is this:

It doesn't need algae stripes to be firm.

Gunkanmaki

A strong tasted maki. It is a small amount of salmon eggs enrolled in nori. Its taste also demands some getting used to.

Uramaki

It is a kind of inverted Sushi. The rice goes out and the fish and vegetables inside. The most popular Uramaki was invented in USA, with the name of California. It takes crab, cucumber, mayonnaise and avocado. I'm not a fan; it tastes like rotten fruit salad.

Hosomaki

It's a small sushi roll. Usually, it has only one ingredient inside the rice and the nori (not the case of that one up here). The most popular ingredients are cucumber, tuna and pickles.

Futomaki

It's a huge hosomaki with much more ingredients inside, as vegetables, fish slices and eggs. The rice portion is larger.

Chirashi

It's a kind of meal with raw fish, sea-food and fish eggs; all of it over a layer of vinegar seasoned rice.

That is it. I hope I was of any help.

The problem is the Onigiri's ingredients wasnt found in hawaii so the japanese immigrants improvised. They used spam to make Onigiri, seeing that the spam is rectangularly shaped, they molded the rice to he spam's shape. Hawaii became a state in those days so people called it Spam Musubi. Other people that lived in hawaii back then altered the recipe.

They added terriyaki sauce, they also put tamagoyaki(japanese omellette) which was wrapped with the spam with nori(dried seaweed) and they also put furikake(a japanese seasoning composed off small shredded pieces of nori, sesame seeds, sugar, salt and monosodium glutamate).

Ingredients

• 3 cups uncooked short- or medium-grain rice
• 4 cups water
• 5 sheets of sushi nori (seaweed in big squares):

• 1 (12-ounce) can Spam luncheon meat

• (optional)1/4 cup soy sauce
• (optional)1/4 cup sugar
• (optional)1/4 cup rice wine (mirin)

• Water

(This recipe is meant to make multiple spam musubis not only one)

Procedure

Rice

First, wash and clean rice. Then let rice soak in water for 30 minutes so it will be soft. Cook rice in any way you can including boiling it or using a rice cooker, but make sure the rice is moist, but not too moist or it will become saggy.

Nori(dried seaweed)

There are two ways to wrap a spam musubi with nori: partial wrap or full wrap. I mostly prefer full wrap so you can taste the seaweed in all of your bites, but people also use partial wrap.

Partial wrap:

Full wrap:

Spam

Cut Spam into 8 rectangular slices approximately 1/4-inch thick. In a large ungreased frying pan over medium heat, fry slices until brown and slightly crispy. Remove from heat, drain on paper towels, and set aside.

Optional Spam Marination

In a small saucepan over high heat, add soy sauce, sugar, and rice wine; bring just to a boil, then remove from heat. Add fried Spam slices to soy sauce mixture, turning them to coat with the sauce; let spam slices sit in marinade until ready to use.

Water

Put water in a small bowl to use as a seal for the edges of nori for wrapping later on. Then set aside.

Spam Musubi (with mold):

Using a Spam Musubi press, place a piece of nori on a plate. Position press on top of the nori so the length of the press is in the middle of the nori (widthwise). The press and the width of the nori should fit exactly the length of a slice of Spam. (Note: If you don't have a musubi maker, you can use the empty Spam can by opening both sides, creating a musubi mold.)

Spread approximately 1/4 cup cooked rice across the bottom of the musubi maker, on top of the nori; press rice down with flat part of the press to compact the rice until it is 1/4-inch thick (add more rice if necessary). Place a slice of Spam on top of the rice (it should cover most of the length of the musubi maker).

Cover with an additional 1/4 cup cooked rice; press until 1/4-inch thick. remove the musubi from the press by pushing the whole stack down (with the flat part of the press) while lifting off the press. Fold one end of nori over the musubi and press lightly onto the rice.

Wet the remaining end slightly with water, then wrap over musubi and other piece of nori; press down on the other end. Cut log into 4 pieces. Repeat with the other 7 Spam slices, making sure to rinse off musubi maker after each use to prevent if from getting too sticky.

Spam Musubi (without spam musubi mold)

Use your hands to mold a block of rice the two times the length of the spam musubi (but same shape as spam). Put the spam on top of the block of rice. Then mold another block of rice the size and shape of the spam and put it on top of the spam. After that wrap the block of spam and rice with nori and seal the edges with water(rub water on edges not soak it).

Here is the Final Product (partially and fully wrapped)

You should try making this. Spam musubi is a popular snack for children and good for field trips. It's popular in Hawaii, but I'm not sure if it is in North America. Either way it is still a good snack due to it's taste and portability.