Furikake Recipe

Furikake are rice toppings which are made of dried seafood and seasonings.  Furikake is not typically made at home as a side dish, but is more often prepackaged products you buy at supermarkets and other stores in Japan.  However, if you don’t have access to shops that sell Furikake, it is easily made at home too.  There are many kinds of Furikake out there, but we will show you a very basic one with Nori and Katsuo (dried seaweeds and bonito flakes) here.

Furikake means literally “sprinkle” in Japanese, and it is typically sprinkled over Steamed Rice or Onigiri.  It could be sometimes used to top other food such as noodles and salad.  Other types of rice toppings like Tsukudani and Nametake, which are wet, should not be mixed with Furikake, because Furikake is completely dry and in a flakey/powdery form.

The main function of Furikake is to season rice, but it is usually not eaten with rice alone without other dishes.  However, when people have no time to cook or don’t have much appetite, Furikake works like a small side dish.  Some picky eater children in Japan who don’t want to eat any food still will eat rice and Furikake.  It doesn’t have much nutritional value, but it is better to eat something rather than nothing.  Furikake is also used as a splash of color for rice in Bento lunch.  When other dishes in Bento don’t have much color, using Furikake with pink and yellow ingredients brightens things up a bit.

If you go to Japanese supermarkets, you will see lots of convenient Furikake products.  Popular Furikake flavors are egg, Tarako (cod roe), salmon, and sesame and salt, and there are many others.  Because it is dried and strongly seasoned, and also with some help from preservatives, the shelf life of Furikake is long. We, as mothers, use convenient store-bought Furikake all the time when making Bento lunch for kids.  If you want to serve all natural food, however, home-made Furikake is the best choice.  There are no artificial ingredients in it, the taste is as good as the packaged ones, and it is very cheap to make!  Once you make it, it can be kept in an air-tight bag or container in the fridge and enjoyed for a whole month, so try it!

Print Recipe

5 from 1 vote

Furikake Reicpe

Cuisine: Japanese

Keyword: furikake

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Ingredients

• 1/2 cup Katsuobushi dried bonito flakes
• 2 tsp Soy Sauce
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 Tbsp sesame seeds toasted
• 1 Tbsp Nori roasted seaweed, cut into small pieces
• 1 Tbsp Aonori green seaweed powder

Instructions

• Put the Katsuobushi, crushing by hand, in a non-stick pan along with Soy Sauce and sugar. Cook at low heat about 5-6 minutes, stirring constantly and taking care not to burn. Katsuo may seize or clump but keep cooking and break apart as much as possible. Let cool on a vat completely, and crush into small pieces.
• Cut Nori into small pieces with kitchen scissors. Mix seasoned Katsuobushi, toasted sesame seeds, cut Nori, and Aonori together.

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