Chapter 2: Onigiri
"Hello again, Fate here with another brand new and exciting recipe brought to you live from the Testarossa household!"
Several cheers and applause came from the Division Six crew as they sat around the living room.
"Today we are going to have..." she looked over at the kitchen table with growing concern "three assistants this time"
"Yahoo!" the first one yelled out "Yagami Hayate desu~" she waved frantically "And with me are Signum and Shamal"
"A-anyway..." Fate sweat-dropped "Let's begin!"
"Right!" Hayate nodded and cleared her throat. "Today we are going to be teaching you how to make something rather simple: Onigiri" she held up a finished product "Mainly because certain people don't trust us around flaming objects" she glanced over at specific people in the crowd.
"So how do we begin?" Signum stood there in her apron, prepared to handle all tasks given to her by her master.
"Well lets start with what we need" Hayate walked up to the table and laid out several items. "We will need:
1) Freshly cooked rice
2) Sheets of nori seaweed, cut into strips
3) Salt
4)Fillings."
"Dont use long-grain rice" Shamal added in "They just don't work quite as well as they should. Just stick to the normal Japanese rice please~"
"Why not?" Signum tilted her head while looking at the rice label
"Well it's because the grains don't stick together" Hayate answered "Stick to the uruchi-mai. The rice grains cling together without being mushy when properly cooked. This rice must be washed to bring out its best flavor though, so be thorough."
"So what should we do next?" Shamal prepared three sets of rice bowls
"First wet your impeccably clean hands with cold water, and sprinkle them with salt." Hayate walked over to the sink and rinsed her hands thoroughly before walking back to the table with the salt shaker in her hands "Next you take the rice and place on one hand. Make a small indentation in the middle of the rice with your other hand and put your filling in there"
"Ooh" Shamal watched as Hayate took a piece of sausage and stuffed it inside
"Now working rapidly, wrap the rice around the filling, and form it into a ball. To make the traditional triangular shape, cup your hand sharply to form each corner, and keep turning it until you are happy with the shape." she presented a completed triangular riceball "Now for final touches, take the seaweed and cut it into strips."
"Like this?" Signum began cutting away
"Yes. The size of the strips will depend on the size of your riceball of course." Hayate nodded and took two strips and placed it around her completed product. "And there you have it! One complete riceball!"
"Hrmmm" Signum picked up a fair amount of rice and tried it "I can't seem to get things to stick properly" she frowned as her attempts were futile
"It doesn't really have to be triangular you know~" Hayate sweat-dropped
"What can we do to make it more triangular though?" Shamal looked at her somewhat rounded creation "You say the shape doesn't really matter, but we would like to at least try."
"Hrmm..." Hayate thought over things for a moment.
"Why don't you use plastic wrap?" Alicia called out from the audience area
"Ah! That's a good idea! I forgot about that" Hayate's light bulb turned on. "Allow me to demonstrate"
"Here you go" Nanoha came over from the side and prepared a roll of plastic wrap and several bowls
"Ok!" Hayate rolled up her sleeves "First you lay some of the plastic over the bowl and then you sprinkle some water in it just to get it wet, then follow it with some light salting."
"So it's the same thing as when you wet and salted your hands earlier" Signum observed
"That is correct" she smiled "Then you just place the rice in there loosely and put your filling in the middle of it." She put a piece of salmon this time "Then you add a little bit more rice on top and press down lightly to over the filling" she noticed that Signum and Shamal began doing their own little projects. "Once you do that, you can take the edges of the plastic wrap, scoop the entire rice segment and make sure to mesh the rice together to get rid of any excess air as well as ensure the salt sinks into the surface of the riceball.
"Looks tasty already!" Vivio called from the audience "I'm getting hungry~"
"From here" Hayate continued "you can form the riceball into any shape you want: be it triangles, stars, squares, anything!"
"Oooooh~" the audience looked over at Signum's creation, making the curious Hayate turn her head
"What the heck is that?!" she pointed at what looked to be the riceball version of Laevantine.
The "handle" portion of the sword was wrapped in seaweed, the blade section of it had several mini hotdogs all along its length
"Ok this is becoming something that it totally shouldn't be" Hayate hung her head as Signum held the 'sword' upright and looked at her creation
"But its fun~" Shamal presented her riceball which came in the form of a little kitten with seaweeds as its stripes and peas for eyes.
"I am not going to ask how you two made those..." the commander shook her head and turned back to her audience. "In any case, are there any questions?"
"Hai!" Subaru raised her hand "What kind of fillings would be good for those?"
"Hmmm, lets see..." Hayate looked up and pondered while her two assistants were busy showing each other the 'capabilities' of their creations " Some fillings you can put in are: pickled plum, bonito flakes just moistened with soy sauce, flaked cooked salted salmon, cooked salty cod roe, chopped up pickles, as well as some of the items we used today."
"Thanks~" Subaru noted them down
"Well that's it!" Hayate bowed as applause came from half of the audience and a sigh of relief came from the other half.
"On to the next game~" Momoko prepared the event on the living room table
"Oh yeah?" Signum's voice carried over from the kitchen in a seemingly small argument with Shamal "This has a special feature!" She raised the rice sword over her head much to everyone else's dismay "Shlongen Form!"
A/N: Ok another recipe down...I can only imagine what happened after that. Having that much rice to make a sword is going to be hell to clean up hahaha. In any case~ Thanks for reading ^.^