Love it or not, Spam is the foundation for classic Hawaiian Musubi served at lunch counters across the islands and at mainland specialty cafes. We actually love Spam this classic way, and think you will too. But, just in case, we offer up 4 ways to craft a Musubi platter for everyone at the table, including crispy fried pork tonkatsu and fresh tempura shrimp which are great substitutes for Spam. And if you’d like a vegan version, try Omni Plant Based Meat Style Luncheon slices for the protein. Add some of your favorite thinly sliced vegetables such as avocado, carrot, and cabbage and give it a shake of umami packed furikake to top it off. Try this with tofu, fried chicken or fish too.
Serves: 4
Difficulty: easy
Prep time: 20 min
Cook time: 20 min
Diet: GF
Ingredients
Classic Spam Musubi & Plant Based Musubi
12 oz Spam, sliced ¼” thick horizontally
For Plant Based version use the Omni Plant Based product noted above
2 eggs, beaten, cooked through ¼” thick
2 sheets nori
Musubi dressing (recipe follows)
3 c cooked short grain white rice, cooled to handle
Furikake seasoning if desired
Musubi Dressing
¼ c GF oyster sauce
¼ c tamari/GF soy sauce
⅓ c sugar
Combine all well. Reserve until ready to glaze Musubi.
Steps
Pan fry spam slices over medium heat, glazing generously with musubi dressing. Set aside.
Cut each nori sheet into 4 long strips, 2” wide. Lightly wet the end of one strip and place another dry strip of nori just over the wet end to create one very long strip (double length of original roughly).
Shape ¼” cup of cooked rice in the center of the strip (over wet seam area) and top with a slice of cooked egg and a piece of cooked spam.
Quickly wrap nori around musubi, wetting loose ends slightly to seal. Glaze top with more musubi dressing. Sprinkle with furikake if using. Repeat with remaining slices of spam. Chill until ready to serve.
If using tempura shrimp, pork tonkatsu or vegan luncheon slices follow the same directions as above, placing desired thinly cut vegetables (carrot, avocado, cabbage) in place of egg and topping with cooked shrimp/pork/etc. Glaze with musubi dressing and serve at room temp.
Additional Musubi Recipes
Pork Tonkatsu
8 oz pork loin chops cut thinly, pounded flat and cut to 2”x4” strips
2 eggs beaten
1 c flour
1 c panko bread crumbs
Vegetable oil for frying
Season pork with salt and pepper. Dip into flour, then egg, and then panko. Fry over medium heat in hot oil until golden brown and cooked through, 4 min. Chill until ready to assemble.
Shrimp Tempura
8 medium prawns, split and skewered
¼ c corn starch
1 c flour
1 egg beaten
1 c water
Pinch salt
Combine shrimp and corn starch. Mix flour, egg, water and salt well. Dip shrimp into batter covering very well. Fry in 1” of hot vegetable oil, turning often until golden brown, 2 min. Remove from oil and drain on a paper towel until ready to assemble musubi.
