Seaweed and Rice Balls

I read of some research this week that showed that "Wakame" Seaweed helps lose weight.  I'm not sure how, but it was enough to inspire me to cook up a recipe that included it!  These seaweed and rice balls are really tasty.  They can be made with other types of seaweed - I use to always make them with Hijiki, but that can be hard to find.  Hijiki comes as small, thread like strands, so is used as is, whereas Wakame comes in bigger strips.  When dry, I use a pair if kitchen scissors to snip the strips across ways into small strands - they will expand quite a lot when cooking and you don't want big pieces that will make the balls fall apart.  Seaweed is also renowned for being high in minerals.

You can buy seaweed in packets in health food shops, so ask there if you can't find them on the shelf.  Some supermarkets may have it too, but generally only a very small range.

As with other recipes for balls, these can be made up as burgers too.

Many people like tartare sauce with seaweed and rice balls, as they do have a bit of an ocean-y flavour.  My kids just wanted to stick with tomato sauce though!  The flavour of the balls is quite strong, so I was happy with no sauce.  Its also nice with plum sauce or similar.

Egg Replacer is a starch mix that is available in packets in health food shops and some health food aisles in supermarkets.  I like to use it for balls, burgers, etc as it works well and is reasonably inexpensive.  You can just use eggs!

With the breadcrumbs, I crumb the bread with my "stick blender" using the grinding attachment, and just use a few crusts from the previous day's loaf - crumbing and adding in smallish amounts until the mixture is firm enough to make into balls.  Fresh breadcrumbs will work better than packaged dry ones for this.  You can always use a food processor to crumb leftover stale bread whenever you have a bit, and keep it in a container in the freezer.  Then you can just scoop out what you need easily.

This quantity makes enough for 4 people.  My children are small eaters, so I had enough leftover to freeze a few.  If making small burgers/rissoles, you'd get 8 to 10 small burgers.

Ingredients:

1 cup (uncooked) brown rice

about 20 grams wakame or hijiki (chop the wakame if using that - see note above)

2 tablespoons tamari or shoyu (good soy sauce)

2 eggs, or if you want to make the dish vegan, use "Egg Replacer" - equivalent to 2 eggs

Fresh brown breadcrumbs - up to about 2 cups

Method:

Cook the rice, seaweed and tamari in boiling water until the rice is very soft.  You can use the absorption method or just boil with lots of water, adding it as needed.  If you boil it with lots of water, add the tamari nearer the end when there is very little water left.  Once the rice is soft, drain any remaining water.

Add egg or egg replacer and mix it through.  Mix in enough breadcrumbs to make the mixture firm enough to shape into balls.

Shape into balls.  Heat a little oil in a frying pan.  Cook balls, turning when necessary, until golden all over.

Serve with some salad, veggies, potatoes cut into chips and baked, or something similar.