Commonly found at Hawaiian barbecue joints and island-style plate-lunch eateries all around town, the Spam musubi is one of my all-time favorite snacks. It’s also one of those if you know, you know food experiences. I suppose the infamous canned cooked pork product is still a bit polarizing, and maybe not everybody loves a mound of steamed white rice as much as I do.
The latest snack shop in Chinatown has been built around the Japanese version of the musubi, and takes its name from this tasty morsel, too. Located in the increasingly busy and scrumptious Shanghai Plaza on Spring Mountain, O.Onigiri tacks on that extra “o” to represent Okinawa, the fifth-largest island of Japan, where these bites are most popular.
The biggest-selling onigiri here are the classic ($5.50), a rectangle of rice, Spam, tamagoyaki-style egg, teriyaki sauce and furikake wrapped in crisp nori; and the kimchi version ($6.75), with veggie Spam, egg and crisp, sour kimchi. Other filling options include fried oysters, shrimp salad or shrimp tempura, softshell crab, unagi, or crunchy and savory chicken or pork katsu. Though Spam is a base for the onigiri, you can order yours without it. The curry potato croquette ($7.50) is a particularly fantastic meatless choice.
O.Onigiri serves other savory small bites like spinach or pork gyoza ($6) and the battered octopus balls known as takoyaki ($6), along with various flavors of mochi ice cream for dessert. It’s a neat little eatery usually full of young people, so hit it when it first opens or in the late afternoon if you don’t want to wait for your onigiri sampling session, whether or not you’re down with the Spam.
O.ONIGIRI 4258 Spring Mountain Road #102, 702-844-8857. Daily, 11 a.m.-9 p.m.
