What is furikake?

The short answer

Furikake is a dry seasoning you sprinkle over rice. Most blends are built from toasted nori, sesame seeds, salt, sugar, and dried bonito, sometimes with bits of egg or vegetable. It adds salt, a little sweetness, and that toasty seaweed flavor in one shake. In musubi, a pinch between the rice and the Spam is what pulls the whole thing together.

The common kinds

• Nori komi furikake. Seaweed and sesame forward. This is the one to grab for musubi, and the one people mean when they just say furikake.
• Seto fumi furikake. A little sweeter, with bonito and egg. Great on a plain bowl of rice.
• Salmon or shiso. Flavored blends that lean savory or bright. Fun to keep around once you have the basic bottle.

Where it comes from

The word furikake just means to sprinkle over, which tells you most of what you need to know. The seasoning itself is not ancient. It goes back to around 1916, in the Taisho era, and the usual story credits a pharmacist in Kumamoto named Suekichi Yoshimaru.

He was worried about how little calcium people were getting. His answer was to grind fish bone fine, mix it with roasted sesame, poppy seed, and seaweed, and sell it as something you could shake over a bowl of rice. He called it Gohan no Tomo, friend of rice, which is still one of the better product names anyone has come up with.

Other companies made their own versions over the following decades, and by the postwar years it was a normal thing to have on the table. Marumiya's Noritama, the one with egg in it, came out in 1960 and is still probably the most recognized blend in Japan. The name furikake got standardized as the general term for the whole category around the late 1950s.

It reached Hawaii the same way shoyu and rice and mochi did, with Japanese families who came to work the plantations. Once it was here it stopped being strictly Japanese and became a local pantry staple. Furikake on popcorn, furikake on chex mix, furikake crusted ahi. None of that is traditional and all of it is normal in Hawaii.

What is actually in the bottle

Flip a bottle over and you will usually find some combination of these.

• Nori. Toasted seaweed, cut or torn small. This is the flavor most people picture when they think furikake.
• Sesame seeds. White, black, or both, toasted. They bring the nutty side and most of the texture.
• Salt and sugar. The seasoning backbone. Japanese blends usually run a touch sweeter than people expect.
• Bonito, katsuobushi. Dried, smoked, fermented skipjack tuna, shaved fine. This is where the savory depth comes from. Blends without it taste flatter, so if you need it vegetarian, check the label carefully because bonito is in most of the standard ones.
• Egg. Little dried yellow bits, sweet and mild. That is what makes a noritama blend look speckled.
• MSG. Often listed as monosodium glutamate. Common, and part of why the stuff is so hard to stop eating.

The brands you will see

You do not need to be picky here, but a few names come up over and over.

Nori Komi Furikake is the plain seaweed and sesame one, sold by JFC and others in a green bottle or a bag. This is the musubi one and the one I keep in the cupboard.

Marumiya Noritama is the egg blend, sweeter and softer, and a favorite with kids on plain rice.

Futaba Seto Fumi is bonito forward with a little egg, sold in small packets. Good on rice, a bit much for musubi.

Ajishima makes a wide range including wasabi, salmon, and shiso, usually in larger bags. Their multi-pack of small bottles is a cheap way to find out which one you actually like.

Make your own

Store bought is genuinely fine and I use it most of the time. But homemade furikake is ten minutes of work, it tastes fresher and more toasted, and you control the salt. It also solves the vegetarian problem, since you just leave the bonito out.

From there you can push it around. A pinch of shichimi togarashi for heat, dried shiso for something bright and herbal, wasabi powder, or a little dried orange peel. Keep any additions dry, since moisture is what makes furikake go soft and clumpy.

Storing it

Airtight, dark, and dry. A cupboard is better than the counter, and the counter is better than the fridge, because a cold jar pulls condensation every time you open it.

An unopened bottle keeps for a year or more. Once it is open, the nori slowly loses its crispness and the flavor flattens out. It will not spoil in any dramatic way, it just gets boring, so I try to finish a bottle within a few months. Homemade goes faster, about a month at its best.

If it has gone soft, spread it on a sheet pan in a low oven for a few minutes to dry it back out.

Other ways to use it

Once a bottle is open you will reach for it constantly. It is good on:

• A plain bowl of hot rice
• Popcorn, believe it or not
• Avocado toast and fried eggs
• Roasted vegetables and baked potatoes
• Poke bowls and musubi, of course

Where to find it

Any Japanese or Asian grocery store will have a shelf of it. On the mainland, the easiest way is usually to order a bottle online and keep it in the cupboard. It lasts a long time.

Check furikake on Amazon

Questions I get

Is furikake the same as nori komi?

Nori komi furikake is one kind of furikake, the plain seaweed and sesame one. Furikake is the whole category. When someone in Hawaii says just furikake, they almost always mean nori komi.

Is it gluten free?

Often not. Many blends include shoyu or a wheat-based seasoning, and some have wheat starch. Read the label rather than assuming.

Is it vegetarian?

Usually not, because of the bonito. Vegetarian blends exist and are labeled as such, or make the version above and skip the bonito.

How much do I use on musubi?

A thin, even layer over the rice before you press, enough to see it clearly but not enough to make a crust. Roughly a quarter teaspoon per musubi. Some people season the rice again on top of the Spam, which I like when the furikake is the plain kind.

Can I mix it into the rice instead?

You can, and it seasons more evenly, but you lose the little band of dark seaweed running through the middle that makes a cut musubi look right.

Does it need refrigerating?

No, and it is better if you do not. See storing, above.

Put it to work

Furikake earns its place in the pantry the first time you make musubi with it. Here is the recipe: how to make spam musubi. If you want to go further with it, the variations page leans on furikake in a few places.