Chirashi Sushi Bowl (aka Superfood Bowl)

A Healthy Bowl Of Leftovers? Yes!

A Chirashi sushi bowl recipe (often Chirashizushi in Japanese restaurants) is one of my favourite meals for January. A very healthy complete meal full of vitamins, minerals and protein. This recipe is so easy to customize that it’s great for families with picky eaters.

How To Assemble Kashi or Bara Chirashi

Rice topped with beautifully arranged ingredients make a delicious and colorful dish for company or a perfect one bowl meal for movie night at home. Mix up your toppings for a beautiful and colorful presentation. The Japanese make it two separate ways: Kashi Chirashi (or simply chirashi) is seafood and toppings organized and artfully arranged. Often the fish is of higher quality and cut more precisely. Bara Chirashi is the scattering of the ingredients over top, often with the seafood cubed and marinated in a light soy dressing.

The Difference Between Sashimi, Poke, Ngiri and Chirashi

Sashimi is skillfully cut and presented fish with no rice or vegetables. Ngiri sushi is a single slice of seafood or Japanese omelet on a bite sized rectangle of rice, sometimes garnished with some wasabi or seaweed. Poke is the most similar looking to chirashi as it is served on top of rice in a bowl but the fish (usually tuna) is marinated in a sweet soy dressing. Poke is a mash-up of Japanese and Hawaiian flavours.

The Humble History Of The Chirashi Sushi Bowl

There are a few theories behind the origin of Chirashi, the seasoned rice dish with delectable ingredients scattered over the top. The word itself means to scatter. Some say it was during the 1600’s when Japanese people were ordered to live frugal lives including plain rice. To hide their seafood and vegetables the people would put them at the bottom of their bowl, hiding them from enforcement officials with a heap of plain rice. Once the diner had a safe or private place to eat, they would turn their bowl upside down and secretly enjoy their luxurious dinner.

The less exciting but very practical theory is that Chirashi was created to use up the less attractive pieces of fish leftover from making sashimi and ngiri. Restaurant versions favor raw fish but home cooks often use bits of cooked seafood.

So with that bit of history, you can see how versatile this dish is! This easy sushi dish is a fantastic way to use up leftover bits of cooked or raw seafood and vegetables from the week.

How To Eat Chirashi

Chirashi is eaten like sushi. Traditionally you eat it with chopsticks and a small dish of soy sauce to dip your bites into lightly. Season your soy sauce dip with a little wasabi to taste, if you like. It is better to dip your bites into the soy sauce as you go rather than pour soy all over the bowl because of the different treatment and flavours in the bowl. Some items are better without soy and some with. You can eat your rice with bites of fish, or eat the fish alone as you do with sashimi and alternate with bites of rice to cleanse your palate between bites.

Japanese Style Eggs On Rice

In a true Japanese Chirashi, the ingredients are all prepared separately with their own marinade or seasoning. This can make the dish quite time consuming but my version is simplified with a dressing to lightly pour over the artfully arranged ingredients once they have adorned the rice. I have included the cucumber salad, seasoned mushrooms and Japanese omelet recipes because they are easy and add much to the variety of flavours. (Here on the West Coast, we have a lot of Asian influenced food. One of my personal favourites are my Miso Baked Oysters, a riff on Oysters Motoyaki.)

Traditional toppings include seaweed, cucumber, raw or cooked fish, crab, octopus or prawns, tobiko, egg (japanese omelet), seasoned mushrooms, shiso or microgreens, shredded or finely sliced carrot and daikon, edamame, lotus root and more. Less traditional but also delicious toppings include avocado, cabbage or fresh herbs like mint or cilantro. You can go crazy and use it all or just choose your favourite few. We usually choose egg as a protein and sometimes one type of seafood followed by 3 vegetables and some seaweed as garnish. Get creative and add really anything at all, just slice it small or thin and arrange it attractively.

The Easiest Recipe For Japanese Chirashi Zushi

Please don’t be daunted by all the ingredients, I’ve included a long list so you can choose your favourites, I don’t expect anyone to use all of them. Start cooking your rice and you can make the toppings while it cooks or make the toppings ahead of time. Assembling a Chirashi bowl is just like assembling a salad. Go all out with luxury or keep it minimal and just choose 2 veggies, 1 or 2 proteins and a garnish and you’ve got a healthy and delicious dish.

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PPS. If you like this recipe, you might also like my Tuna Nicoise Salad recipe or the Mexican Tuna Ceviche recipe.

Happy, healthy eating my Friends, kanpai!

Chirashi Sushi Bowl (Chirashizushi)

A delicious and beautiful dish full of superfoods and easy to customize for picky eaters. This healthy bowl is also a fun way to use up small amounts of leftover seafood and vegetables and very easy to make. Traditionally made with white sushi rice but for a healthy alternative, substitute short grain brown rice. To take it up a notch, you can add the sweet rice vinegar seasoning to the rice but this is optional. This is also easily made vegetarian by omitting the seafood and utilizing the edamame or omelet for protein.

5 from 21 votes

Print Pin Rate

Course: Dinner, Lunch, Main, Seafood, Vegetarian

Cuisine: Asian, canadian, Japanese

Keyword: Bowl, Chirashi, Easy, Easy Recipe, Healthy, Rice, Sushi, Sustainable Seafood

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 50 minutes

Servings: 4

Author: Sabrina Currie

Ingredients

Chirashi Sushi Toppings And Garnishes

• Cooked and shelled edamame beans, wakame or nori seaweed, thinly sliced, shredded or julienne carrot and daikon (Japanese radish), thinly sliced sushi grade raw seafood or bits of cooked seafood
• Seasoned mushrooms, cucumber and omelet (recipes below)
• Garnishes: Wasabi, pickled ginger, shiso leaves or microgreens, sliced scallions, sesame seeds, tobiko, lotus root, edible flowers such as shiso or thyme flowers (the Japanese love a beautiful dish!)

Seasoned Sushi Rice

• 1.5 c Short grain white or brown rice, cooked according to package.
• 3 tbsp Rice Vinegar
• 2 tbsp Sugar
• 1/2 tsp Salt

Cucumber Salad

• 1 c Cucumbers, sliced very thin in rounds
• 1/4 c Rice Vinegar
• 1 tsp Sugar

Sweet Seasoned Shiitake Mushrooms

• 1 c Shiitake Mushroom, sliced 1/4"
• 2 tbsp Mirin (sweet Japanese cooking wine) or 1 tsp sugar and 1 tbsp water
• 1 tbsp Soy Sauce
• 1 tsp Vegetable Oil

Japanese Omelet

• 2 Eggs
• 1 tsp Sugar
• pinch Salt

Chirashi Sushi Dressing

• 2 tbsp Mirin or 2 tsp each sugar and water
• 2 tbsp Soy Sauce
• 2 tbsp Rice Vinegar
• 1 tbsp Vegetable Oil
• 1 tbsp Green Tea or water

Instructions

Seasoned Sushi Rice

• Once you've cooked your rice, mix vinegar, sugar and salt together and sprinkle over rice. Stir gently and leave to cool until ready to serve. *Note, seasoning the rice is optional. Also, if you have kombu seaweed, you can add a chunk to the rice while it cooks to add more authentic Japanese flavour.

Cucumber Salad

• Combine sliced cucumber, vinegar and sugar and let sit until ready to use, up to 4 hours. Drain cucumber before adding to dish.
  

Sweet Seasoned Shiitake Mushrooms

• Toss all ingredients with mushrooms and add to a small non-stick pan. Cook gently on medium low until the liquid is almost evaporated. Let cool, then use for topping dish.

Japanese Omelet

• Beat eggs well with sugar and salt. Preheat a large pan on medium, oil very lightly and then pour in eggs to make a paper thin omelet. Once cooked through (only about 1 minute), cool slightly, roll onto a plate and once it is room temperature, slice it into julienne (thin) strips.
  

Chirashi Sushi Dressing

• Mix all ingredients together and lightly spoon over arranged Chirashi bowls.
  

Assembly

• Fill the bottom half of your bowl with 1 cup of rice. Then artfully arrange your chosen ingredients on top and gently spoon a few teaspoons of dressing over any unseasoned toppings and enjoy. Serve with additional soy sauce for dipping if desired. Kanpai!