Omurice. A delicious and popular Japanese fried rice covered in a luscious blanket of soft scrambled eggs with a tangy ketchup sauce.
Japanese omurice is a tasty and iconic fusion dish inspired by Western food thanks to the western ingredients.
There are many variations of omurice, ranging in different accompanying sauces to a variety of proteins. The one I'm teaching today is with spam using a demi-glace sauce.
Popular in Japan
This popular comfort food has gone viral on social media and is sold all over the streets of Japan. There's a famous restaurant in Japan, called Kichi Kichi, which is renowned for their omelet rice thanks to their fluffy omelette that comes in an oval shape, which is different from the tornado thin omelette. The Chef of Kichi Kichi is also quite entertaining to watch as he cooks his Japanese omelette rice.
Different sauces
This dish is usually served on the side of the bowl with a tangy demi-glace sauce, a Japanese curry sauce or sometimes a white sauce. If you want to make this an easy recipe, you can skip making the sauce and drizzle ketchup on top of the omelette.
What does Omurice mean?
The word omurice is a blend of two words "omelette" and "rice". It's a western-influenced Japanese dish that contains fried rice with an egg omelette on top with a sweet tomato sauce. It's become incredibly popular for good reason in Japanese cuisine thanks to its western influence.
Ingredients
You will need the following omurice ingredients. ***Please scroll down to the recipe card below to find full instructions and details***
Fried rice:
- Cooked rice: Sushi rice or jasmine rice will work well for this recipe. You may use same day cooked rice or leftover rice. Old rice works well in fried rice but it's not mandatory for this dish.
- Spam: or ham or minced beef or chicken. Spam is a great way to keep it simple as it offers a delicious flavor and saltiness to the white rice.
- Onion: A small onion gives this rice dish a lovely fragrant aroma that is much needed in fried rice.
- Frozen mixed veggies: Make sure to give these a rinse under cold water to thaw them before frying. This will make this dish an easy omurice recipe so you can skip chopping your vegetables. If you can also replace the frozen mixed veggies with green peas, diced carrots, corn, or simply omit them altogether.
- Ketchup: This is a common ingredient used in omu rice. It's first fried with the rice. Ketchup is also added to the demi-glace or omurice sauce or it's drizzled over top of the yellow omelette.
- Soy sauce: Just your regular all-purpose soy sauce. The label should simply say "Soy Sauce" without the words "light soy sauce" or "dark soy sauce". You may substitute with low sodium soy sauce if you wish.
- Sesame oil: This offers a nutty flavor to the ketchup rice.
- Avocado oil or any neutral oil: You may use any neutral oil like peanut oil, grapeseed oil, vegetable oil, or canola oil. Avoid using olive oil as it carries a slight scent and taste.
Omurice sauce:
- Avocado oil or any neutral oil
- Ketchup: This is the main components to this Japanese rice omelette. It's used in the sauce to give it a tangy sweet taste!
- Soy sauce
- Tonkatsu sauce: A popular Japanese sauce that is tangy, sweet, dark and thick. It gives the sauce a depth of flavor and compliments the western omelette.
- Sugar: To help sweeten the sauce and balance out the saltiness from the soy sauce.
- Water
- Milk: To give the sauce a creamy taste.
- Cornstarch: To help thicken the sauce.
Omurice Omelette:
- Avocado oil or any neutral oil: To coat your dry skillet with enough oil so that the beaten egg doesn't stick.
- Large eggs: To make your creamy egg omelette. For a very yellow omelette, opt for Free-Range or Free-Run eggs with Omega 3's.
- Salt: A pinch of salt really helps to season the egg mixture.
How to make Omurice
Below are visuals to show you how to make this omurice recipe. ***Please scroll down to the recipe card below to find full instructions and details***
Fried rice:
- Dice spam into small cubes or small pieces.
- In a pan set over medium high heat, add oil, followed by onions and diced spam. Fry until onions are translucent and spam is slightly brown.
- Add in rinsed mixed vegetables. Fry until veggies have softened, about 1-2 minutes.
- Toss in cooked rice and break it down into granules. Mix everything together.
- Season rice with soy sauce, ketchup and sesame oil. Give it a mix until every rice granule is colored brown.
- Transfer rice into two serving plate(s) and shape it into a dome. Alternatively, you can pack the fried rice into a dome-like medium bowl and then place a larger shallow bowl over top of the rice. Let it set for 1 minute. Then flip it over and remove the medium bowl.
How to make Omurice Egg
There are two ways to make it the omurice egg, an easy way and a fancier challenging way:
Easy way:
- Beat 2 eggs together.
- In a clean frying pan about 8 inches wide on low-medium heat, add oil.
- Pour eggs into the pan.
- Lightly scramble for 5 seconds until the eggs are about 85% cooked through and remove from heat. Let the egg slide on top of the fried rice.
- Repeat the above steps for the second omelette.
Fancy way:
- In a small bowl, beat 2 eggs (per serving).
- In a small non-stick pan (8 inches wide) set over low-medium heat, add oil.
- Pour your eggs into the pan and let it bubble to create a solid base.
- Quickly insert wooden chopsticks positioned at a 45-degree angle from each other along the edges of the pan. Then slowly bring chopsticks toward the center.
- Hold the wooden chopstick in the center, only rotating the pan so your egg becomes a tornado shape.
- Once your egg pancake or egg tornado is cooked, with the help of the chopsticks slide it over your fried rice dome. Repeat this process again with the remaining egg for the second omelette.
Demi-Glace Sauce
- In a small saucepan, add your sauce ingredients and whisk them together.
- Then bring it to a boil over medium-high heat, while stirring.
- Once sauce as thickened, remove off heat and pour half of it around or on top the omelette fried rice. Enjoy!
Other recipes you may like!
If you enjoyed this:
- Thai Spicy Basil Fried Rice
- Kimchi Sausage Fried Rice
- Spam Fried Rice
- Chinese Chicken Fried Rice
- Chicken Pineapple Fried Rice
- Pineapple Fried Rice
- Kimchi Fried Rice
- Egg Tofu Fried Rice
I hope you give my Omurice with Spam a try and enjoy it!
If you enjoyed my Omurice recipe, please leave a star rating and share it with your family and friends or on social media! Take a picture of your re-creation and make sure to tag me @ChristieAtHome in your feed or stories as I would love to see it!
Christie
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Omurice
Ingredients
Fried rice
- 4 cups white rice cooked (sushi or jasmine rice works best to hold the dome shape)
- 1 ¼ cup spam diced
- ½ yellow onion diced
- 2 cup mixed veggies frozen kind rinsed in water and strained
- 3 tbsp ketchup
- 2 tbsp soy sauce (not light or dark soy sauce)
- 1 tsp sesame oil
- 1 tsp avocado oil or any neutral oil
Omelette
- 4 large eggs
- 2 tbsp avocado oil or any neutral oil
- ¼ tsp salt
Demi-glace sauce
- 5 tbsp. ketchup
- 1 tbsp. soy sauce (not light or dark soy sauce)
- 1 tbsp. Tonkatsu sauce store bought
- 1 tbsp sugar or white sugar
- 1 tsp avocado oil or any neutral oil
- ½ tbsp cornstarch
- ¾ cups water
- ¼ cups milk
Instructions
- Dice spam into small cubes or small pieces.
- In a pan set over medium high heat, add oil, followed by onions and diced spam. Fry until onions are translucent and spam is slightly brown.
- Add in rinsed mixed vegetables. Fry until veggies have softened, about 1-2 minutes.
- Toss in cooked rice and break it down into granules. Mix everything together.
- Season rice with soy sauce, ketchup and sesame oil. Give it a mix until every rice granule is colored brown.
- Transfer rice into two serving plate(s) and shape it into a dome. Alternatively, you can pack the fried rice into a dome-like medium bowl and then place a larger shallow bowl over top of the rice. Let it set for 1 minute. Then flip it over and remove the medium bowl.
Omelette (for Tornado version, see Notes below for instructions):
- Beat 2 eggs together.
- In a clean frying pan about 8 inches wide on low-medium heat, add oil.
- Pour eggs into the pan. Lightly scramble for 5 seconds until the eggs are about 85% cooked through and remove from heat. Let the egg slide on top of the fried rice. Repeat the above steps for the second omelette.
Demi-Glace Sauce:
- In a small saucepan, add your sauce ingredients and whisk them together. Then bring it to a boil over medium-high heat, while stirring.
- Once sauce as thickened, remove off heat and pour half of it around or on top the omelette fried rice. Enjoy!
Notes
How to Make Tornado Omelet
- In a small bowl, beat 2 eggs (per serving).
- In a small non-stick pan (8 inches wide) set over low-medium heat, add oil.
- Pour your eggs into the pan and let it bubble to create a solid base.
- Quickly insert wooden chopsticks positioned at a 45-degree angle from each other along the edges of the pan. Then slowly bring chopsticks toward the center.
- Hold the wooden chopstick in the center, only rotating the pan so your egg becomes a tornado shape.
- Once your egg pancake or egg tornado is cooked, with the help of the chopsticks slide it over your fried rice dome. Repeat this process again with the remaining egg for the second omelette.
I made this for my son who loves Omurice and he really enjoyed it!
My kids love omurice and spam, so I think they would love this dish! Yum!
Mmmm, I'd love to give this Spam Omurice a try! Sounds like such a great variation of an omelette!
The domed shape of your omelette is so fun... and your yummy Omurice sauce is totally fabulous!
I've got to try your challenging technique, Christie! I always like a bit of a challenge! This looks super yummy. I've never cooked with spam but I"d probably sub in some ham!