ArtNight

Banquet: A Feast for the Senses at Pacific Asia Museum is a multi-media exhibition featuring the work of 14 contemporary artists exploring the links between food and culture. Although it is still in its installation stage and will not open to the public for a few more weeks, visitors got a foretaste of the show at ArtNight, an event that brings together various cultural venues in Pasadena.

Besides a slide show in the gallery of works to be exhibited, there was a banquet table in the courtyard displaying a cornucopia of Asian foods -- exotic-looking fruit and vegetables from San Gabriel market, bowls of ginkgo nuts and shrimp chips, shots of green tea, even a bottle of Kewpie mayonnaise.

One thing that caught my eye were the onigiri that came from the Famima, the Japanese-style "convenience" store that just recently opened its doors near the museum. Onigiri are rice balls shaped into balls or triangles, the most classic version being the nori musubi wrapped in a sheet of roasted seaweed with an umeboshi, or sour pickled plum, tucked in the center.

When making onigiri, it's imperative that you use freshly cooked rice. I remember my grandmother scooping steaming hot rice into her salted hands, and how red and puffy they would get. The expression "to use salted hands" in Japanese means to handle with loving care and evokes how onigiri for many represents the ultimate comfort food.

That's why it's always a bit strange for me to see these onigiri in their sanitized incarnation, packaged in such a way that you can detach the nori from cellophane and wrap it around the rice without ever getting your hands sticky. Still, it's something that gives me the warm fuzzy feeling every time I see it. What is your comfort food?