Meet Onigiri, the VTuber defying physics to teach Twitch how to cook YouTube: OnigiriVTubers are known for playing games in front of their audience, or maybe singing karaoke. Onigiri bucks the trend, inviting everyone into her kitchen on Twitch to whip up culinary delights, break bread, and trade cooking tips. Onigiri, an oni chef VTuber on Twitch, isn\u2019t your typical streamer. She doesn\u2019t sit there playing games (at least seriously), drawing amazing art, or performing beautiful music. Where her love really lies is in cooking. The mashing of a kitchen with a model that can only occupy a 2D space might seem impossible, but Giri has managed to innovate to meld her passions together. She might only cook meals for two \u2014 herself and her Onibro who sits off camera and helps with the stream \u2014 but she invites thousands into her cozy virtual kitchen every time she goes live. However it wasn\u2019t forged out of pure love to start with. To put it bluntly, her lack of skill in all areas VTubers typically thrive in forced her to create a unique broadcast and find her own niche. \u201cI\u2019m a little bit of a boomer, so going into the streamer sphere where it\u2019s populated by zoomers, everyone knows how to play video games or has a special skill like drawing or singing,\u201d she laughed. \u201cWhen I went into VTubing I quickly realized I can\u2019t do any of those. I\u2019m a terrible singer, I can\u2019t draw to save my life, and I play games but silly ones \u2014 I can\u2019t play skill-based ones like Apex Legends. \u201cI really had to find my own niche and what I was potentially good at, and personally I found it exciting when other streamers or VTubers did cooking streams. Whether it was [with a] handcam or they\u2019re an IRL streamer from their kitchen, I always wanted to check it out. Then I was like \u2018wait a minute, why can\u2019t I just do that?\u2019 \u201cI didn\u2019t want to provide handcam content. I thought I could do better, maybe something that was never seen before. I looked around and no one really cooks the way that I intend to present my cooking content. So I was like \u2018okay I\u2019m good at cooking, I like cooking, I\u2019ll just do that!\u2019\u201d Onigiri started VTubing in August 2021 \u2014 first with just a simple PNG avatar, before quickly leveling it up and getting more immersive with her streams. Having been locked inside for more than a year she was enthralled by the VTubing community as a self-professed weeb. That, plus her passion and love for cooking, spurred her on to take the plunge. She didn\u2019t want to set up a camera in her kitchen and broadcast herself to the world as the level of privacy and separation was paramount. \u201cIt released the pressure of trying to put a pretty face on in front of the camera,\u201d she explained. \u201cYou can dress however you want but still let your personality shine through via an avatar. It was really fun to just connect with the three people that were watching me, but I didn\u2019t feel the pressure to have my face look a certain way or my room. \u201cIt was just an anxiety thing, a boredom thing, but now VTubing has really filled that emptiness for me. I\u2019ve been blessed with a really loving community \u2014 although they might come off kind of strong, but I love them a lot and I\u2019ve been lucky to have them. I\u2019ve been counting my lucky stars that I am where I am because of them.\u201d Onigiri wields mixed reality perfectly to immerse viewers into her kitchen \u2014 not her proper one mind you, but a fully-functional set she designed \u2014 while keeping the VTuber feel. You can see her hands, always in black gloves, moving along rhythmically when cutting vegetables or stirring a pot. What you can\u2019t see is her real-life body. Using a chroma key and a morph suit, she is able to keep herself out of the picture. Her VTuber model stands in her place, moving around and following her hands to keep an authentic feel. \u201cI pitched my idea to a family member and they were like \u2018yeah I can help with that\u2019,\u201d she explained. \u201cI told him \u2018I want to do cooking, I don\u2019t want it to be a handcam, I want it to be immersive. Is there some way you can have my model move and maybe capture my IRL hands and kitchen?\u2019 \u201cWe realized a good way to make it work was using a chroma key to our advantage so I can block myself and my background out and only have my foreground show up and everything else would be my model. I\u2019m very lucky that it did work out the way that it did.\u201d It might seem janky to watch at first, and the first streams were far from polished. However, as time goes on it\u2019s become more fine-tuned and seamless. She can often host guests just by dragging their models next to hers, much like inviting someone over to your house and having them linger by the stove. The stream is a home away from home, and something born out of her love for cooking from quite young. \u201cI am Chinese, and for Chinese people, food is a very strong culture for us. Both my parents cook. We eat at home every single day. My parents believe in the typical \u2018why buy this thing when we have it at home\u2019. My mum made sure all the meals were home-cooked and we shared a dinner table, all that. \u201cThey never really pushed me to learn how to cook but they always ask me if I want to help out, maybe cut some green onions, wash some dishes, just watch \u2014 things like that. It was always around me, every single day, and I was gradually like \u2018can I try this?\u2019 and they were very encouraging. That\u2019s where it all started.\u201d As she got older, Onigiri began to appreciate the smaller things. It\u2019s one thing to make food just to sustain ourselves, but she really wanted to push herself in the kitchen to truly improve. That involves sitting down and watching the Food Network (Bobby Flay and Guy Fieri, to name a couple of stars), flicking through YouTube (she really wants to collaborate with Uncle Roger one day), and reading food blogs. It can be a learning experience, but it can also be a reflective one. Just standing there toiling away at a task for a set amount of time, not thinking about anything else, is immensely satisfying. \u201cCooking is my own mental meditation time,\u201d she said. \u201cI can zone out for 30 minutes and it\u2019s fun to go on YouTube and be like \u2018this recipe looks cool I want to try that\u2019. Sometimes it turns out great, sometimes not so much, but it still has a very rewarding feeling.\u201d Watching her at times is like an extended cut of hit anime Food Wars \u2014 something Onigiri laughed off because she \u201cdoesn\u2019t have a super competitive personality\u201d. That being said, she has done collabs with other VTubers where they battle it out over the cooktop. \u201cWhen there are the cool collabs where they want to challenge me to a cooking \u2018battle\u2019, it\u2019s definitely kind of exhilarating to be like someone who wants to cook with me or against me,\u201d she laughed. Most of the time though her stream is cozy. It\u2019s just Onigiri hanging out and cooking with her chat right there, and maybe a guest or two. Sometimes it\u2019s a \u201chand and brain\u201d collab where her guests give her a shopping list of ingredients and they guide her on how to make the recipe. Other times, she\u2019s just trying to cook something new \u201cjust for the experiment\u201d. \u201cObviously it\u2019s great if it turns out well, but for content they don\u2019t care if you mess up. It\u2019s like \u2018oh shucks I messed up, now you guys know what not to do for next time\u2019 and you brush it off. No one wants to see perfect execution every time \u2014 that\u2019s kind of boring.\u201d However, being a VTuber chef is not as simple as setting your camera down in your kitchen and recording a stream. There are all the usual processes like getting a model, stream assets, and more. For Onigiri though, she has to go the extra mile with her kitchen set-up which features plenty of standalone hot plates, two beloved cleavers, chopping boards galore, and a camera perfectly angled to keep everything else tucked away and hidden. It does bring its own set of challenges \u2014 but the number one problem for her is time. \u201cThere\u2019s tons of things but the limitation I find sometimes is that the stream is usually 3-4 hours long,\u201d she explained. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of things where it\u2019s a slow cooking process or it requires marination over 2-3 days or whatever, so I can\u2019t physically make it because of the stream constraint. \u201cThere\u2019s also the fear of reflections and stuff. As a VTuber, reflections are the bane of our existence. When I\u2019m prepping for a stream I have to be careful about certain things. Am I using a lid? Is the pot too shiny? Where\u2019s the angle of my knife? And also will this take too long to make?\u201d And in case you were wondering, VTuber models aren\u2019t immune to random oven burns or misangled slices of a finger either. Sadly the morph suit and the pixels don\u2019t give her any immunity from any kitchen mishaps. With all that being said, Giri\u2019s kitchen is more than just her cooking for show. She wants viewers to ask her questions and be interested in the cooking process. It\u2019s as much a learning experience as it is entertainment. No matter if someone is a total novice or if they are working in the industry, she hopes to share at least some insights into her life through food, help people find what they like, and teach them some great life skills. \u201cEspecially now with everyone being homebodies, people want to learn how to cook. I have had a lot of people come into my streams and say \u2018I\u2019m so glad I found your stream because I love your videos.\u2019 \u201cI have seen an increase in people being interested in cooking and people asking in chat for tips, whereas before it was \u2018oh you\u2019re cooking, that\u2019s cool\u2019 but that was it. I get a lot more inquisitive people who are interested in the process of cooking and baking or if I have any tips to share. \u201cWhen people come into my stream and ask for any ideas about a really easy meal that a non-chef can make, or anything for a beginner to start with, I recommend boiling some eggs or making some instant noodles. You might laugh and it may seem like a troll answer, but you have to understand the basics of controlling a flame, how to boil water, know when things are done, judging heat. It takes practice.\u201d With her first anniversary approaching, Giri is brimming with plenty of plans including another subathon (in her first one she made ramen from scratch: tonkotsu, tare, noodles, and all the trimmings) as well as wider goals for Twitch.. One of them is to hopefully keep going for the years to come. Another is obviously continuing to educate Twitch on all things cooking, and provide a kitchen for everyone to visit if they are feeling homesick and want that community feel. As a chef though? There are a few foods she wants to try and make: \u201cBirria [for one] \u2014 the slow cooked mexican pork \u2014 but that takes 6-7 hours. I also really want to smoke something, but that requires being outside and ventilation and a few days. \u201cBut a smoked slow-cooked brisket or something? That\u2019d be awesome.\u201d Onigiri is a joy to watch, but how does her food actually hold up? Well I\u2019m a pretty avid cook myself, and so I asked her for some advice before we parted. I had a friend\u2019s housewarming the day after our interview and wanted to take something over for a potluck. Her suggestion? Green bean casserole. And take it from me, it was damn good.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Meet Onigiri, the VTuber defying physics to teach Twitch how to cook YouTube: OnigiriVTubers are known for playing games in front of their audience, or maybe singing karaoke. Onigiri bucks the trend, inviting everyone into her kitchen on Twitch to whip up culinary delights, break bread, and trade cooking tips. Onigiri, an oni chef VTuber […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-56944","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56944","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56944"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56944\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56944"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56944"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56944"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}