Japan - Okonomiyaki

Look at me! Only one week later and here I am posting another food. It'll never last ^_^

I enjoyed last week's Currywurst so much I've decided to stick with the street food theme this week. This time it's Japan's turn so I'm making Okonomiyaki which is a kind of pancake. Traditionally it's shredded cabbage held together with a batter but the Japanese use many different vegetables and meats along with the cabbage. The name translates as 'grilled as you like it' which fits its versatile nature!

I got into the spirit of it by using what I had in my fridge (which turned out to be not as much as I hoped, not even an onion).

Ingredients: 
 

500g cabbage
300g other vegetables (I had a pepper)
200g meat (I had bacon)
2 large eggs
1/2 cup cold water
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons vegetable oil






Shred the cabbage into fairly small, thin pieces. The recipe I used suggested using a mandolin but I had to make do ravaging it with my cheese grater.





I grilled the bacon and then chopped it up. It was lucky to escape two slices of buttered bread. Mmm bacon!




I then sliced the pepper putting it in the bowl with it's friends cabbage and bacon. They look all cosy together. ^_^





Next, I mixed together the eggs, flour, water and salt until smooth. Well, moderately smooth, I used a too small bowl which made it awkward. I could've switched it to a bigger bowl but I hate extra washing up.





Here I am adding the batter to the bowl. Pretty nice action shot, eh?


Mix it up until all the components are well covered in the batter. See picture below for perfect example of this.





Heat up a tablespoon of oil in a pan and add half the mixture. The recipe said to put on low, cover with a lid and leave for 10 minutes. I felt slightly anxious about doing that so I put it on low, covered with a lid and hovered about for 10 minutes. Then I flipped over the pancake and it looked like this:




Hurrah, success! Not burnt at all ^_^ Flip onto a plate and garnish with sauces of your choosing. I chose tomato ketchup and barbecue sauce.



I had no idea how it would taste and felt suspicious that the cabbage wouldn't be cooked enough. I was wrong though, the cabbage was cooked perfectly (even if i do say so myself) and the pancake tasted really nice. I'd like to try it with a better variety of vegetables in fact maybe some that go together a bit better. But my pancake was pretty good anyway and I'm glad to have tried it :)

Comments

  1. The recipe suggested a mandolin? Isn't that a musical instrument?! :o

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