Checking ALL the Bloggable Boxes: Okonomiyaki

Anyone who’s ever read a recipe blog can attest that food and nostalgia are inextricably intertwined. There are plenty of entries (including mine) that start with long-winded accounts of how a particular food fits into the author’s life story, and I believe that how you feel about this says a lot about how you look back at your life in general (I also wholeheartedly agree that there should be a Jump To Recipe button at the top of the page because sometimes you really do just want the recipe).

I read cookbooks for fun, so my opinion on this may be a bit skewed, but I think that we can’t separate the food we eat from the places we eat it and the people who prepare it and the conversations that happen around that meal. I write about what I’m doing at the time I’m cooking something so that I can look back and remember that slice of my life; I forget a lot of things and it’s nice to have a reference point. This has been particularly true in the Covid era, which has warped everyone’s perception of time passing and robbed us of so many of the usual touchpoints for memory. 2020 was long and strange and terrible, and 2021 was too, and I don’t have high hopes for 2022 either – but at least it can be a good year for cooking.

Somehow we managed to go from a complete standstill to everyone being insanely busy once the school year started, so dinner has become mostly another task to be managed and fit in to a crowded schedule. I have mixed feelings about this. There’s a lot to be said for hopping back on the meal prep bandwagon (thank you, Cassie Joy Garcia!) especially now that I’m sending meals over to my newly-relocated mother-in-law. Much as I adore novelty and new , nobody is going to perish of boredom if we eat the same things sometimes, and it’s perfectly normal to want to get something on the table in under half an hour.

Imagine my delight in coming across a dinner that ticks every single one of my boxes: 

• It was ready in under half an hour, start to finish, using ingredients I have on hand
• Everyone liked it (or wisely kept their mouths shut if they didn’t)
• It’s a dish that was introduced to me BC (Before Children/Before Covid) by my friend Kristi, so there’s an element of nostalgia (“remember when we used to eat at restaurants?!”)
• It came from the infamous and ever-growing To Cook folder
• It’s fun to say

There are many, many versions of this recipe out there. This particular one came (as many of my favorites do) from Deb at Smitten Kitchen, who adapted it from a recipe she found via Tasting Table.

 

Okonomoyaki

½ small head of cabbage, shredded or very thinly sliced
4 carrots, peeled into ribbons
5 lacinato kale leaves, cut into thin ribbons
4 scallions, sliced very thinly on the diagonal
1 teaspoon kosher salt
½ cup flour (we’re using King Arthur All-Purpose Gluten-Free flour these days)
6 eggs, lightly beaten
Oil for frying
Okonomiyaki sauce
Kewpie mayonnaise

Toss the vegetables together in a large bowl. Toss the mixture with the flour until all the vegetables are coated. Stir in the eggs.

Heat a large skillet on medium-high heat and coat the bottom of the skillet with oil. If you’re feeling excited about your new stove, you can use the griddle that’s oh-so-conveniently located between the burners and feel very proud of yourself for picking out such a good one.

I use my hands for this so it’s not very precise, but take ¼ - 1/6 of the vegetable mixture and put it in the pan, then smoosh it down with your hand or a spatula until it’s about ½ inch thick. Cook until the edges begin to brown (3-5 minutes), then flip with a large spatula. Cook on the other side until that’s brown too.

There are lots of recipes for okonomiyaki sauce online; if you don’t have an Asian grocery near you, it’s definitely possible to make your own (Smitten Kitchen’s version includes a recipe for this, btw). I keep forgetting to add Kewpie mayonnaise to my shopping list so I’ve had to make my own. But this is enough of a favorite around here that it’s worth the trip to get the bottled sauces, which are then conveniently in the fridge when your idea of getting dinner on the table doesn’t include that much effort.

To serve, squeeze the sauce back and forth across the pancake, then top it with a similar drizzle of the mayo. I know – this seems totally gross, right? Trust me, it’s delicious. The pancakes without the sauces are kind of boring. Sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds, seaweed flakes, or the shaker of both that you found while you were buying the other sauces at the Asian grocery store.

Help! I can’t find Kewpie mayonnaise!

No worries. For each cup of Hellman’s mayo, add ½ teaspoon Dijon mustard, 1 ½ tablespoons of rice vinegar or apple cider vinegar, and ½ teaspoon sugar. Mix well and put into a squeeze bottle.