The original recipe called for groats. Groats?! What are those? They sound totally groat. I wasn’t sure what they were and my local grocery store didn’t have any. Since the original recipe described them as a barley texture, I substituted barley for groats. Not sure what groats taste like, but this tasted great with the barely. We certainly love our mushrooms!
This was nice and hearty for a vegetarian stew. We all loved it. Ellie only ate just the mushrooms though. I served this with a salad and pear and cheddar grilled cheese sandwiches. Good eatin’!
‘Okonomi’ means “what you like,” and ‘yaki’ means “grilled” or “cooked.” But the basic is a simple flour batter with shredded cabbage and either seafood or pork. This dish has many variations especially depending on the region of Japan as well.
You typically cook these at the table at home or out at a restaurant, and eat them as they are finished. I’ve had this once before in Japan at a restaurant but never at home.
I got out my old electric pancake skillet and we decided to cook them at the table to make it fun. I just learned that Aya’s mom has never made it before(she said “I’m from the East side. That’s a West side thing”). Aya has never made it, and only had it at a restaurant. I was really going into uncharted territory when deciding to make this.
You can use squid, octopus, pork, scallops, shrimp, etc when making this. I decided on just using shrimp. Then it’s topped with okonomiyaki sauce, Japanese mayonnaise, dried fish flakes, pickled ginger, and ao nori (dried nori flakes).
It’s not one of my favorite dishes, mainly because the flavors are so unique. Pancakes with cabbage, fish, seaweed, and mayo? Yes, that’s pretty much it. We had fun making it at the table and Ellie loved the shrimp. And since the cabbage was in pancake form, she was more open to eating the cabbage. This step-by-step guide really shows the process quite well.
Considering I didn’t totally know what I was doing, I did pretty well.
RECIPES:
Okonomiyaki (Cabbage Pancake)
*Recipe from the book Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko
Ingredients:
3.5 cups plain all-purpose flour
3 cups water
2 large eggs beaten
1/4 tsp salt
4 sprigs scallions, roughly chopped
14 oz white cabbage, sliced very thin
vegetable oil for frying
Japanese okonomiyaki sauce
Japanese mayonnaise
ao nori (dried seaweed)
pickled ginger
1 lb of fresh raw shrimp, peeled and shells removed
Mix flour, water, eggs, cabbage, and shrimp together like you would pancake batter. Make sure all of the cabbage is evenly coated.
Heat skillet and pour batter in pancake shapes. If the batter is too thick, spread it around a little bit to make a circular shape.
Cook for 2-3 minutes and then flip. Make sure shrimp or other fish/pork you may use is fully cooked.
Cover pancake with okonomiyaki sauce then drizzle with Japanese mayonnaise. Cover with fish flakes, seaweed, and pickles ginger. You can put as much or as little as you want on.
This is mostly vegetarian/vegan, except that the broth that everything cooks in is a fish base broth. Aya did say there are seaweed based broths available if you really wanted it to be true vegetarian.
When we sat down to eat, Aya said, “This tastes like Japan.” I took that as a good sign.
It’s a lightly flavored broth with a little soy sauce and rice wine. So the vegetables don’t really have a strong flavor. But from what Aya says, it’s very Japanese.
Aya said dishes like this with simmered vegetables are very common for a typical dinner in Japan. It’s usually accompanied by soup, rice, and two other small dishes. I served it with gyoza, and a daicon salad.
RECIPES:
Nimono (Simmered Tofu w/ Vegetables)
*Recipe from the book Japanese Cooking by Emi Kazuko
4 dried shiitake mushrooms
1lb daikon
2 atsu-age (fried tofu) 7oz. each
3/4 cup cut green beans
1 tsp rice
4oz. carrot, peeled and cut into 1cm thick slices
11oz. baby potatoes, unpeeled
3 cups dashi stock
2 Tbsp sugar
5 Tbsp soy sauce
3 Tbsp sake
1 Tbsp mirin
Soak the dried shiitake in one cup of water for 2 hours. Drain and discard the liquid. Remove and discard the stalks.
Peel the daikon and slice into 1cm discs. Plunge into cold water.
Put the atsu-age in a sieve, and wash off the excess oil with hot water from the kettle. Drain and cut into pieces of about 1 x 2 in.
Boil the green beans for 2 minutes and then drain them, cooling them under running water.
Cover the daikon with water in a pan and add the rice. Bring to the boil then reduce the heat to medium-low. Cook for 15 minutes, then drain. Discard the rice.
Put the atsu-age and the mushrooms, carrot and potatoes into the pan with the daikon. Add the dashi stock, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low. Regularly skim off any scum that comes to the surface. Add the sugar, soy sauce and sake. Mix the ingredients thoroughly.
Cut wax paper into a circle smaller than the pan lid. Place the paper inside the pan to seal the ingredients (I didn’t do this part). Cover with the lid and simmer for 30 minutes or until sauce reduces by half. Add the green beans for two minutes so that they just warm through.
Remove the paper and add the mirin. Taste the sauce and adjust with soy sauce if required. Remove from the heat.
Arrange the ingredients attractively in groups on a large servings plate. Pour over a little sauce and serve warm or cold.
With the amount of butter and sugar in this, it really goes against how I’ve been cooking lately. But since I’ve already visited Coldstone Creamery three times this week (it’s been one of those weeks), I figured why not end it on a high note, right?
This recipe definitely lives up to it’s name. I’m not sure what else to say. The only thing I did differently was use almond milk instead of whole milk because that’s what I had on hand.
We’ve been sticking with the Asian inspired foods this week. We went out for Thai on Monday, had tofu sandwiches with ginger peanut sauce and soup Tuesday, and now this tasty red curry quinoa. This definitely doesn’t replace your more traditional Thai vegetable red curry dish with rice dish, but it’s a great way to eat quinoa. I’m learning quinoa is very versatile. This recipe serves two to three and I think that’s spot on. We devoured this and Aya had to stop herself so she could have leftovers for lunch.
Super easy and super fast, both a plus today.
The soup was leftover from the other day and complimented this really well.
Rounding out the theme for this weeks meals, I found a nice Japanese recipe for tomorrow. I’m looking forward to that one.
The original recipe called for groats. Groats?! What are those? They sound totally groat. I wasn’t sure what they were and my local grocery store didn’t have any. Since the original recipe described them as a barley texture, I substituted barley for groats. Not sure what groats taste like, but this tasted great with the barely. We certainly love our mushrooms!
