Ivan Orkin's Savory Pancakes (Okonomiyaki) Recipe on Food52 (2024)

FAQs

What kind of flour do you use for okonomiyaki? ›

Okonomiyaki flour is made of unbleached wheat and soy flours, leavening and spices such as kelp for flavor. It's designed to rise naturally on its own, meaning you don't need to add extra ingredients like nagaimo to get thick, fluffy pancakes.

Pancake mix: I use Bisquick, but you can use any other box mix, or make your own from flour and baking soda if you prefer. Oil or butter: This keeps the pancake from sticking to the pan. I tend to use olive oil, but any vegetable oil or butter will work. Condiments: The sky is the limit here.

Make sure you only add the batter to the vegetables at the last minute before cooking. If you leave the vegetables in the batter too long, the water will come out and you'll have a soggy mess that's impossible to flip without breaking.

Okonomiyaki has sugar and dashi as primary flavoring. The second problem is that they're made of different types of flours and therefore have a different texture. Korean pancake mix has a fair bit of non wheat flour—usually a mix of tapioca, potato and rice flour.

Okonomiyaki is sometimes translated into English as "as-you-like-it pancake". However, this may be misleading. Though it does consist of batter cooked on a griddle, okonomiyaki has nothing of the sweetness or fluffiness of pancakes, not to mention that it is usually filled with octopus, shrimp, pork, yam or kimchi.

To make healthy pancakes, use whole-wheat or another whole-grain (cornmeal, oats or buckwheat) flour instead. Whole-wheat flour has 16 grams of fiber per cup compared to 3 grams of fiber in white flour.

Okonomi Sauce Substitutes: If you don't have Okonomi sauce on hand you can make your own. Easy Okonomi Sauce Recipe: Mix 3 tbs of ketchup, with 1 tbs of Worcestershire sauce, with 1 tsp of Soy Sauce.

Okonomiyaki is traditionally made with dashi, the essential Japanese soup stock, so if you have it, please use it in place of the vegetable stock. Half a regular-sized cabbage is all you'll need for this recipe and you could also substitute with purple cabbage.

They are typically served topped with mayonnaise, a Japanese style barbecue sauce and are sprinkled with bonito flakes which appear to 'dance' as they move around in the heat rising from the pancake.

In Japan, it's traditionally topped with okonomiyaki sauce, drizzles of Kewpie mayo, dried seaweed flakes, and bonito flakes.

What is that flaky stuff on okonomiyaki? ›

Katsuobushi (Japanese: 鰹節) is simmered, smoked and fermented skipjack tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis, sometimes referred to as bonito). It is also known as bonito flakes or broadly as okaka (おかか).

They are known to move or dance when used as a topping on foods such as okonomiyaki and takoyaki. It can be an odd sight upon first viewing if moving food makes you squeamish. However, it is nothing to be alarmed about. The bonito flakes move due to their thin and light structure upon the hot food and are not alive.

These have developed over the years into a fluffy Japanese-style of pancake commonly known as “hottokeki” (hotcakes). Japanese hotcakes are distinguished by their souffle-like texture which creates a thick yet light and fluffy pancake that may be up to several inches high.

A type of pan-fried batter or savoury pancake, monjayaki is Tokyo's answer to okonomiyaki, the iconic dish of Hiroshima and Osaka. Monjayaki retains a slightly runny appearance much like melted cheese even when cooked – but the delicious concoction tastes better than it looks.

The main difference is in how they are prepared and the relative amounts of each ingredient. In Osaka style okonomiyaki, all of the ingredients are mixed together and cooked together. In Hiroshima style okonomiyaki, all of the ingredients are layered almost like a cake.

At its simplest, okonomiyaki batter is just flour, eggs and water, though dashi, an intensely savoury, seaweed-based stock often replaces the last.

I've seen okonomiyaki referred to as a “Japanese pizza” or “Japanese frittata” in the U.S. The batter is made with flour, tempura scraps (tenkasu), grated yam (nagaimo or yamaimo), and eggs. It's then mixed with shredded cabbage and sometimes additional ingredients like shrimp and squid.

Aside from noodles, in Japan, we use wheat flour for sweets, bread, and tempura too. Commonly, hakurikiko (soft flour) is used for sweets and tempura batter, churikiko (medium flour) is for udon noodles, jun-kyorikiko (semi-hard flour) is for ramen noodles, and kyorikiko (hard flour) is used for bread.

I've seen rice flour (米粉, komeko) at the supermarket on occasion as well, and there are some other flours that are sold for specialty use, such as roasted soybean flour (きなこ, kinako) and glutinous rice flour (もちこ, mochiko) which are mainly used for making traditional Japanese sweets.