A delicious cabbage pancake. Serves 1 as a hefty meal, 2 with a side as a light meal, or 4 as an appetizer.
I'm not super concerned about making an inauthentic "grilled whatever you want", but if something in here doesn't strike you as especially Japanese that's probably because my cooking instincts are mostly French. I started from the Osaka-style okonomiyaki recipe in Ono and Salat's Japanese Soul Cooking, but as I've riffed off of it I've probably veered west.
- literally any 8"-10" skillet will do
- silicone spatula
- 100g green cabbage, finely chopped
- 45g cooked meat, like hard sausage or ground pork. sub more veg if you like, but by volume (1/4cu or so) rather than weight
- 75g AP flour
- 1tsp kosher salt
- 1/2tsp granulated sugar
- 1/4tsp baking powder
- 1/4tsp MSG
- 1/4tsp togarashi
- 2 large eggs
- 1tbsp water
- ~15bsp toasted sesame oil
- okonomiyaki sauce (or tonkatsu sauce) (or make your own)
- kewpie-style mayo (or make your own)
- bonito flakes
- aonori
- finely chop the cabbage and whatever protein you're putting with it. (you can leave the cabbage in shreds but I think the texture is better chopped.) place in a mixing bowl.
- add dry ingredients to the mixing bowl and stir thoroughly to combine. give it a few minutes to let the flour hydrate a little, that'll help the batter stick
- preheat skillet on the low side of medium
- add eggs and water to the mixing bowl and mix until no dry flour remains
- add oil to skillet and swirl to coat. let the skillet heat the oil until gently smoking
- add batter to skillet and press out into a pancake about 1/2" thick. cook for 5min or until the pancake releases easily from the pan and has a nice brown crust
- slide pancake onto a plate, if you're worried about the other side sticking (e.g. on stainless) add a bit more oil to the skillet and swirl to coat
- using the plate, flip the pancake into the pan on its uncooked side. use the spatula to support one edge so it doesn't fold onto itself. this is hard to describe but obvious when you're doing it.
- cook the pancake another 3-4min, until the secnd side releases easily and is well-browned, and the batter in the middle is set (~165F on an instant-read thermometer)
- slide back onto the plate, top with sauce, mayo, aonori, and bonito flakes, and serve
- flipping the pancake with a spatula is apparently most common, I've found the plate method more reliable
- most recipes I've seen call for one egg per pancake; if you want to adapt this recipe, use 1/4cu water or dashi instead of 1tbsp to replace the water content from the second egg
- no, you don't have to use MSG in the batter, but if you don't it won't be as good