Monjayaki
A deliberately runny batter cooked inside a ring of its own solids and eaten off the griddle.
Fish, Shellfish. Not vegetarian — contains ebi, which is shrimp, fish, shellfish.
Ingredients
- 400 g white cabbage, very finely chopped
- 60 g plain flour
- 400 ml dashi
- 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce
- 150 g prawns and squid, chopped
- 100 g sakura ebi
- 60 g tenkasu
- 50 g sweetcorn
- 2 tablespoons oil
- aonori and shichimi, to serve
Method
- DELIBERATELY RUNNY, which is the whole thing and looks like a mistake. The okonomiyaki on this site is a thick pile of cabbage barely held together; this is the opposite -- a thin liquid batter, about six times as much dashi for the flour, that never sets into a cake and is eaten half liquid off the griddle.
- CHOP THE CABBAGE MUCH FINER than for okonomiyaki, almost to a mince. Large shreds will not hold the liquid inside the ring.
- BUILD A RING OF THE SOLIDS AND POUR THE LIQUID INTO IT. Drain the solids from the batter, fry them on the griddle 3 to 4 minutes, then push them into a doughnut wall with the spatulas and pour the liquid into the middle. The ring is a dam.
- It will leak at first. Patch the wall with the spatula where it breaches.
- Once the liquid thickens slightly, break the wall down into it and mix everything together on the griddle.
- Then SPREAD IT THIN and let the underside catch. The crisp scorched patches are what people are there for.
- Keep it moving and spreading as it reduces -- it goes from soup to a sticky paste over about five minutes.
- EATEN WITH SMALL SPATULAS DIRECTLY OFF THE GRIDDLE, not plated. Press a spatula down to scrape up a thin crisp piece and eat it from the spatula.
- Aonori and shichimi over the top.
- Keep the heat low and the scraping constant; the last of it, scorched onto the metal, is the best part.
Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.
Filed under Japan · All recipes