Today we explain how to make delicious Takoyaki.
The products we used:
Ingredients and Tools
Firstly, we explain the ingredients and tools you need to make Takoyaki.
Essential Ingredients (3-4 servings)
- Wheat flour (light flour) (A) : 300g
- Water (A) : 1200ml
- Granulated soup stock (A ): 40g
- Eggs (A) : 2 pieces
- Boiled octopus : 120-140g
- Cabbage : 1/8 piece
- Tenkasu (Tempura scraps) : to taste
- Red pickled ginger : to taste
- Other toppings : (see below)
(A) shows the ingredients for the dough. Make sure to use light flour, not strong flour. For the granulated soup stock, use a Japanese-style soup stock (dashi broth) such as dried bonito flakes, “Niboshi (small dried sardines)” or “Agodashi (dried flying fishes)”.
The essential tool is a Takoyaki cooker/pan. In addition, some Takoyaki picks and a special oil puller are quite useful if you have.
Common toppings are Takoyaki sauce, green laver (green dried seaweed), dried bonito shavings, and mayonnaise. Please prepare these toppings as you like.
How to cook
In this section, we explain the procedure for making Takoyaki.
1. Cut the boiled octopus
Cut the boiled octopus into small pieces about 2 grams per Takoyaki.
As the octopus suckers have a good tooth touch, it will be best to cut every pieces including octopus suckers.
2. Cut cabbage
Cut the cabbage fine. The tiny pieces of cabbage can make a light tooth touch when eating Takoyaki.
3. Cut red pickled ginger
Cut red pickled ginger. Red pickled ginger not only contributes to the refreshing taste of takoyaki, but also adds color and it looks delicious.
4. Make the dough
Put all the ingredients with (A) together in a bowl and mix them. Please mix carefully not to lump up as much as possible.
Here we used granulated soup stock, however of course you can use Japanese-style dashi broth (soup stock) made from dried bonito flakes and Kombu (kelp). Takoyaki will taste better and more delicious if the dashi broth has taste stronger, so please prepare for dashi with using enough dried bonito flakes and Kombu.
5. Prepare the Takoyaki pan
Warm up the Takoyaki pan thoroughly. This is a necessary process when using iron Takoyaki pans. For Teflon-Takoyaki pan/cookers, be careful not to use it without oil before cooking because it will rather damage it.
After the Takoyaki pan gets enough warm, use an oil puller to draw in plenty of salad oil/any of vegetables oils (not included in the above list).
6. Pour the dough in Takoyaki pan
Pour the dough into the Takoyaki pan. Pour enough dough to overflow from each portion.
7. Add ingredients
Soon after pouring the dough into the Takoyaki pan, add the ingredients thoroughly. Put pieces of octopus into each portion.
8. Heat it up
Leave it as it is for a while.
When the dough around the edge of the takoyaki cooker is cooked and hardened, use a takoyaki pick to flip over each takoyaki piece one by one. Even it loses its shape, don't mind it and please continue with that.
9. Form a nice round sha
Flip over each piece with a pick until the surface of each piece is browned. As heat up Takoyaki, each piece should gradually form a nice round shape.
10. Completed
It is completed when the surface of each piece turned brown in color. Enjoy them with your favorite toppings.
Let's try to make the supreme Takoyaki with your original recipe!
Generally speaking, the smaller the amount of flour used to make Takoyaki dough, the fluffier and tastier it becomes. However, the smaller the amount of dough, the more difficult it is to foam a round shape nicely. Therefore, making delicious Takoyaki needs a good skill.
The recipe introduced here is relatively easy to make, even for your first cooking.
When you get used to making Takoyaki, try reducing the amount of flour and eggs little by little to achieve the supreme recipe.
