I found a recipe for Takoyaki on a page that was titled My Lunch Can Beat Up Your Lunch. I pretty much followed it except for the cabbage. I had no idea how much or how little I would be using, so next time maybe I'll get a small head or something like it. I also didn't have the bonito flakes. Maybe next time.
It called for dashi - but not how much. I have both packets for konbu-dashi and found the one packet I still had in the fridge for hon-dashi. I figure that I'd make it using almost all dashi instead of water. The way I understood how to make dashi using both of these packets of stuff - 1 liter of water to one packet konbu and/ or one tablespoon hon. Sometimes recipes call for a mixture of both or it doesn't care which one. Maybe next time I make okonomiyaki, I will use the combined dashi instead of water as well, now that I've decided this is how I'm going to make dashi. Boil 1 liter of water, then add both the measured quantities of konbu and hon, immediately remove from heat and let it cool down, then strain through a paper filter.
I heated the puff pan to Medium High and let it sit while I got the pickled ginger and scallions ready. For pickled ginger, I used pickled sushi ginger, which isn't just for sushi anymore and was suitably pickled anyway. Since the pan is solid iron, the included handle mitt was required. I oiled the pan generously before putting in the thin batter. That was 1 egg, 3/4 cup flour, and 1 1/3 cup water, but as my 2nd round of making takoyaki proved, it should be mostly dashi instead of water anyway as that 2nd bunch turned out better than the first when I followed the recipe.
There is a trick to making takoyaki. Put a little in each cup, get your tako and other bits you want in the cups right away. If the pan is suitably hot enough, the batter should try to begin cooking almost immediately. The recipe also called for rice crispies, so that was interesting to add. Then slosh some more batter to fill the cups.
You use the little wooden picks to separate the batter between cups, and of course to flip and turn the takoyaki. At some point, if you have oiled the cups right and they've cooked long enough, the takoyaki should move easily if you try turning them but not flipping them in the cup. This is a sign they about ready to be flipped and should be a nice golden brown when you do. Flip it over, the uncooked batter with leak out onto the bottom of the cup, and while doing so you should be tucking in bits into the center of the ball with the picks. It takes practice to make it look neat.
If you watch videos of people making large amounts of takoyaki (there are some good ones on Youtube), you understand why they need to work fast. Put the batter down, spread the interior ingredients around, more batter, and by that time the hot big griddle cooks them quickly and the first ones are ready to be flipped by the time they finish putting everything on. Slow the video down (save it to your computer of course to do this in VLC), and you can study their motions of using the picks. It's incredible.
I also didn't have takoyaki sauce or Japanese mayo, so I used some BBQ sauce instead. I did have some ground nori though. ^_^ A slight crust on the outside, but creamy in the middle, though I don't think I can take eating them steaming hot like I've seen.
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