Ingredients
- 250g all purpose flour (or takoyaki flours for better result)
- 2 big eggs
- 900ml ice cold water
- 1/2 tbs salt
- 1.5 tbs soy sauce
- 1 tbs dashi powder
- 250g octopus
- 50g tenkasu (Made from 1 tbs rice vinegar, 4 tbs tempura flour, 4 tbs ice cold water)
- 1 stalk of green onion
- 50g beni shoga red ginger (optional)
- Bonito flakes (Katsuobushi)
- Takoyaki sauce
- Kewpie mayonnaise
Tool
- A frying pan for takoyaki
- A few skewers
On our website, we have also a Takoyaki Cooking Box with all the essential ingredients that are difficult to find elsewhere, in just a few clicks you get them all home! Check out below!
Instructions
1. Make tenkasu (crispy tempura bits)
Mix 1 teaspoon of rice vinegar, 4 tablespoon of ice code water and 4 tablespoon of tempura flour as batter. Heat at least 2cm deep oil in a pan, slowly drop the batter bit by bit from 30cm above the oil.
2. Boil the octopus and cut it into 1-1.5cm dices.
3. Dice the spring onion into small pieces.
4. Cut beni shoga ginger (right) into small stripes or cubes. If you can't find beni shoga, consider substitute it with pink gari ginger (left).
5. Whisk the eggs in a large bowl, add the iced water, soy sauce, salt, dashi powder and mix well.
6. Add the flour into the liquid mixture in threes batches, mix well.
7. Oil the takoyaki pan, place it on high heat. Wait until the pan is hot, pour the batter into the holes until half full.
8. Right away, add 1-2 pieces of octopus in each hole, followed by sprinkling on top the pieces of ginger, green onion, and tenkasu (fried tempura bits), no need to worry if they are getting into the holes or not. Then pour again the liquid batter until it is just overflowing on the top surface of the pan. Don't worry about it being too full.
9. Let the batter set for 3-4 minutes, then use a skewer, start breaking and dividing the batter along the edges of the holes, making them into individual portions.
10. Finally it's time to flip the balls and you have to move fast! Get your skewer into the side of each hole, scoop and flip the balls, while tucking the ingredients under the holes. They could look messy at the beginning, just keep turning for a few times and the balls will literally take care of themselves.
11. Your takoyaki are done when the crust become golden brown. The final result you want to achieve is a golden crispy crust and a tender (runny) fillings. Keeping the pan on high heat is key!
12. While the takoyaki are hot, dress them up with Otafuku takoyaki sauce first then Kewpie Japanese mayonnaise, carefully sprinkle on top abundant katsuobushi bonito flakes, and finally the vibrant green aonori powder. You can skewer them up just as how they are served on the street's of Japan!
