Homemade Gluten Free Okonomiyaki

Lately I've really been into cooking and baking and so I decided to make some gluten free okonomiyaki and the sauce for it. Okonomiyaki is kind of a savory pancake. We eat the "kansai fu" which means "Osaka style". We took some pictures.....but they aren't great as they are taken at night in the kitchen. Also, if you click on the links within the recipes, it will take you to some sites that sell the items you need to make it. We aren't connected to these places in any way and haven't used these brands but it will give you an idea of what the items are.

This makes a big okonomiyaki-good for 1 really hungry person or 2 or more people.

I made the sauce the day before (all store bought sauce has gluten in it).

The sauce:
1/4 cup ketchup
1 1/2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1/4 teaspoon of Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon soy sauce (gluten free)
3 tablespoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon mirin (Japanese sweet cooking wine)
1/8 teaspoon ginger (ground, in a jar)

Combine all ingredients in a small saucepan and simmer for 1 minute or so stirring constantly. You can add honey for a sweeter version or a bit more soy sauce if you find it too sweet. Remove and cool. Store in the refrigerator.



The "pancake" part of the recipe:
1/2 cup Pamela's baking and pancake mix
1/2 cup brown rice flour
1 large egg
1 cup of water
about 2 cups of cabbage cut into bite size pieces (I didn't measure this so it is a guess)
6 pieces of raw shrimp cut into pieces
3-4 pieces of "buta bara" (buta bara is thinly sliced pork belly-You could use another kind of pork-thinly sliced bacon perhaps) Here is a picture.

Toppings:

sauce (see recipe above)
aonori-ground nori (seaweed)
Japanese Mayonnaise (American mayonnaise won't work for this)
katsuobushi (dried shaved bonito fish)

Cut up the cabbage into bite sized pieces and put aside for the moment. In a big bowl,combine the flours, water and egg and stir well.

In a big (lightly oiled) frying pan, lay the meat out in strips and then add the shrimp on top. The heat should be medium. Add the cabbage to the bowl of "pancake" mix and mix well. Pour this mixture on top of the meat and shrimp. I then covered the pancake with a lid. Just like a pancake...when the top has bubbles or is getting a bit dry looking and the bottom (you can check with a spatula) is turning a nice golden brown you can flip it over. Now, this is a big heavy pancake-I can actually flip it (thanks to a few years of being a cook in a restaurant back in high school!) but if you can't you will have to try to flip it over with a spatula.....if it break apart don't worry about it as it will still taste great! Let it completely cook on the other side. You can cut into it to check that is cooked through if you aren't sure. When it is done, put it on a plate.

Add the sauce on top-I like a nice bit of sauce so I add a fair bit. Then sprinkle the aonori on top. Then add the mayonnaise and then the katsuobushi and it is done!! My hubby loves this better than the real stuff so I'm pretty happy with that!

I know you want to be Canadian, please.

My friend sent me this and I just had to share as it is hilarious! Enjoy!

Difficult teaching moments!

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Worried about your skin looking older...take a placenta pill!

I have seen a beauty commerical on TV many times and at first when I heard the word "placenta" in English in the commerical, I thought that it must be one of those crazy Japanese English words because I just couldn't imagine that there would actually be placenta in the pill. But no, I was wrong....it is placenta.

The reason to take the pills is basically to keep your skin looking young. They say that the placenta helps to stabilize protein so your skin shows less signs of aging. Hmmm.....Apparently they decided to go with bovine placenta from Denmark since Denmark is famous for pigs (I didn't know that!).

Now, if pill form bothers you, perhaps you could drink it with fruit and vegetable juice? Here is a commercial I found on YouTube.

Before writing this I googled, in English, "placenta pill" and from what I could see in the wee bit of time I looked most of the sites that talk about eating placenta have to do with people believing it helps moms who just gave birth to recover faster and possible stave off postpartum depression. All the sites talked about using the woman's own placenta.

Now, I usually say "never say never" but I just can't see myself doing this for beauty.

Any thoughts?

I just made gluten free, low(er) carb bread!

So, under "my favorite blogs" on my blog, there is "Elana's Pantry". I put it there a while back because it looked cool but I never really checked it out until today and OMG....I wanted to make so many of the recipes but I figured I wouldn't have the ingredients on hand....after all I live in Japan where you basically can't find gluten free products. BUT I realized I had everything on hand to make her "gluten free simple bread" so I made it. You will have to forgive the pictures as we took them at night but you can at least see what it turned out like. It is very very good!! It is too small to make regular sandwiches with but I made mini open faced egg salad sandwiches and they were amazing! And so simple to make without a million hard to find ingredients. And because the main ingredient is almond flour it is pretty low in carbs! Oh yeah - don't use Bob's Red Mill almond flour as it is too coarse-she has links to the almond flour she recommends.

I can't wait to toast this and eat it with bacon and eggs in the morning!!

Strange new Japanese flavors of American Favorites

"Baobab" is the latest flavor from Pepsi here in Japan. The taste is supposed to be similar to the baobab fruit from Africa which of course....most Japanese have never tasted. I'm sure this has everything to do with the world cup which will be starting soon. It is supposed to be "refreshing". Hubby and I bought a bottle so I could report to you all. The taste....it isn't cola...much lighter and a bit spicy....almost a bit gingery and not as sweet as cola. Does it taste like the baobab fruit? Not a clue as I have never tasted it but it was pretty good and I would drink it again.

"Ume" or pickled plums is one of the new flavors for bubblicious. Pickled plums are quite sour and so is this but while it isn't my favorite flavor of gum....it isn't bad!

We also bought "matcha" (powered green tea) "caramel" corn (no caramel on these but you get the idea ...sweet corn snacks) today and I think my hubby like the ume gum better.

If you are hungry and in Hokkaido....

If you are hungry and in Hokkaido it looks like it might be possible to just pick asparagus from the road! This asparagus sure wanted to see the sun! I can't believe that no one else noticed it before it got this big!!

In other news, it has been getting quite warm which of course means summer (or hell, as I like to call it) is coming. People are already complaining about the temperature which today is supposed to hit 30 degrees Celsius. But I keep telling people to enjoy it as this is nothing compared to what is coming!! And of course before the sweltering temperatures come, "tsuyu" or rainy season has to start which should happen next month. This is the season that can cause a lot of problems like mold growing on leather etc. I best stop blogging about it before I get too depressed!