Week 31: Tanabata Festival - Shrimp Okonomiyaki [Baking]

Intro from Baking Challenge: The Tanabata Festival is on Saturday so it's time to expand your baking skills into Japan! Tanabata Festival is the wishing star festival so maybe try making some SPACE JELLY . Or if you want something savoury takoyaki and okonomiyaka are very common festival foods. As for general Japanese desserts, try things such as mochi, cotton soft cheesecake, or melon pans (a bun wrapped in cookie dough!). There's also about a million recipes using green tea, black sesame, or red bean paste. Get out there and make something awesome!

I somewhat followed the recipe here, although I had to make a lot of substitutions based on availability: regular flour and water instead of the Okonomiyaki flour; chopped cabbage, broccoli, and carrots for the veggies; and I added shrimp. I used coconut oil to fry the pancake and had a lot of issues with the batter sticking to the pan. Not sure if that was the fault of the coconut oil, but I might try something different in the future. Also, I wasn't able to find Okonomiyaki sauce, so I followed this recipe to make my own with ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, and soy sauce.

Bonus action shot of my pancake falling apart while cooking

For as sloppy as it looks, it actually came out really tasty! It made for a very filling lunch to share.