Japanese Street Food

Summer evenings in Japan can be hot and sticky, but it's also the season for outdoor festivals called omatsuri. I grew up in the States and spent my summers in rural Kyushu, where the festival foods were always a highlight. Rows of makeshift stalls filled the humid air with competing smells, and I wanted to try something from every one.

There were table-sized griddles piled with steaming noodles and cabbage, the fruity, savory aroma of sauce sizzling against hot steel. A few stalls over, charcoal-seared meat billowed smoke through the glare of floodlights. The sweet smell of taiyaki batter hitting a hot mold would pull me in yet another direction. It was sensory overload in all the right ways.

These Japanese street food recipes bring some of those flavors into your kitchen. Okonomiyaki is a good place to start: shredded cabbage folded into a savory batter, with room for whatever mix-ins suit your fancy. I'll show you how to get the outside browned while keeping the center tender, and you can take it from there.