Takoyaki Cakepops – for beginners

Ingredients for 3 servings:

• 200 g flour
• 2 m.-sized eggs
• 450 ml dashi
• ½ bag(s) of baking powder
• 1 dash of soy sauce
• 200 g octopus, cooked, cut into small pieces
• possibly spring onion(s), cut into fine rings
• possibly pickled ginger, finely chopped

Instructions

Working time approx. 15 minutes; Cooking/baking time approx. 40 minutes; Total time approx. 55 minutes

simple variant

Note: The batter is too large for the specified amount of octopus. You may want to only make half the amount the first time. Mix the batter ingredients well. The batter should have the consistency of very runny pancake or crepe batter. Heat a cake pop maker to high. Pour batter into the holes and then place one or two pieces of octopus in. The batter should and may overflow. (Actually, spring onions and pickled ginger should also be added – I skipped those for now, especially since the bowls in my cake pop maker are rather small.) Close the lid and wait 3 minutes. Open it and see if the balls have already loosened. (They probably won’t. However, it also depends very much on the performance of the cake pop maker.) Wait another 2-3 minutes, then turn the balls 90° so that a gap forms in the bowl. Now pour in some fresh batter and stuff in any overflowing dough bars. Repeat this process two or three times until the balls are nice and crispy. I found that simple chopsticks worked best for me; they were definitely the easiest tool to use: If the balls start to stick, simply press in a little with the side of the chopstick, and the dough will release from the pan! My top tip for beginners: Start with the (usually) three inner bowls: They’re easy to handle without the baking becoming stressful. Within the first session, I got so good that I could even process six balls at once. Next tip: My cake pop maker isn’t powerful enough, so I wouldn’t be able to fill all 12 bowls at once. You’ll just have to experiment with your own device.