Ingredients

• 1 cup (200g) rice
• 4¼ oz (120g) cabbage, sliced
• 3 scallions, thinly sliced
• 1¾ oz (50g) scallops, chopped up if they’re big
• 1¾ oz (50g) squid, cut into small squares
• 1¾ oz (50g) shrimp, roughly chopped
• pinch white pepper
• 1½ oz (40g) mozzarella or similar cheese, cut into small cubes
• 3 eggs
• ½ cup (65g) all-purpose flour
• vegetable oil, for frying
• 6 bacon strips, cut in half
• 4 tbsp okonomi sauce or katsu sauce
• Japanese mayonnaise (optional)
• 3 pinches katsuobushi (optional)
• aonoriko (green seaweed flakes, optional)

Directions

• Cook the rice as you would normally, maybe a little firmer than usual as it will continue to steam as the pancake cooks. Let it cool to room temperature, then mix together with the cabbage, scallions, scallops, squid, shrimp, white pepper, cheese, eggs and flour. You may want to use your hands to break up any clumps of rice.
• Unless you’ve got a very large griddle, you will likely have to make one pancake at a time. Heat a generous glug of oil in a frying pan or griddle (you’ll need a good layer of it to keep the rice from sticking), then cook one-third of the bacon until just starting to brown.
• Pour a third of the pancake mixture over the bacon in the pan, using a spatula to help form it into a disk.
• Cook on one side for about 5 minutes, keeping your eye on the heat—it should not be too hot so the pancake doesn’t burn. Now here’s the tricky part.
• Flip the pancake over—this is a two-spatula job, and you’ll want to make sure the entire base is loosened from the pan before attempting to flip. Alternatively, you can slide your spatula underneath the pancake to release it, then turn it over into another oiled frying pan.
• Cook for another 5 minutes or so. In the last 2 minutes of cooking, spread the okonomi or katsu sauce all over the surface of the pancake, making sure it goes all the way to the edge. Carefully lift out the pancake onto a heatproof plate and keep it hot in a warmed oven while you prepare the rest of the pancakes.
• To serve, carefully transfer the pancakes onto warmed dinner plates (again, use two spatulas). Squeeze a spiral or a zigzag of mayonnaise over the sauce if you like. Garnish with a big pinch of katsuobushi and a sprinkling of aonoriko if you want.

Notes

• This obscure dish, most likely invented at an izakaya called Takobō in Kumamoto, is Kyushu’s answer to okonomiyaki. If you’ve not had okonomiyaki, you should—I know only one person who doesn’t like it, and he’s weird. It’s associated mostly with Osaka, where it’s essentially a cabbage pancake topped with a sweet sauce and filled with all sorts of ingredient combinations (okonomi means “as you like”). In Hiroshima, the pancake becomes a thin crepe that tops a pile of cabbage and fried noodles. The Kumamoto version is sort of like the Osaka version, but it’s filled with rice. Think of it like a big disk of fried rice with a lovely crispy crust on the bottom, like Persian tahdig. In keeping with okonomiyaki customs, you can add pretty much anything you fancy to this—like curry powder, corn, bean sprouts or kimchi.

Photos