Danish sweet takoyaki?

Takoyaki, or Japanese squid balls, are relatively common here in Singapore, but just today for the first time I came across aebleskiver, a Danish puffy pastry made from batter.

Ableskiver filled with jam [Source: The Prepared Pantry]

I instantly made the connection between the two when I saw the shape of the aebleskiver pan. It turns out others have made this connection too – this online shop for Japanese goods sells takoyaki pans and explicitly says you can use them to make aebleskiver as well. Takoyaki pans are easily available in Japanese stores in Singapore, so it won’t be difficult to get into aebleskiver production at home :)!

Aebleskiver pan [Source: The Prepared Pantry]

Read more about aebleskiver and how to make it:
www.aebleskiver.com
The Story of Aebleskiver
Prepared Pantry’s Aebleskiver Centre

Some pages on takoyaki:
LunchInABox’s takoyaki tutorial
Gindaco Takoyaki franchise
Plastique Monkey on takoyaki
YouTube videos on making takoyaki

These are great ideas for expanding your range of foods if you are on a Failsafe diet. Those who are gluten-intolerant simply need to use a gluten-free pancake recipe. To convert any pancake recipe to make aebleskivers, simply replace each egg with the whites of three eggs – whipped and folded into the batter.

Although aebleskiver is traditionally filled with jam or applesauce and dusted with icing sugar, you could easily use any filling you wish. Similarly takoyaki is traditionally a savoury dish, but you could start with the batter and fill it with anything you like.

Unfortunately, many of the ingredients in traditional takoyaki are definitely not Failsafe: takoyaki brown sauce, Japanese mayonnaise, dashi soup stock, pickled ginger and bonito flakes.

Time to get creative here! You might get some ideas how to adapt takoyaki by reading this quick history of takoyaki, which was preceded by choboyaki and radioyaki (yes, it was named after the new modern sound machine at the time!). Or try this vegan takoyaki using konnyaku for inspiration!

Once you’ve bought your takoyaki/aebleskiver pan, you can also make :

1) these cute little egg-shaped cakes (Ji Dan Gao 雞蛋糕), which can also be stuffed with whatever you fancy.

2) Thai kranom krok – coconut pudding (uses rice flour & coconut milk, a bit like apom balik in Malaysia/Singapore), which can even be stuffed with mussels. Recipes here and here. (Don’t forget, coconut milk is not OK for the Failsafe diet.)

3) “Hokkaido hot-cakes”, which I’ve never tried before and just saw for the first time at a Japanese desserts stall in the basement of Plaza Singapura earlier today. They are stuffed with custard.

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