Taiyaki (鯛焼き)

Today, I made Taiyaki (鯛焼き) after a long time. Taiyaki is a Japanese fish-shaped cake which has, traditionally, sweet red beans paste inside, and its name literally means "Baked Sea Bream".

Why Baked "Sea Bream - TAI 鯛"?

It is rather odd to think baked sea breams can be this popular. There won't be many nations on earth who appreciate stuffing some sweet inside a fish would be a popular item as fish are considered quite slimy and smelly for many in western society. But here we go, this is Japan, the nation of fish lovers. This is the key point of the reason behind this question. This usually quite expensive fish, Sea breams, especially the pink / red ones, are considered as one of the lucky symbols in Japan since. Also, the colour of red is placed in the centre of the national flag represented as a sun, and the red means the energy, vitality, heat, and power in our tradition. Not just the colour but the sound "Tai", sea bream in Japanese, sounds the same as the last part of Mede-Tai (めでたい), which means auspicious or happy. So a Japanese sweet maker over 100 years ago wanted to sell his round shaped sweet, thought of this idea of selling the same sweet shaped in a fish shape and as a result, the sales rocketed to the moon and back.

Making Taiyaki in the UK

Today at home, as we were in a great hurry for hungry stomachs, we used Costco pancake mix! And used the waffle recipe, which uses the pancake mix, an egg and some water. I also didn't have the red bean paste handy so used white and milk chocolate filling, which turned out to be very yummy! You could say that it was fish-shaped waffle with chocolate. While you can buy Taiyaki from many shops and special stalls who would make it fresh in front of you in Japan, we have almost no choice but to make if you live abroad. (If you know a shop who sells them in the UK, please let us know!) I preferred a modern version of Taiyaki with cream and custard and as a stall was by the station I used to use, I often bought them for home or for a small gift for friends.

In order to make Taiyaki, you will need the Taiyaki maker for creating the fish shape so might not be handy for all but you could possibly arrange it with normal pancake or waffles with a bit of imagination. I can't stop thinking this sweet will be quite popular in the UK as it is quite a unique idea and this country is becoming very health conscious. I believe that it can spread the love of fish. That's me being very positive again!