At some point, Russell and his Kobe band members (the group he was playing with in the earlier post) decided they wanted to have an okonomiyaki party. The drum player lives in Osaka and the bass player lives in Himeji, so we are in the middle in Kobe. Plus, it made sense to have dinner close to the rehearsal venue. Of course, we are always happy to have guests over.
There was one problem, though. Our previous attempts at okonomiyaki - those recorded last year at this time when Russell's sister was visiting - hadn't gone so well. The food was delicious, but its hard to make okonomiyaki in a small, rounded fry pan. Its really much nicer if you have a flat surface that you can get around easily for flipping. The drummer said she would bring her okonomiyaki hotplate, but in the end it was deemed too heavy. Russell and I decided it was time we had a hotplate - especially since it seemed likely to increase our house party potential. Russell went off to band practice, and I headed to the big electronics store downtown. There were quite a few options. There was the basic, cheap, plain hotplate. Unfortunately, its only settings were on and off, and I had specific instructions to get something that could be adjusted. It was also possible to get hotplates that had interchangeable plates. There was a flat plate for things like okonomiyaki or hot cakes, there were plates with grill ridges for yakiniku (grilled meat), there were plates with half circle indentions for making takoyaki (octopus balls), there were bowls that could be used for nabe, and there was every combination of those plates in between. I needed the flat plate and I really wanted a nabe bowl, too. I searched around and the only combination I could find with both of those options was the full four plate option that was on special. It was a bit extravagant, but it wasn't too expensive and it did expand our range of dinner party options significantly. Plus, the temperature was totally adjustable.
I went ahead and bought it - though getting it home was another task entirely. With three heavy metal plates and a big stoneware bowl, the resulting box was HEAVY. The person helping me at the shop put double plastic handles on it and wrapped it in bubble wrap. She also triple checked that I could make it home and did not look convinced. In the end, I did make it home, but I had sore muscles and bruises for the next week. My choice did prove to be a good one, though, and has been used regularly ever since. Its maiden voyage, of course, was as an okonomiyaki pan. It had come up at some point that Russell's bass player was a rock-solid okonomiyaki chef. He had apparently developed his talents as an underclassman in charge of feeding the upper classmen in his high school karate club. We have it on good authority that one does not want to disappoint one's upper classmen in a karate club. After band practice, the band went to the grocery store and got everything they would need. When they got to our place, the bass player got right to work. He was a clearly good at what he was doing. He was working fast, cleaning up after himself (shock!) and even providing regular appetizers for us while we waited like a bunch of impatient baby birds.
The result was delicious. He grated a bunch of mountain yam and threw that in to make the okonomiyaki more fluffy. Mountain yam is this funny vegetable that we get here. Every time I have seen it, it has been grated up. The grating turns the tuber into a kind of white, mucousy slime. Its totally unappetizing. It doesn't have a strong taste - I think the main draw is the texture. There are a number of slimy foods in Japan - things like okra, natto (fermented soybeans) and mountain yam are a solid corner of traditional japanese cooking. Of course, all of them are extremely healthy, and they do grow on you after a while. The mountain yam slime also has the benefit of trapping a lot of air during the grating process, so the resulting goo made the okonomiyaki super light and moist. Typical okonomiyaki around here tends to be much heavier. 
Once it got down to eating the bass player and drum player took turns flipping the resulting vegetable pancakes. In the end, however there was a little more batter left than expected. The resulting okonomiyaki stretched out to cover the entire hot plate thoroughly. Its made flipping a real challenge. The final flipping responsibility was given to the drummer, who decided it might be wise to cut the okonomiyaki in half and only flip half at a time. That's what she's up to in the picture. It worked pretty well, and in the end all the feast was eaten. We are lucky to have such skilled friends.
About a week after the okonomiyaki party, I was talking with some co-workers, and they were telling me how easy it was to make nabe. I now had a nabe bowl that went with my hot plate, so I decided to give it a try. My co-workers told me that all I would need was some fish and vegetables. I put it all in the bowl. add about a half inch of water and let the whole thing simmer down into a kind if stew. I bought salmon, two kinds of mushrooms, carrot, greens, sweet potato and some fish-based meatballs. I threw everything in the pot ( took less than 10 minutes) waited 15-20 minutes, and we were feasting on steamy fish and veggie goodness. It was delicious, healthy and fast. All things we like in a new recipe.We had so much fun that we tried again the next day. This time we tried different mushrooms, potatoes, different greens, a white fish, and kimchi. The kimchi really made the nabe. It was lightly spicy and the salt (something we never add on our own) really made the soup nice.
It now became hard not to have nabe every night. We were worried we would get tired of it, though, so now we save it for one or two nights a week. Sitting around our heated table with the blanket over our laps and a a hot pot of vegetables in the middle of the table is pretty awesome. Especially now that the temperatures are dropping. This was definitely one of our better purchases.
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