The best part of going to the pancake places, aside from eating the pancakes, is that you get to watch them expertly shape, flip, and plate up serving after serving of fluffy goodness. It’s nice to watch but also kind of awkward because I’m sure the pancake peeps don’t really want anyone staring at them. I would have major anxiety if people were watching me do my job day after day after day.

Heck, I was anxious making these pancakes in the safety of my own home in my joggers and sweatshirt. It’s a good thing I was in comfy clothes because these pancakes have been years in the making and to be honest, I failed a couple times before they came out just the way I wanted them.

Japanese pancakes: with or without mold?

The very first time I tried to do Japanese pancakes I did the ring mold version, but that just wasn’t what I wanted. Then, a couple of years ago, I winged it and made some that tasted good, but weren’t perfect, looks wise. (Update: I made the ones with molds and they are super tall and fluffy!) I kept meaning to perfect that recipe and put it up, but I kind of sort of *gasp* forgot about them. Just recently though, Mike mentioned that Pancake Day was coming up and I started thinking about pancakes again and here we are.

I tried to find the recipe that I was working on so many years ago but somehow it was gone so I gave up and just tried out a very popular google result. Sadly, I was seriously disappointed: too eggy and nothing like the pancakes I’ve had in Tokyo. They weren’t even fluffy?! I just knew I had to get back the recipe that I started so many years ago so I asked Mike to help and lo and behold, it was there, on my computer. With tasty recipe in hand, I set out on making them even fluffier and went deep into fluffy pancake search mode and found a promising looking video.