Hey, kids: guess what time is it? It's time to restart that Long March known as 100 Favorite Dishes (INSERT YEAR). YEAH!!!
Hey,
don't ding us for listicles: Weekly DataLab studies show ustedes love
this gimmick, launched in honor of our coming Best Of issue. Besides, it
is rather fun to do this for us Forkers–an opportunity to highlight
dishes from restaurants we'll never full review, or secrets from old
standbys. Anyhoo, let the march continue...
Calling Takoyaki Tanota a food truck is too generous. It is a
cart–nothing more than a propane powered griddle on wheels with a
trailer hitch. But in its stripped down existence lies the hook.
Essential to the experience is watching your takoyaki being prepared. If
it were a truck, this wouldn't be possible.
On the cart, you see its birth from the beginning, starting from the
batter. You witness the liquid being poured into the greased dimples, a
nugget of cooked octopus meat dropped into the middle. And then you see
them being coaxed and teased by an attendant equipped with nothing more
than a sharp stick until they miraculously transform into perfect
spheres.
]
The popovers are then drenched in a sticky-sweet glaze, showered with pulverized aonori (seaweed), squiggled with drizzles of Kewpie mayo and a fistful of chopped green onions.
You eat it right there, standing, within seconds of cooking, because the crispness of the outer layer is tenuous. If you're not huffing and puffing at how insanely scorching the custard-like interior is, then you've waited too long to let them cool. To eat them any other way than scalding is to miss the point of takoyaki.
Follow Takoyaki Tanota at takoyakitanota.com, or follow them on Twitter @takoyakitanota
The list so far:
99. Fiesta Noodles at Jollibee
100. Chilaquiles Verdes Con Huevos Estrellados at La Tablita California
Click here to view our 100 Favorite Dishes of 2010!
Click here to view our 100 Favorite Dishes of 2011!
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Before becoming an award-winning restaurant critic for OC Weekly in 2007, Edwin Goei went by the alias “elmomonster” on his blog Monster Munching, in which he once wrote a whole review in haiku.