I Can Haz Fish Waffles

[gurdymonkey]

Finally busted out the new tayaki iron. Krusteaz Belgian Waffle mix works just fine, but even the small batch instructions made more batter than I needed, so that's in a plastic container in the fridge to be used for the next time - which could conceivably be as soon as tomorrow's breakfast. Red bean filling is traditional, but I put a dollop of sweet potato butter from the roadside produce joint on I-80 in Dixon and it was excellent. (The stand inside the mall in San Francisco's Japantown does them with red bean paste, chocolate or banana, but really, you could put just about anything you liked inside.)

Wikipedia says tayaki are only about 100 years old, which doesn't surprise me, really. Most recipes involving the use of eggs and sugar tend to date to after contact with Europe. Food and Fantasy in Early Modern Japan includes a section on a "Namban Cookbook," which includes various sugary sweets. The frequent instruction "heat from above and below" should tell you that the Japanese didn't bake before the barbarians introduced the concept of cake and biscuits. So yeah, total novelty treat and not period, but hey.

Anyway, it's the first time I've ever used a waffle iron of any kind. (My mother didn't do pancakes or waffles. She just didn't. Not surprisingly, this means I don't make them for myself either. Usually.)  It was surprisingly easy: grease the mold - I used a nonstick spray: fill one side of the mold about 3/4 of the way, add the fruit butter, then cover the filling with more batter, close the iron (the handle has a square ring on it to clamp the handles shut with) and lay it directly on the burner, wait until it smells like cooked waffle and turn the iron over. You do have to be careful about not overfilling the iron and you do have to pay attention with your nose to cooking time, but it wasn't difficult.

EDIT: Well that answers that question. The iron is specifically designed for filled waffles. If you attempt unfilled waffles, the dimensions of the fish body are such that the batter in the middle does not cook all the way through. Tasted all right with an application of butter and maple syrup, but the last bit of batter was sacrificed on a fish that got burned in an attempt to cook the body more thoroughly....