Okonomiyaki: How Hiroshima’s ‘soul food’ has taken centrestage amid G7 summit

Food is possibly not the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear Hiroshima. However, the meeting of the Group of Seven (G7) leaders of the world’s wealthiest nations in the Japanese city has put the spotlight on Hiroshima’s “soul food” – okonomiyaki. According to The Guardian, this signature dish of Hiroshima is expected to make it to the plates of the G7 leaders who will be served a version prepared with oysters at a “social occasion” on Saturday (20 May). What is this dish and why it is so popular in Hiroshima? How is the city promoting it during the three-day G7 summit? Let’s take a closer look. What is okonomiyaki? It is a flour-based Japanese pancake, which roughly translates to “cooked as you like”. Okonomiyaki is popular across the country, especially in Hiroshima and in the Kansai region – Osaka, Kyoto and Kobe, reported BBC. According to a Japan Experience article, the base mixture of okonomiyaki is made of wheat flour, egg, fish broth, and white cabbage.

There are two popular styles to cook Okonomiyaki – Kansai or Osaka style and Hiroshima style.

Osakans prefer to add seafood and nagaimo, a type of yam, to their base mixture. They then include anything from pork, egg, cheese, squid and bonito to seaweed, shrimp, and spring onion on top. This mixture is then grilled on a hot plate and the final dish is served with mayonnaise or okonomi sauce, according to the article. The main difference between the two styles is that while in the Kansai style, all the ingredients are mixed together, Hiroshima prefers to make the dish in layers. Hiroshima style also includes grilled soba noodles. As per National Geographic, Hiroshimans “start with a crepe-like thin flour dough base, top it with a mountain of cabbage, grill it down, flip and top it with a cake of grilled soba noodles, also dripped with the signature sauce”. [caption id=“attachment_12621362” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Okonomiyaki has become Hiroshima’s signature dish. Reuters[/caption] While the dish has been called “the Japanese pizza”, Japan Experience noted that it is a “wrong” comparison as the two have “nothing in common apart from the round shape”. History of Okonomiyaki While tracing back the exact point of origin is tough, the concept of a grilled pancake goes back to Buddhist ceremonies during the Edo period (1683- 1868), reported National Geographic. During the Meiji Era (1868-1912), this sweet version of pancake spread beyond monasteries, as per the Japan Experience article. After the Kanto earthquake in 1923, a savoury variation of the dish became famous. As per The Guardian report, an earlier version of the dish was called issen yōshoku, or “one-penny western food”, which was made with a batter of flour and water cooked on an iron plate and garnished with chopped spring onion and bonito flakes. After the US atomic bombing on 6 August 1945, the survivors turned to the pre-war dish due to food shortage, the report added.

Okonomiyaki evolved along with Hiroshima as its people rebuild the city from the ruins.

They used the little ingredients available to make the pancake such as cabbage and onions mixed with the huge quantity of flour provided by the US as part of post-war rations and any other food item that they could find, as per National Geographic. As the city healed and recovered, other ingredients like pork, cabbage, eggs and yakisoba noodles made it to the dish, reported The Guardian. “Hiroshima developed side-by-side with okonomiyaki; it took root in the citizens and became their favourite food since then. It’s literally soul food for Hiroshima people”, Shizuka Kobara, public relations officer at Otafuku, the prime Hiroshima-based maker of okonomiyaki sauce, told BBC in 2020. Okonomiyaki and the G7 connection As per the BBC report, Hiroshima has more okonomiyaki restaurants per capita than any other region in Japan. With Prime Minister Fumio Kishida hosting G7 leaders in the city, okonomiyaki has taken centrestage. “Okonomiyaki has gone from a food for survival to a speciality of Hiroshima,” the Oconomiyaki Academy’s director, Shigeki Sasaki, told the Asahi Shimbun newspaper. “Given current global events, we want to incorporate a message into the dishes that they symbolise the peace and reconstruction of Hiroshima.” [caption id=“attachment_12621402” align=“alignnone” width=“640”] Restaurants in Hiroshima will serve G7-inspired okonomiyaki. Reuters[/caption] The Oconomiyaki Academy, a local restaurant trade group, has decided to alter the dish to showcase the food culture of the G7 countries. These G7-inspired versions could be seen at restaurants during the summit: burger meat for the US, maple syrup sauce for Canada, sausage and sauerkraut for Germany, fish and chips for Britain. “We thought a lot of customers from various countries overseas would come here. So we wanted to offer various flavours of okonomiyaki to match their tastes,” Atsuki Kitaura, the city-wide manager of the Chinchikurin chain, told Reuters. With okonomiyaki on the table, Hiroshima is hoping to put its culinary culture on the global map. With inputs from agencies Read all the  Latest News ,  Trending News ,  Cricket News ,  Bollywood News , India News  and  Entertainment News  here. Follow us on  Facebook,  Twitter and  Instagram.