Tamagoyaki (Japanese Rolled Eggs Omelette) Recipe

Make sure you try this Tamagoyaki (Dashimaki Tamago) recipe or you are really missing out on this traditional Japanese deliciousness.

If you follow the easy Japanese omelet recipe as shown below, you can make one of the simplest and most versatile protein-rich side dishes in Japanese cuisine.

So, What is Tamagoyaki?

Tamagoyaki literally means “cooked egg” or “grilled eggs” and is made by frying thin layers of seasoned eggs that are rolled as they are cooked in a square pan. You can enjoy it for breakfast, slip it into a bento, or use it as a sushi topping. It’s also traditionally called atsuyaki tamago or atsuyuki tamago in Japan.

You can easily make this soft fluffy Japanese omelet with the Tamagoyaki recipe given below.

But first:

The tools you will need to make your Japanese rolled omelette

• Mayaki nabe or Yukihira Japanese copper frying pan 
• Coconut oil
• sushi mat
• Japanese chopsticks

To make a beautiful delicious tamagoyaki, you will need a square frying pan called Mayaki nabe in Japanese. We bought ours for about $15 and we are really delighted with it.

We use it on a daily basis and it hasn’t worn out at all. It really has a good value for money. If you don’t want to spend additionally, you can always use a small round pan, but it will be much more complicated to achieve the right result with this recipe.

You can also use an omelette maker if you want to make things even easier.

And if you want to invest a little more, you can use a traditional Yukihira Japanese copper frying pan or choose one from here.

To oil your pan, I suggest you buy some coconut oil. It’s especially effective and lasts a very long time. It’s also much more economical than the traditional oil that we reserve only for seasoning. Oil your dish using a silicone brush. The other advantage is that coconut oil is very stable at high temperatures, which is not the case with other oils.

You will also need a sushi mat called makisu that will give the tamagoyaki its rounded and compact shape. It will be much easier to cut in slices and will hold well in chopsticks.

If you want an alternative, you can always wrap it in foil paper, on which you will lay a layer of the omelette. The aim is to compact it until it cools down.

You may want to buy Japanese chopsticks to flip the tamagoyaki and possibly a spatula to help yourself in the process. You can buy spatulas which are of good quality and that will be very useful for you to make your okonomiyaki properly.

Here is a new recipe for tamagoyaki (Japanese rolled omelet) for 1-2 people. We really wanted a fluffy and tasty Japanese omelet with a noticeable taste of dashi that’s why I made my version of the recipe.

Easy Tamagoyaki (Dashimaki Tamago) Recipe ( 玉子焼き)

Advice and tips on How to Make your Japanese Rolled Omelette

• Instead of using mirin and soy sauce, you can simply use ordinary Japanese dashi broth, you will achieve similar results. Add a sachet of dashi powder to your eggs to give them an exquisite taste.

• After cooking, you can lay the tamagoyaki on a sushi mat and wrap it tightly to get a solid roll. This is a great idea, especially if it’s the first time you are preparing a tamagoyaki: the roll will be tight and easy to cut.

• You can add different ingredients to make the omelet taste good, such as chives and nori seaweed. Just be sure to finely chop them before adding to the mixture.

Can you make Tamagoyaki without pan?

Well, you don’t necessarily have to use a special square pan to make tamagoyaki, but it will probably be easier than with a round pan.

And here is how to roll and finish this tamagoyaki rolled omelette recipe.

So, now let’s get a beautiful roll of tamagoyaki.

Place the egg roll on the makisu (sushi mat) and wrap it in tightly, but without crushing it. Hold everything with rubber bands.

Wait until it cools down to room temperature and do not place it in the fridge. Then remove your makisu sushi mat and cut out your roll in slices of about 3cm.
recipe tamagoyaki cold

Your tamagoyaki is ready to be enjoyed!

Enjoy!

Tamagoyaki can be eaten with a little wasabi, shoyu soy sauce, and grated daikon (Japanese radish). It is usually accompanied by Japanese rice and miso soup for breakfast. You will often also see it in bento, because it is eaten cold.

As you have seen, it is really easy and quick to make this recipe. You can cut it into a thinner slices if you want to make a nigiri sushi. The possibilities are endless, you can incorporate it into a sushi maki, onigiri (rice ball), onigirazu (sandwich maki), temaki sushi…

It’s up to you to get creative and create your recipes with some imagination by adding to the preparation any other ingredients you like such as spinach, chives, mushrooms, other vegetables…

To add a nice touch to our rolled omelette, why not make a sweet tamagoyaki? These famous Japanese rolled omelets with savory sweet flavors are often highlighted in Japanese movies and cartoons too.

It may surprise you, but Tamagoyaki is an omelette that is often decorated with sweet not only salty condiments. It is a dish that is part of the daily life of the Japanese who usually consume it for breakfast.

Tamagoyaki is often used as an addition to bento and nigiri sushi.

It’s very different from your ordinary omelette, both in terms of flavors and texture, its preparation requires some ingredients and utensils straight from the land of the Rising Sun.

The mirin sauce already has a slight natural sweetness in its flavor, but if you want a really sweet tamagoyaki version we’ll need to add some sugar in there.

Sweet Tamagoyaki Recipe

Ingredients you’ll need to make a sweet Japanese rolled omelette

For a sweet tamagoyaki, you will need :

• 3 eggs
• ⅓ Tablespoon of powdered sugar and /or honey for extra sweetness
• 1 teaspoon soy sauce
• ½ Of mirin
• 3 tablespoon dashi (3 water and dashi powder)
• Salt to taste
• parsley or cilantro if desired
• Sesame or other cooking oil

Mirin is a Japanese semi sweet rice sauce that is easily found in Asian grocery stores.
For dashi, this is the Japanese broth. There are different kinds, but the best known are those based on dried bonito and kombu seaweed. So you can choose to make homemade dashi which will be excellent for your ramen or use powdered broth that works a bit like veal stock. If you choose this option, you will only need to dilute a tablespoon of dashi powder in 3 cups of water.

The Japanese brand shimaya offers a very convenient powdered bonito broth to quickly make this tamagoyaki recipe.

Also, note that if you are looking for a real sweet tamagoyaki omelette, it’s called Datemaki and is a traditional Japanese dessert. My version of the sweet rolled omelette is more like a pancake with honey.

Preparation and cooking of the sweet Tamagoyaki Japanese omelette

For the preparation, as for a normal omelet, beat your eggs either with a whisk or with chopsticks and add all the ingredients to the recipe.

As I mentioned above tamagoyaki is cooked in a rectangular pan called makiyaki nabe to give it its traditional shape and get a perfect omelet size (neither too big nor too small).

To make it sweet you just add the powdered sugar to the beaten eggs mixture before you fry your omelette. You can also make it even sweeter by adding a little honey, maple or agave syrup, just like you would do with your pancakes.

Method

1. Lightly oil your frying pan,
2. Pour with the help of a ladle a thin layer of beaten eggs. Eggs need to line the entire surface of the bottom of the frying pan
3. Roll the thin omelet on itself using a spatula or long chopsticks if you have any,
4. Again oil the bottom of your frying pan and again pour a small ladle of beaten eggs. Once cooked, roll the omelet.
5. Repeat until you run out of beaten eggs.
6. (Optional) garnish with some honey on top before serving.

Enjoy!

Let me know if you tried this tamagoyaki omelette recipe or if you have any questions in the comments below.