Up Your Japanese Cooking Game With This Rolled Omelet Pan

One of my obsessions over the past several years has been cooking Japanese dishes at home, an urge inspired by traveling there, eating about 80 zillion Japanese restaurant meals back home, and consuming far too many episodes of Midnight Diner: Tokyo Stories and Japanese Style Originator.

This reached its peak in 2017, when I challenged myself to make at least one new-to-me Japanese recipe each week (I ended up making 62 total). I immersed myself in cookbooks like Japanese Soul Cooking and Tokyo Cult Recipes, as well as online resources like Just One Cookbook, to learn dishes like omurice, chirashi, and kara-age. My pantry became cluttered with Japanese ingredients (yes, there are now two types of sesame paste in my cabinet), and I assembled a little roster of tools, like drop lids and daikon graters.

One dish I never mastered that year was the simple-looking but deceptively tricky Japanese rolled omelet. So for my birthday, my husband bought me this tamagoyaki pan. I don’t think it’s over-the-top to say that this pan and I have been inseparable ever since.

Its compact size and sloped shape mean that I actually have been improving my tamagoyaki technique more and more with practice. But even if I’m not making myself a Japanese breakfast (or making a bento for my husband to take to work), I find other ways to use this pan. Its Maifanite stone non-stick coating (yes, I had to look that up) works great for any sort of egg scramble, fried egg, or quick sautee for one, and it’s a breeze to clean. There’s even a special spatula that fits the pan perfectly (I found that using it in conjunction with a pair of chopsticks works best for rolling my omelets).

If your cooking obsession mirrors mine, the pan is a great tool to have at your disposal. Just be warned that it’s not a miracle maker — you’ll probably subject yourself and any dining companions to a few lumpy, messy-looking omelets before you find your groove.

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