Otaku no Podcast » video

The TJX Crew Invade J-Town

Donald Burr — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 16:49:32 +0000

If you live in or near a city of reasonable size, odds are that it has a fairly sizable Japanese-American population, and that it would have some form of Japantown. Perhaps it’s nothing more than a collection of several Japanese or Asian markets or restaurants along a particular city block, or perhaps it’s a huge section of town completely devoted to Japanese-American businesses. Some of the more famous are San Francisco’s and San Jose’s Japantowns (San Francisco’s being one of my favorites), and Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo (which I still haven’t made it to, despite the frequent protestation of one of my co-hosts). Whatever your town has, though, it should be your sworn duty as otaku to visit such a place. Because you will find all manner of things that will interest you there — anime and related goods (Japan Video and Media remains one of my favorite stores to find this kind of thing, and I make it a point to stop in whenever I’m in the area); Jpop, Jrock, and other Japanese music; Japanese household goods; cultural items (decoration, bonsai, etc.); clothing (get your cosplay on!); and, most importantly, FOOD!!! It’s the next best thing to visiting Japan, and is a hell of a lot cheaper (maybe…)

The TJX crew recently visited Markham, Ontario’s J-Town (map) and shot this nifty little video in which they sample such delicacies as yakitori (one of my favorites), Mitsuya Cider “ALL ZERO,” onigiri (I have fond memories of these – during our Japan trip in 2004, most nights we’d pick up a pair of these at a konbini and they’d serve as our breakfast the next morning); and “korokke,” or croquettes.

Be warned tho – watching this is gonna make you hungry! (A trip to your local Japantown should take care of that though!)

Cool Find: How to register at Nico Nico Douga

Donald Burr — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 19:24:51 +0000

Nico Nico Douga is a sort of Japanese YouTube, and is one of the most popular video sharing sites in Japan. It’s a hotbed of otaku-related video sharing activity, and you can often find fun fan-made anime- or video game-related video content on it. (There’s tons of other weird, wild and wacky Japan-related video content on there as well, of course.) One unique feature that NND has over other similar sites is that when a user comments on a video, rather than the comments appearing as one long list below the video, comments are instead overlaid directly on top of the video, and furthermore can be synced to a particular time in the video. The whole effect is rather akin to VH1’s Pop Up Videos.

While the website is in Japanese, it isn’t really that difficult to find and view videos. (“see shiny looking video thumbnail? click on it.”) Registering for the site is another matter entirely, and unless you have a fairly good grasp of the Japanese writing system, you’re out of luck. Until now, that is. This excellent video from the folks over at Ichiro-Style (a site that I honestly hadn’t heard of until today) shows you the step-by-step procedure for registering, including translations of all the prompts. Wonderful!

So why not head over to Nico Nico Douga today and try it out for yourself? Registration is free (there are paid Premium accounts that give you certain unknown added benefits, but registering for one of those requires a Japanese credit card). All you need is a working e-mail address where you can receive the validation e-mail. Of course, if you’re afraid of spam or whatnot, you don’t have to use your regular e-mail address; you can always set up a free Gmail, Yahoo! Mail, or heck, even a Hotmail account.

Watch your downloaded anime on your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad with Air Video (Updated)

Donald Burr — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 18:38:49 +0000

I hope you’ll excuse this slightly off-topic posting, but I just found something that I had to share with you.

We’ve all got anime on our hard drives. Might as well man up and admit it. OK, so maybe it’s anime you legally purchased through an online service like iTunes; or maybe it’s content that you ripped from DVD’s that you own (technically illegal under the DMCA, but we’ve never heard of individuals who only do this for their own personal use [and don't share the files they create] being prosecuted); or maybe it’s something that you downloaded via teh torrents (definitely illegal, but most anime companies have traditionally turned a begrudgingly blind eye toward fansubs). But I’m sure that many of us have some anime hanging around on their hard drives.

Playing this downloaded anime, however, can prove to be a problem. There are over 9,000 video formats out there. (Not really, but it sure feels like it!) And with different bitrates, options, etc., this can prove quite confusing for most computers to play. Add different audio formats (AAC? AC3? PCM? WAV? MP3???!) and different subtitling methods (SSA? ASS? SRT??!) and that makes the complexity even worse. Fortunately, for desktop PC’s and Macs, there are excellent “swiss army knife” video players such as VLC (Mac, Windows, and Linux/UNIX) and Perian (Mac only) that do a pretty good job of playing back the various video formats out there.

But what about portable devices? Devices such as the Archos 5 do a fairly good job of playing back the most common video formats, but many files still require transcoding, which takes lots of time and CPU power. But if you have an iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad, you’ve got an even harder challenge, as these devices support a very limited set of formats (basically only MPEG-4 and H.264 of a certain resolution and bit rate). Also, with any portable device, your storage space is limited – anywhere from 8 to 64 GB for flash players, and maybe 250-500 GB max for hard drive based players. Which is a problem for those of us with, erm, larger anime collections.

What to do, what to do?

Enter Air Video. This fantastic app for the iPhone and iPod touch lets you stream video files from your computer over either WiFi or the 3G cellular network. The kicker here is that, if the file is in a format that your device can’t play natively, it will transcode it – on the fly! And it also supports the display of embedded subtitles. It’s pretty solid too. I’ve thrown just about every oddball video I’ve got at it, and it works perfectly.

The program is available right now for the iPhone and iPod touch. They’ve already upgraded it for the iPad and have submitted it to Apple for approval, so hopefully the iPad version will be out soon. Best of all, the iPad version will be a free upgrade to those who already own the iPhone/iPod version, so feel free to buy it now – the iPod/iPhone version works just fine on the iPad.

Get it today for the amazingly low price of $2.99 at the iTunes Store. There’s also a free version with limited features. You’ll also want to head over to the Air Video website to download the accompanying server software for your desktop computer (versions available for both Mac and Windows).

A few days ago I wrote about how the iPad will appeal to anime and manga fans. This, my friends, is a concrete example of that.

(UPDATE 04/09/2010: The iPad version of Air Video is released and is on the App Store, and once again, is a FREE update if you’ve already purchased the program. Just go to the Apps section in your copy of iTunes and click the “check for updates” button at the lower right corner of the window, and you should automatically download it.)

What The iPad Will Mean For Otaku

Donald Burr — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 17:38:37 +0000

If you haven’t heard of the Apple iPad, which is due to hit store shelves tomorrow morning, then you’ve probably just returned from a long journey into another dimension fighting an impossibly tough foe on behalf of a civilization that considers you their only hope for survival. Or perhaps you were off frolicking with your mail order bride who turned out to be a powerful goddess who can grant your every wish (and get you into a ton of mischief while doing so). Or [insert other random contrived anime plot here].

In brief, the iPad is Apple’s answer to the tablet and netbook. Based on the iPhone OS, it’s a tablet computer that Apple is positioning to fill a perceived gap in functionality between a smartphone and a laptop computer. Since it’s based on the iPhone OS, and uses similar (though scaled-up) hardware, it has many features similar to the iPhone and iPod touch; however many user interface elements have been designed to take advantage of the much larger screen (a 9.7-inch (25 cm) LED backlit multi-touch display at 1024×768). And at $499 for the base model, the price is really quite reasonable considering the power and capabilities of what you get (IMHO of course).

Of course, reaction on the Internet to the device is bitterly divided. (Kind of like American politics. Sigh.) The true fanboys are lauding it as the best thing since sliced bread, while the haters are calling it “just a giant iPod touch.” But I think that the detractors are missing the point here. Yes, it IS a giant iPod touch. And that giantness is what makes the device work. There are things that you just can’t do (or you can do, but very poorly) on the iPhone or iPod touch because of its limited screen size. The larger screen of the iPad makes these applications possible. (Yes, she was right when she said “size matters.”) Here is why you, the otaku, should get really fired up about this device.

The first, and most obvious, is video playback. Sure, you can play video on your iPhone and iPod touch (or even video iPod). But you’ll probably lose your eyesight trying to watch it on that tiny screen. There are, of course, dedicated video players with bigger screens such as the Archos. But even those pale in comparison to the iPad’s generous 9.7 incher.

Where do you get video content then? Well, the iTunes Store has a fairly decent selection of anime titles, and at $1.99 per episode or roughly $35 for a full season, the prices are pretty reasonable. (Insert standard disclaimer about how different regions have different content in their respective iTunes stores.) Of course, you could always convert your own DVD’s into H.264 video files and load them on yourself, using tools such as HandBrake, RipIt, and AnyDVD. (Insert standard disclaimer about how, technically speaking, this is against the law thanks to the DMCA, but unless you’re planning on selling them, you probably won’t get caught, but it’s still technically illegal, and how you should only do this with DVD’s that you honest-to-God own.)

Then there’s always streaming video. Two major streaming video providers have already tossed their hat in the ring. Netflix, the uber-popular DVD-rental-by-mail outfit, has been offering streaming video to go along with its rental service for several years now; and yes, they do have some decent anime content. Not a whole lot, but it’s growing day by day. They now have an iPad app (free even!) that will let you stream any of Netflix’s streaming titles to your device. The best part is, if you start watching something on your computer, and then have to leave the house or something, you can pick up on your iPad right from where you left off, and vice versa.

And everybody’s anime streaming site Crunchyroll has also committed to creating an iPad app. Currently they have an app for the iPhone and iPod touch (also free!) that will let you watch any of their streaming titles; this app should work on the iPad’s compatibility mode, so you can get your Crunchyroll on until they finish their iPad-native app.

Also, it is rumored that Hulu will be making an iPad app too.

Of course, there are plenty of other sites out there that stream anime, legally or otherwise, including the websites of most (all?) of the big anime licensors (FUNimation, Bandai, etc.). The problem with these, of course, is that they use Adobe’s Flash, which the iPad will not support. But this won’t always be the case. The web is moving in its own slow, ponderous way to adopt the HTML 5 standard, which includes built-in support for streaming video, obviating the need for Flash. And the iPad supports HTML 5 perfectly. I suspect that once the iPad hits the masses, there will be a flurry of websites converting over to HTML 5. In fact, some of the big players have already done just that.

Are you into manga? Well then you’ve got reason to sit up and take notice too. Manga is definitely something that does NOT work well on an iPhone or similarly sized device. The screen is just too darn small. Either you have to squint and try to read micro-print on a full-page display, or you can zoom in and be faced with the prospect of having to scroll around to read everything. This is probably why those very few manga/comics forays on the iPhone failed so miserably. Of course there are e-readers such as the Amazon Kindle and Barnes and Noble Nook. Sure, they have bigger screens; but they are (so far anyway) only black and white, and the weird “flashing” effect when the e-ink screens refresh is off-putting to some.

Well, there are some exciting things afoot. Marvel Comics has released an iPad app (free!) based on the Comixology technology. And it looks really awesome. In portrait mode, you get the full page, though at about 80% of the size of a traditional comics page. Even so, text and graphics are crisp and easily readable thanks to the iPad’s excellent screen technology. But turn the unit on its side (in landscape mode), and a new viewing mode becomes available. You zoom into each panel of a strip, and tapping on the screen brings you to the next panel in logical order, all the while highlighting moments of dialogue or action. This is a fantastic way of viewing comics, and Andy Ihnatko, beloved tech pundit and well-known comics fan, really likes it. I’m sure that manga publishers will soon sit up and take notice.

If you’re an artist, you have cause to celebrate as well. Using the giant iPad screen and touch surface as an artist’s canvas is only natural, and with programs such as SketchBook Pro and Brushes, it’s really quite simple yet powerful. Several months back, an artist made a big splash in both the tech and art community, by creating a New Yorker cover using an iPhone. Imagine what you can do with an iPad! I wonder when we’ll start seeing people sitting at Artists’ Alley not with paintbrush or pen, but with an iPad instead.

And finally, with its large screen and native PDF support, the iPad makes an excellent PDF reader. When you consider that many anime conventions make their schedules, program guidebooks, etc. available in PDF format, this can be quite a handy thing to have. It’s admittedly a small thing, and wouldn’t make sense as the sole reason to buy an iPad; but if you bought one for any of the reasons above (or other reasons of your own, perhaps) it’s a nice extra.

Tablet computers are certainly nothing new – Microsoft has been trying to market them for years. But they have always failed miserably in the common consumer market. One possible reason why is because they were trying to extend the desktop computer metaphor onto the tablet, by using standard desktop operating systems (i.e. Windows). In taking their already-successful mobile iPhone OS and scaling it up to tablet size, Apple has done what Microsoft and countless other companies have failed to do — deliver a compelling tablet experience that just *works*.

Exciting times are upon us!

“Anime TV” visits Anime Los Angeles 6

Donald Burr — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 07:29:28 +0000

Little did I know, but the folks over at Anime TV, Revision3’s new anime show, paid a visit to the recently-held Anime Los Angeles 6 held last month. Either they hired uber leet invisible ninja cameramen, or I simply did not notice them thanks to my oblivious-to-the-world nature. More likely the latter. Anyway they highlighted some of the cosplay gathering action as well as a look at the dealer’s room and Artist’s Alley, and a brief interview with Guest of Honor Kyle Hebert.

You can download the video or subscribe to the podcast through the website, or watch the embedded version below. The Anime LA segment starts 8 minutes into the video. They also review the series Rental Magica.

Mobile Suit Gundam now streaming for free on Crunchyroll!

Donald Burr — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 21:15:32 +0000

Attention Gundam fans! In honor of the impending Mobile Suit Gundam UC (Unicorn) Blu-ray release, everybody’s favorite streaming anime provider Crunchyroll is not only streaming Unicorn, but is also streaming the original Mobile Suit Gundam series! This stream is available free to anyone in the US, Canada, Europe (excluding select countries) and Russia.

Not familiar with the Gundamverse? (Where have you been??!) Here’s a brief synopsis describing the series. You can also check out the Wikipedia entry on Gundam (but beware – there be spoilers here!)

“U.C. 0079. The rebel space colonies of the Principality of Zeon launch a war of independence against the Earth Federation, using humanoid fighting vehicles called mobile suits to overwhelm the Federation Forces and conquer half of Earth’s surface.

Months later, the Federation has finally developed its own prototype mobile suits at a remote space colony. But when the colony suffers a Zeon surprise attack, these new weapons fall into the hands of a motley crew of civilians and cadets, and fate places a youth named Amuro Ray at the controls of the white mobile suit Gundam…”

And here’s the synopsis for Mobile Suit Gundam Unicorn:

“The year is U.C. 0096. Three years have passed since the end of the Second Neo Zeon War.

It is said that the Vist Foundation manipulates the Earth Federation and Anaheim Electronics from behind the scenes. Hoping to create a new world, the Foundation attempts to hand over a certain secret to the Neo Zeon remnants known as the Sleeves. This will mean the opening of Laplace’s Box, which holds a great secret tied to the origins of the Universal Century.

The exchange between the Vist Foundation and the Sleeves is to take place at the manufacturing colony Industrial 7. This is the home of the student Banagher Links, who rescues a girl he sees falling through the colony’s zero gravity area. The girl gives her name as Audrey Burne and says she wants to prevent a war, spurring Banagher to step into the conflict surrounding Laplace’s Box—almost as if he is drawn in by his own bloodline.

Based on a story by author Harutoshi Fukui, the newest Gundam work dynamically unfolds against the backdrop of the Universal Century. It all begins with this first shocking episode.”

Video #0002 – The Sushi Experiment 1.0: Inari Sushi

Donald Burr — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 17:34:58 +0000

Welcome to our first ever videocast. Okay, technically this is our second videocast, but since the first one was an Anime LA highlights video I put together over 9000 years ago, it doesn’t really count. In this first videocast, we take a brief journey away from anime, and into the kitchen, and I teach you how to make Inari Sushi, a tasty treat perfect for munching on during anime watching parties. (I mentioned this in Anime on the Cheap part 1) And no raw fish is involved!

This is really an experiment for me. I won’t do these videocasts very often – maybe one every few months at best – so don’t worry, your bandwidth won’t be choked up with huge downloads every week.

Products mentioned in the video:

Sushi Making Set VI

Japanese Import, Kitchen, $50.50

Laquer Sushi Bowl and Sushi mat set D482

Ekitron, Kitchen, $25.99

Sushi Rice Japanese style – 5 lb (Kokuho Rose)

Kokuho, Misc., $9.99

RiceSelect Sushi Rice, 36-Ounce Jars (Pack of 4)

RiceSelect 2006, Grocery, $24.33

Hime Seasoned Fried Bean Curd (Inarizushi-No-Moto)

Hime, Misc., $6.49

Zojirushi NS-ZCC10 5-1/2-Cup Neuro Fuzzy Rice Cooker and Warmer, Premium White

Zojirushi 2005, Kitchen, $159.99

Sushi for Dummies

Judi Strada. For Dummies 2004, Paperback, 288 pages, $9.47

“Anime TV,” a new anime video podcast from the folks at Revision3

Donald Burr — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 05:29:24 +0000

Those of you with an insatiable desire to consume anime news in podcast form, take note – there’s a new kid on the block! Revision3, the Internet video programming network formed by many ex-TechTV personalities including Kevin Rose (of Digg fame), is now hosting an anime review show, Anime TV. The show, hosted by well-known American anime voice actors Cristina Vee and Johnny Yong Bosch, consists of panel-style discussions where the panelists talk about the various anime, manga, video games, etc. they’re into at the moment, and, as a group, review one particular anime series. They also occasionally feature other segments; for example in their first episode they “invaded” the US dub studio Bang Zoom Entertainment and took the audience on a tour of the facility and interviewed some of their key personnel.

My first impressions are that they sometimes take things a bit over the top, for example the whole “Anime TV… GO!” schtick. The panelists seem to have a good rapport with each other, and obviously we the audience will grow more comfortable with them as we get to know their tastes and personalities. I’ll wait to pass final judgment until a few more episodes have come out. I will say however that I’m pretty much in agreement with their verdict on Ghost in the Shell 2.0. The original animation was definitely cleaned up and did look crisper; however the transitions to and from the redone CGI elements were still a bit too jarring for my taste. If you haven’t seen GitS yet… for heaven’s sake, go do so now!! But if you already own the original GitS on DVD, it’s not really worth it to upgrade.

You can watch their first episode below, or subscribe via iTunes.

How not to run an AMV competition screening

Donald Burr — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 09:49:25 +0000

Day 1 of Anime Los Angeles has officially drawn to a close. Due to various factors including my travel schedule (I didn’t actually arrive on-site until close to 2:30 this afternoon) and my body’s need for a sudden unscheduled nap (remember what I said about human frailties…) I only made it to one panel today, but it was an interesting one – all about anime conventions in Japan and how they differ from the typical style of anime conventions we’re used to in the Western world. I’ll post more on that later. However, the evening ended on a bit of a sour note…
The Anime Music Video (AMV) contest is something I really look forward to at every anime convention I attend. Having tried (and failed) to make one myself, I know how hard it is to make an AMV – and how much harder it is to make a good AMV. The creativity of the AMV community simply astounds me. Plus it’s a great way to discover new anime – I often see scenes, characters, etc. that interest me and motivates me to go online and find out what series they came from.

Anyway, back to tonight’s AMV contest. For starters, they were late letting us in. No biggie there – late starts and line-ups are pretty much par for the course when it comes to an anime convention, and we’re used to that sort of thing. Once we finally got seated, however, the event didn’t start – they were running late. Again, no biggie, and at least they were running AMVs from previous contests on the big screen to entertain us while we were waiting.

Then things started to go south. Specifically, the computer that was running the AMVs started freaking out. Badly stuttering/pausing video, sound dropouts, Windows crashes (did I mention this was being run on a Windows machine?), and multiple occurrences of the Windows “USB device connected/disconnected” sound (which seemed to indicate problems with an attached USB hard disk – presumably the source from where they were playing the videos.) The natives began to get restless, and there was some jeering and heckling from the audience (some of which, I’ll admit, came from the Otaku no Podcast camp).

Finally, the MC, the inimitable Tadao Tomomatsu, appeared on stage to get the ball rolling. Only… it didn’t. Again, frequent video stuttering/pausing, sound dropouts, program crashes, etc. If it weren’t for his (sometimes corny, but always funny) jokes and entertaining stories, I fear the scene would have turned very ugly. While he vamped, the tech crew was busy trying to get things to work. Finally, they got it working more or less, with only the occasional slight audio glitch, and we proceeded through the Drama, Action, Comedy categories. But there wasn’t enough time to show the final category (“Pro,” for high-production-value videos, similar to the “AMTV” category in Anime Expo’s AMV contest).

So what went wrong here? Let’s do a little hypothetical post-mortem analysis here…

I’ll ignore the late start/late seating issues, as these are common at conventions. Clearly the main issue was technological in nature. What happened?

First of all, it turns out that the computer being used was the personal computer of (presumably) one of the A-LA staff. This was his (or her) gaming rig. It would have been far easier to use a less, umm, riced-out machine. Less complexity and all that. Almost any machine is capable of playing back video these days, even many lower-end notebooks (and even some netbooks).

Second, apparently the videos were being played back from a USB Drobo – a professional-grade highly redundant external storage device. Again far more complexity than was needed. It would have been much simpler to use a standard USB external hard drive, such as a Western Digital My Book. (Or even a USB thumb drive, which are pretty much bulletproof and highly reliable.) It turns out that the Drobos require specialized drivers for the best functionality – during one of the periods when Tadao was vamping, tech staff were frantically downloading the latest Drobo drivers and software.

Finally, it looked like the videos that were supplied for the contest were in a variety of different formats. Unfortunately there’s not much you can do about this. Working with video is a complex procedure, especially given the wide variety of formats that AMV source material comes from (retail DVDs, fansubs of various formats, and now HD video). You could attempt to use one of the video “Swiss Army Knives” – programs that attempt to decode and play back a wide variety of video formats. (in fact it appeared that they were using VLC, one of these type of programs.) Unfortunately sometimes even these versatile tools fail or generate undesired results. You could also enforce a “standard format” that all submissions must be sent as – say, for example, H.264 video with a maximum bitrate of 1500, and a maximum resolution of 720×480. The tools for converting between video formats (transcoding) are widely available and generally work well enough. Or – best of all – standardize on the DVD format. Most computers these days come with DVD burners, the DVD format is robust and reliable (it’s withstood the test of time), and it is very difficult to screw up computer-based DVD playback software. And if the unthinkable happens and the computer crashes or whatever, then all you have to do is hook up a cheap $40 Wal-mart DVD player to your A/V system and you’re back in business.

Lastly, I feel that most, if not all, of these problems would have been averted, or at least lessened in severity, if the staff had used Macs in the video preparation and/or playback workflow. I’ll acknowledge that Windows has done some serious catching up in the multimedia department in the past 20-odd years that it’s been out; however I still firmly believe that the Mac still has an edge when it comes to working with digital media, especially video. (and before you hit that “comment” button – I don’t want to turn this into a “my computer/OS is better than your computer/OS” thread. So stop right there. If you still feel the need, please do so by contacting us directly.) One of the conventions I spoke of last year, FanimeCon, used a completely Mac mini-based video playback system for all of their screening rooms, and (to my knowledge) did not have any computer-related video playback problems whatsoever.

I do feel I must give credit where credit is due, however. The staff did their darndest to ensure that “the show must go on.” And if it weren’t for the always-entertaining Tadao-san — like I said earlier — things would have turned REAL ugly. Finally, unlike Anime Expo of several years ago, A-LA actually had an AMV contest. They didn’t mysteriously lose their files or equipment, with no backups to be found anywhere.

I’ll post links to all of the AMV candidates (as well as links to their entries at AMV.org where available) when I’m less tired. Tomorrow’s looking to be a pretty full day, and in order to survive it, I really do need my beauty rest. Oyasumi nasai…

How to make Okonomiyaki, TJX style!

Donald Burr — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 00:23:27 +0000

Okonomiyaki is a Japanese food best described as a sort of Japanese pancake (or perhaps omelette), with various other ingredients (meats, seafood, vegetables, cheese, etc.) mixed in. It may be difficult to type, but it’s pretty darn tasty. Like many other Japanese dishes, it is enjoyed throughout the country, and each region has its own variation on the dish. It’s sometimes cooked in front of you Benihana-style, and sometimes the restaurant leaves the cooking to you – each table has a grill on it, and you basically get a bowl full of mixed ingredients that you can grill to your liking. The most well known ones comes from Osaka (where it is said that okonomiyaki was invented) and Hiroshima. In our 2004 Tokyo trip, we had the pleasure of enjoying some Hiroshima okonomiyaki during a break in our tour schedule. It was indeed mighty tasty.

In their latest episode (and their first video episode), the TJX crew demonstrate how to make this delicious food. Be warned tho, you might want to at least have some snacks nearby, you’ll get hungry watching it! Watch it here.

EDIT: If you want to “kick it up a notch,” (ha!) and you have some decent cooking skills and have access to a decent Asian foods market or specialty store, I found this recipe for completely made-from-scratch okonomiyaki. And if you’re a wimp and/or rather use the pre-made stuff, but can’t find it anywhere locally… well, you can order anything on the Internets these days… Amazon has both the mix and the sauce!

Okonomiyaki kit / Japanese pizza – 4.3 oz x 3

ImportFood, Misc., $14.50

Japanese Okonomi Sauce – 12 oz x 2 bottles

Otafuku Foods, Inc., Misc., $11.50

EDIT 01/05/2010: Locally-mirrored copy of the video removed at the request of TJX, because it was causing confusion. This video is theirs, and I ask that you please direct any inquiries, comments, etc. to them directly. You should be able to play the video directly from their website, but if you can’t get the video to play in their embedded player (like I did), there IS a link to directly download it (look for “Podcast: play in new window / download” below the black video box). Or you can subscribe to their podcast – I’m sure they wouldn’t mind having a few more subscribers Sorry for the confusion guys. Gomen nasai.