OSAKA ¨C Daimon Okonomiyaki Dojo, a late-night restaurant specializing in Osaka comfort food, has an unheard of 450 items on its menu.
The small restaurant, located near Takidani Station in Tondabayashi, sits just 10 people. It¡¯s owned by Yukimasa Tanida, 73, who sports dyed brown-orange hair and dresses like a stylish teenager, and his fashionable wife, Misuzu, 70, whose impressive, towering hairdo brings to mind Marie Antoinette. I ask Yukimasa where he learned to make okonomiyaki (savory cabbage pancake).
¡°In prison,¡± he replies, deadpan. ¡°I¡¯m just joking. When I was a young man, I was a bit of a ne¡¯er-do-well. I used to frequent a local okonomiyaki restaurant in Kawachinagano. The owner was a stubborn, moody geezer from Kyushu who told me that I was wasting my life playing around. So he offered to teach me his secrets if I opened up my own restaurant.¡±
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