A traditional Japanese-style breakfast staple reinvented! No more cold, soggy scrambled eggs with ketchup. Try out these new tamagoyaki fillings for a Japanese fusion breakfast you’re gonna love.
I’ve been a big fan of tamagoyaki, Japanese-style rolled omelets ever since I’ve moved to Japan. My favorite were the ones my Japanese host mother in Gunma used to make filled with tarako cod roe and cheese.
Soon after I started eating eggs for breakfast every day on my diet, I bought my first tamagoyaki pan so I could have another way to eat my eggs besides fried, scrambled, or boiled.
I was on a tamagoyaki kick, making them pretty much every day. After a conversation with a colleague from New York about what we eat for breakfast, I got the idea to combine our breakfasts, Japanese and Western-style, to create “the healthiest breakfast in the world”.
I was inspired to reinvent tamagoyaki, a pillar in the traditional breakfast eaten by the longest living people on the planet.
After finding out what’s in the breakfast bowls of the leading nutrition experts in the West, I did what was quite easy– I put two and two together.
“I wish someone [an expert] would, like, just tell me exactly what to eat.”
Those were her words. My colleague from New York had also been reevaluating what she should be eating for breakfast. She mentioned that the guest [a doctor] on the Tim Ferriss podcast that she had just been listening to ate oatmeal, nuts, and berries for breakfast every day.
Oatmeal. nuts. berries…That’s when the bells went off and all the squirrels in the park stopped diggin’ and turned to listen. Then another colleague said, “I cook everything with coconut oil”. So I also want to give her at least some credit too.
New Tamagoyaki Fillings
After this one brief conversation, hunting down “oji-chan” who sells big cartons of mixed berries for 500 yen from his lil’ white Suzuki truck, and weeks of experimentation in the kitchen, I give to you…
“The McAllister Roll” (named after the one and only Ms. McAllister, the colleague who inspired me to create it)
Superfood tamagoyaki fillings – rolled up to make the healthiest breakfast in the world*
The McAllister Roll is East meets West. Don’t let the “Mick” in McAllister confuse you with the “Mick” in McMuffin!
A McAllister Roll is made up of six superfoods, some of the healthiest, most nutrient dense foods on the planet! When you add a side salad – a must – and a half an avocado – green tea – that’s 8, 9, 10 superfoods in one meal.
Good for you and tastes good too. Here’s your first bite.
Tamagoyaki Fillings and What to Eat with Tamagoyaki
The McAllister Roll
Ingredients
The Roll (★ = Superfood)
- 2 eggs ★
- 2 pinches salt
- ½ tsp (or less) maple syrup* (or sugar)
- 1 teaspoon coconut oil ★
Filling
- 1 heaping tbsp oatmeal ★ steal-cut or rolled
- 12-13 almonds ★
- 10-12 blueberries ★
- 3-4 dashes cinnamon ★
Recommended Sides
- salad (kale ★ , spinach ★ , mixed greens, or lettuce) with a few tomatoes ★ or raspberries ★
- or cooked spinach ★
- or steamed broccoli ★
- or green veggie smoothie ★
- ½ avocado ★ with extra virgin olive oil ★ and salt
Instructions
Prep (Recommended music for prep- Katy Perry Chained to the Rhythm)
- In a small pan, heat water - add salt to taste (~ 2 pinches).
- When water comes to a boil, turn down heat to a gentle boil.
- Add oatmeal, cover pan, boil for 5 minutes and strain. Spread out oatmeal on a cutting board and let it sit out so it loses moisture.
- Chop almonds into small chunks.
- Rinse your blueberries and dry them with a towel like a baby's bottom after bath time.
- Crack eggs into a small bowl, gently beat them with a fork, and add salt and maple syrup. (Say thank you to chickens and each egg. - Marie Kondo)
Cooking (Recommended playlist for cooking - Calvin Harris Rollin' and Katy Perry Roulette (pronounced 'roll it')
- Turn on a small stove burner to low heat.
- Using long cooking chopsticks and a piece of paper towel, coat pan with coconut oil. (Watch tamagoyaki cooking basics here.)
- With a fork or chopsticks, put a small amount of egg on the pan. If it sizzles, the pan is hot enough.
- Pour enough egg into pan to make a thin layer. Tilt the pan back and forth and side to side so the egg coats the entire bottom.
- Once the layer of egg is half cooked, add fillings on top of one third of the layer of egg (in this order: almonds, oatmeal, cinnamon, and blueberries). See photo above.
- With a spatula, roll up the tamagoyaki towards you to carefully wrap the fillings inside like a burrrrito.
- Once completely rolled up, nudge the roll to the far side of the pan, away from you.
- Repeat the process from step 2- recoat the pan with coconut oil, add egg, and roll. Continue this process until you run out of egg mixture. Tip- When adding second or third layers of egg, gently lift the tamagoyaki with cooking chopsticks so the raw eggs can slide underneath the entire roll and coat the entire pan.
Notes
Related recipes:
Healthy Tamagoyaki- nutrition and fillings for Japanese rolled omelets (low carb)
The “Zero Carb” Tokyo Burger and other Easy Japanese-Inspired Low Carb “Breakfasts”
*Disclaimer: I am not a medical professional. Please consult with your doctor before following my advice except for music recommendations- you can’t go wrong with Katy Perry.
Jisun Fisher says
Matt, this looks SO good. It looks like the eggrolls my mom makes but with a western twist. Now that I'm really mindfully considering how to nourish my body and my hubby's body, I'm considering learning to cook a dish or two that would really energize us.
I love your flair in writing, but being a complete newbie in this arena, a video to go along with your instructions would be AWESOME. Our take-out locales would totally miss us, but I'm not feeling the love from the pizza or chinese we do every other night.
Keep the recipes coming!
Vincent says
Thank you, Sunny!! I just almost finished my next blog post. We had a typhoon day off of work today. Got some writing time in. I made one tamagoyaki video if this helps! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vlQ3HjYacko&index=9&list=UUvCdA732NkZNF65CngRbgnA
At that time, I was planning on doing another video for tamagoyaki with fillings, then went to UPW, decided to 'step up'! Got the idea to do interviews from 'modelling', 'getting a coach', and it was me overcoming limiting beliefs/fears. The guy I interviewed last week gave me lots a new ideas for changing what I eat- it went awesome. Still want to do some more recipes in the future. Since it's a request from you, then I need to make it happen! ! ! 🙂
Jack Bayles says
Your photography and also breakfast ideas are stunning. First rate. I think you may get some push back on eggs in a vegetarian brekkie. Keep it up.
Matt says
Thanks so much, Jack! I really appreciate your compliments! I use only free-range eggs from Hokkaido! 🙂
Yasuhiko Takasaki says
Your new recipe The McAllister Roll looks delicious. The idea fusing Japanese and Western food style is good, especially the combination of egg and blueberry is unique. Traditional Japanese tamagoyaki which you can find at susi restaurant is made with the combination of egg, bonito soup, suger and rice wine.
Matt says
Dear Yasuhiko, thank you very much for your kind comment and rating my recipe! Usually, I make savory tamagoyaki similar to traditional Japanese-style with dashi. I like to take inspiration from the Japanese foods I love and recreate them to make something new and healthy. Thank you so much for taking the time to leave a comment!