Japanese soufflé pancake gaining popularity in US, yet origin story begins in Hawaii 15 years ago
The Japanese soufflé pancake has become more popular as a dessert café that specializes in the dish has made its way to the United States, but a chef in Hawaii says it's been around since 2008.
As the Japanese soufflé pancake has grown in popularity amid the recent U.S. expansion of a Canadian-headquartered dessert café, its origin can be traced to a Hawaiian restaurant and its pancake-averse chef.
Nathan Tran is proprietor and general manager of the Cream Pot, a popular breakfast and brunch spot for Japanese tourists and Hawaiian residents in the Waikiki neighborhood on the south shore of Honolulu.
There, Chef Tran routinely prepares his signature dish – the one that brought him internet fame and made the Cream Pot a destination. But it wasn't always like that, Tran told Fox News Digital in a Zoom interview with his restaurant as a backdrop.
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Tran's intent, when he first opened the Cream Pot in 2008, was to serve up a brunch menu of sweet entrées such as crêpes and "pain perdu" (French-style French toast) and other savory dishes. Absent from the menu, however, were pancakes.
"We never had pancakes on the menu because we didn't want to make anything that we didn't like eating ourselves," Tran said. "I wasn't too fond of typical pancakes … They were just not for me."
But within the first six months of business, it became apparent there was an interest in pancakes, especially among Japanese customers, Tran said.
When customers learned it was the only typical breakfast dish missing from the menu, "they would do a 180 [degree] U-turn and go away," Tran recalled.
Unwilling to "sell out" and give in to making pancakes, Tran, who is of Japanese descent, decided to combine his love of soufflés and his interest in sweets into a dish that would appeal to both his sensibilities and the pancake crowd.
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"I thought a great idea would be to do a freestanding souffle with a twist so it kind of resembles the looks of a pancake," Tran said.
"A pancake is essentially a quick bread, but a classic souffle doesn't really have any flour in it. So, we do it the classic way in terms of the ingredients."
And with that, the soufflé pancake was born.
Tran shared with Fox News Digital how he makes the soufflé pancake at his restaurant.
"There's no flour in ours," Tran said. "It gets its rise from meringue and some custards and creams and cheeses."
It's also gluten-free, Tran revealed, "but we don't advertise it that way."
"With ours, we make some custards that we blend in with some cheeses," Tran said.
"And then with the meringue, we mix it, blend it and we fold it, and then we'll put it onto a skillet or a flat iron. And we'll sear it on both sides first to get its shape, and then we'll bake it. And then we bake it to a certain point where the inside's just cooked but still soft and custardy like an actual soufflé."
Each soufflé pancake is about 70% baked, Tran said.
"We leave it and then right before we serve it, we'll bake it again to get the maximum rise on it," he said. "They'll deflate if you leave them sitting too long."
In the beginning, Tran said, "we were just advertising on a chalkboard. And slowly people started ordering them."
As Tran explained it, his creation soon caught the attention of a Japanese magazine profiling breakfast places in Hawaii. From then on, Tran said, the international and national media took notice of this "really interesting-looking item because it was nice and thick and fluffy and soft-looking."
Eventually, Tran was approached by Japanese companies looking to partner or franchise with him.
"I just wanted to keep it boutique and keep it small," Tran said. "I didn't want to be involved with something like that. I knew it's just going to go out of control in terms of the quality and stuff like that. So, I just stayed away from it."
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There was also plenty of interest from others looking to replicate the soufflé pancake, Tran said.
"A lot of people started coming and trying to study the product," he said. "It was funny."
Almost a decade after Tran debuted his dish in Hawaii, Benson Lau created his own rendition of the soufflé pancake more than 4,000 miles away in Canada.
Lau founded Fluffy Fluffy – known internationally as Fuwa Fuwa – in 2018, a year after studying pastry in Tokyo.
Lau said he is self-taught in the art of the soufflé pancake.
"I didn't learn from anyone," he told Fox News Digital in a telephone interview.
Two years after the first Fluffy Fluffy opened in Toronto, the business began franchising outside of Canada and eventually expanded into the U.S., becoming North America's largest dessert soufflé café, according to its website.
The first Fluffy Fluffy in the U.S. opened in Orlando last year and its newest U.S. location in Miami opened last month. Besides Florida, there are also Fluffy Fluffy locations in California, Texas and Georgia.
Fluffy Fluffy's version of the soufflé pancake is "fun and authentic," a sort of balance between the East and the West, Lau said.
"I basically tested the recipes over 1,000 times," Lau said, to find the right "balancing texture between a pancake and a soufflé."
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Lau said Fluffy Fluffy's soufflé pancakes are "made with egg whites and very low sugar."
He said many Fluffy Fluffy customers come in the middle of the day to "enjoy a bite of happiness."
There are various menu options, too, including the matcha tiramisù and blueberry cheese soufflé pancakes.
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Back in Hawaii, Tran remains focused on his day-to-day duties at the Cream Pot, aware of the craze surrounding his creation but seemingly unmoved by it all.
Tran said he doesn't have any regrets about his decision.
"I make enough money," he said. "I'm not trying to become some tycoon or something like that. It's not my thing."