In Los Angeles last December, Morio Sase had a bout of nerves. What had made him think he could persuade Americans to cast off their culinary prejudices and warm to something with as great an "ick factor" as octopus?

"I worried whether Americans could eat octopus, but 'takoyaki' sales at a special event proved they love it," said Sase, founder and president of HotLand Corp., which operates about 300 Tsukiji Gindaco takoyaki outlets across Japan and 11 in other parts of Asia. "I was relieved and I felt I could make it."

He said customers at the weeklong event stood in line for up to two hours to try his company's product. They sold some 500 packages a day and had to close the event two days early after running out of ingredients to make the takoyaki octopus dumplings.