Japanese desserts use local and foreign ingredients, with mochi as a central element. There are many variations of wagashi, dango, and jellies. Green tea is often served with sweet desserts. Some desserts are twists on foreign imports, such as castella and green tea-flavored chocolate bars. Sweet breads like melonpan and anpan are also popular.
Japanese desserts can be traditional affairs using local fruits, plants and nuts, foreign imports, or a unique combination of the two. There are many regional variations of Japanese desserts known as meibutsu as well as souvenir (omiyage) versions for tourists. Traditional Japanese desserts use ingredients such as sweet azuki beans, fruit, nuts and mochi.
Mochi is a sticky, glutinous rice cake that forms a central element of Japanese desserts. It is often served wrapped around sweets such as azuki paste (daifuku), anko, and strawberry paste. Some desserts spice up the mochi with flavors like cherry blossom (sakura), peach, and green tea. Mochi are most popular on New Year’s Day.
Wagashi is a type of mochi-based dessert. There is not just one type of wagashi, but instead there are dozens of variations. They are made with fruits, nuts, azuki and mochi. Green tea is often served as a complement to sweet desserts.
Mochi is also used to make Japanese sweets called dango. Dangos are mochi balls that are placed on a skewer and dipped in flavoring. The traditional festival dango is dipped in a soy sauce syrup called shouyu and is referred to as mitarashi dango. Another type of dango is bocchan dango which has a regular dango ball, a green tea flavored ball, and an azuki flavored ball.
Mochi can be made differently to make a variety of jellies. There are also other jellies also called agar jellies which are used in desserts like anmitsu and mitsumame. These jelly cubes are combined with ingredients like azuki or anko, fruit slices, and mitsu syrup.
Many Japanese desserts are a twist on foreign imports. For example, castella is a cake named after the Castile region of Spain, but it’s actually the Japanese version of the Portuguese cake known as Pao-de-lo. Castella is a sponge cake often eaten plain or topped with brown sugar, powdered green tea, or flavored powdered sugar/icing.
Ice cream is a popular dessert in Japan as well. A dollop of vanilla ice cream and another of green tea ice cream are often served alongside azuki beans and mochi. There are also a range of mochi wrapped ice creams available with a mochi wrap wrapping around vanilla, chocolate or green tea ice cream or a flavored mochi around plain ice cream.
Many Japanese foreign desserts have gone through the green tea process. This means replacing one ingredient with green tea. For example, there are many ranges of green tea flavored chocolate bars. There are also green tea castella cakes and other sponges, green tea ice cream, cheesecake and tiramisu. Similar versions have also been made in a cherry blossom flavor.
Japan also has a number of sweet breads that can be served as a dessert. Melonpan looks like a melon, but is made from ordinary bread dough wrapped in cookie dough before baking. These can be served plain, with chocolate chips inside, a custard filling, or flavored with ingredients like powdered green tea and caramel. Anpan is a sweet bread filled with azuki beans.
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