Toraya 'Shimokobai' Tea Ceremony Confection

While it is mid-winter here in Kyoto, we are getting ready for fruit blossoms already. In February the plum trees will bloom and the very fortunate will be treated to see plum blossoms in the snow! To me, plums blossoms are more beautiful and intoxicatingly fragrant than the over-appreciated sakura. The combination of delicate plum blossoms on a leafless, gnarled and contorted black plum tree with lichen and moss, amid snowflakes, all enveloped by the invisible yet penetrating fragrance of the blossoms is an experience with a depth of beauty that I have found unsurpassed.

I hadn’t seen a wagashi that expresses my ideal of plum blossom and snow until today when I dropped in at Toraya to have a look at their tea ceremony wagashi line-up for the second half of January. When I saw this one, I knew I had to show all you foodies out there in the 183 countries with KyotoFoodie fans.

Toraya 'Shimokobai' Tea Ceremony Confection

How to ‘Frost’ a Wagashi Confection: Shinbikiko
Flower shaped wagashi are very common but this one is covered in a kind of rice flour called shinbikiko (新引粉). Shinbikiko is similar to cornmeal in texture but is pure white. It is made with mochi rice that has been steamed, dried, ground and then roasted. The sticky mochi surface of this confection is dusted with shinbikiko creating an obvious yet delicate effect of frost.

Wagashi Frost: Shinbikiko - detail

How Did Shimokobai Wagashi Taste?
While I have complained on KyotoFoodie many times about theredundant and monotonous taste of tea ceremony wagashi, this one really got me. The sensation created by the flavors and textures was quite weird and otherworldly, but in a very subdued way. I loved it!

The filling is gooey but not too sweet white bean paste, it is very soft and creamy. The mochi covering that creates the red plum blossom is gyuhi mochi that very chewy, rather more al dente than normal mochi, like it had been stretched taut over the soft filling and allowed to dry a bit. The shinbikiko really got me though. It reminded me of poppy seeds on a muffin, but not crunchy at all, it was like damp poppy seeds, or damp cornmeal. The taste was ‘ricy’ and dry, yet damp in texture. Weird.

These three contrasting textures and flavors melting together while being chewed made it even more weird.

I found myself wishing for a whole plate to eat so that I could try to better apprehend and express the precious textures and flavors.

The 'kuromoji' traditional tea ceremony utensil is used to cut and eat namagashi.

When do Kyoto Fruit Trees Blossom?
February: Plum (ume 梅)
March: Peach (momo 桃)
April: Cherry (sakura 桜)
Due to global warming these fruit trees are often blooming earlier than they did traditionally. Forget the namby-pamby late spring sakura and seek out the ume!

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Chestnut Shaped Egg Yolk Anpan Sweet Bun

An egg yolk filled anpan sounds really good, and ought to be, especially from a shinise like Miki Keiran. However, I was a little disappointed. It was by no means bad, but the combination has the potential to be quite amazing and it wasn’t. Too bad.

Egg Yolk Anpan Sweet Bun - Egg Yolk Bean Paste Filling

How did it taste?
The bread is soft and just average in taste as far as Japanese bread goes, the egg yolk glaze is quite nice, quite thick and sticky, and fragrant too. There are white (and a few black) poppy seeds adhered to the glaze at the bottom, to create the visual effect of a chestnut.

The filling is egg yolk and smooth and creamy white shiroan bean paste. If you didn’t know it was bean paste, you probably wouldn’t guess it by the taste or texture. The richness of the egg yolk appropriately comes to the forefront.

One variety of this anpan contains a chestnut, which is fine, but with the addition of the whole chestnut, the richness and delicacy of the egg yolk gets overpowered. I tried just the egg yolk bean paste mixture and it was very, very good.

In the end, I think that there is too much bread to filling and the presence of the chestnut muddled the taste.

This is one interesting confection to me and one that I would like to redesign! This anpan cost 150 yen, that is not expensive at all for any anpan in Japan. And, this is Nishiki Market. No one goes to Nishiki Market looking for a bargain! If there were tons more filling I think this would have worked better. Just double the price and double or triple the amount of filling and this anpan would be out of this world! I am not sure what to do about the chestnut but they definitely need one to offer one without the chestnut. This is a shinise egg shop, I think that they should focus on the egg aspect rather than try to make it conventional with a chestnut.

Egg Yolk Anpan Sweet Bun - Egg Yolk Bean Paste Filling (notice chestnut chunk at bottom of paste)

About Anpan
The meaning of anpan comes from ‘an’, anko bean paste and ‘pan’ the adopted word in Japanese for bread. This now ubiquitous confection was developed in 1875 by Yasubei Kimura, a samurai who had recently lost his livelihood as a result of the Meiji Restoration. This was a time of rapid Westernization of Japan but bread hadn’t really caught on in Meiji era Japan. Yasubei, in need of a livelihood based his confection on the traditional manju confection, replacing the mochi with bread but keeping the sweet bean filling. This proved a winning combination. Yasubei was recruited to make an imperial anpan for the emperor and his bakery thrives today in Tokyo’s Ginza shopping district.

About Miki Keiran
Miki Keiran was founded in 1928 and the Honten (Main Store) is located in the Nishiki Market. Miki Keiren also has stores in several department stores in Kyoto, Osaka and Tokyo. Miki Keiren only makes Kyoto-style dashimaki tamago omelettes for take out. Dashi means broth and much of Kyoto cuisine starts with broth. Miki Keiren uses the finest eggs for their omelettes but the dashi costs even more money than the eggs. That is Kyoto! Miki is a family name meaning ‘three trees’ and keiren means ‘chicken egg’.

Miki Keiren’s dashimaki is a must have for New Year’s in Kyoto. Kyotoites have to reserve theirs in advance and then they come to a different location on a nearby street away from the narrow Nishiki Market shopping street to pick theirs up at an appointed time a day or two before New Year’s. In Kyoto, dashimaki is serious business!

– Shop Photo and Map Coming Soon –

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