Wagashi: Kuromitsu Dango (黒みつだんご)
Kuromitsu Dango is a simple and tasty wagashi that combines mochi, syrupy kuromitsu and powdery kinako.
What is Dango?
Dango is a popular treat in Japan; it is mochi, usually balls or cubes served impaled on a stick. It is sometimes grilled and usually has some kind of sweet sauce poured over it, or the mochi itself is sweetened and flavored.
The Ingredients
Mochi, as you probably know is ‘rice cake’, a paste made of steamed and pounded glutinous rice. Mochi comes in a plethora of tastes and forms and it is always chewy and yummy.
Kuromitsu, literally ‘black syrup’ made from kokuto ‘black sugar’, Southern Japan’s famed sugar is mineral rich and very earthy in flavor. Kuromitsu is nearly identical to molasses in consistency and quite similar in taste.
Kinako is soybean flour. Soybeans are roasted and then ground into flour. It is very healthy, containing vitamins and protein. The taste is quite similar to peanuts and is common in many dishes in Japanese cuisine. Kinako is often sweetened with sugar.
Mochi dango is squired on a stick, thick kuromitsu is poured over the top and is sprinkled generoursly with kinako, then you’ve kuromitsu dango!
A Serving of Kuromitsu Dango
Kuromitsu Dango – Detail
Kuromitsu Dango
Kuromitsu Dango ‘Bite Away’ View
This shows a cross section of the kuromitsu dango.
Kuromitsu Dango in Package
This particular store sells them in packs of 10 dango heaping with kinako.
Yum! One of these days I’m gonna try make it! Do you have a recipe?
Wow! That looks so good. I really like mochi so I wonder how to recreate this treat here.
yummy!
Hey there everybody, Yes, mochi is yummy, but very labor intensive to make. It requires special rice, glutinous rice which is generally available in Western countries. Steaming and pounding it is the complicated part. There are modern mochi maker machines, but the proper way to do it is to pound the steamed rice with a huge wooden hammer in a huge stone bowl. In contemporary Japan, people very rarely, if ever make mochi themselves. I would think that your best bet would be to try to procure mochi in your own country. If you can get mochi, the rest is simple, just pour and sprinkle on the pre-made ingredients, kuromitsu and kinako.
Oh my, this sure looks good!! I’m drooling.
This looks amazing! I really want to try mochi, but I’ve never seen it here… 🙁
this looks fantastic! and it reminds me of a similar Chinese dessert (for the life of me I can’t recall the name) but it’s basically glutinous rice balls (not the filled ones which are called tang yuen) that are cooked and then covered with an orangey-brown ginger syrup. you eat them with a toothpick/dessert stick after dipping them in a plate of ground peanuts. 🙂
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Not ‘ningbo tang yuar’?
I used to think at kinako was made from peanuts, not soybeans. In China, they have ground peanuts?
Want to try! Want to try!