WAGASHI Japanese Sweets Cooking Experience in Tokyo

Arigato.kitchen wagashi cooking class offers traditional Japanese sweets making and Maccha green tea.

The attraction of Wagashi is not only enjoying its taste but also you can see and feel the season by the looking and ingredients. Let's enjoy eating and looking the Japanese sweets and have a relaxing time.

About Wagashi

Wagashi is an essential part of Japanese culture and tradition, that is, to enjoy as a treat and an art to express the passing seasons. Wagashi can be enjoyed with its appearance, such as the color and the form. For example, Wagashi in summer can express ‘coolness’ with a clear jelly to represent water or freshness to help getting through the hot and humid summer season. This is another way to learn Japanese traditional and actually experience it by cooking!

◆Menu

Wagashi and Maccha (Japanese Green Tea)

◆Wagashi Calendar in all Seasons

Spring
- March

Sakura Mochi - rice cake with bean paste wrapped in a preserved cherry leaf.

Botamochi - The steamed rice and a thick azuki paste is hand-packed around pre-formed

balls of rice.
- April

Hanami Dango - a Japanese rice cake ball made out of mochiko powder.

Sakura Yokan - a thick, jellied dessert made of red bean paste, agar, and sugar.
- May

Kashiwa Mochi - a rice cake wrapped in an oak leaf.

Ichigo Daifuku -a kind of Japanese confection consisting of a strawberry inside 'daifuku',

which is a rice cake stuffed with sweet bean paste.

Summer
- June

Anmitsu – Gelatin cubes and sweet bean paste with fruits.

Hydrangea Yokan – soft sweet bean jelly
- July

Milky way Yokan - The special Ama no Gawa (Milky Way) yokan celebrates Tanabata.
- August

Apricot Water Bun - Mizu (water) manjū is traditionally eaten in the summertime and

contains a flavored bean filling.

Autumn
- September

Sweet Potato Yokan - As traditional as Japanese desserts come, this sweet treat combines sweet potatoes with sugar for

sweetness, salt and vinegar for flavour balancing, and agar for gelatinising without the need

for gelatin.
- October

Tsukimi Dango - Rice dumplings in appreciation for the harvest of grains.
- November

Kuri Zenzai - Sweet made with soft beans and chestnuts

Kuri Manju - Chestnut bun

Winter
- December

Black Sesami - It is used for winter Wagashi a lot of time.

Mame Daifuku – It is a Japanese confection consisting of a small round mochi, glutinous rice cake, with Anko, sweet paste made from beans.
- January

Oshiruko - Sweet bean soup with rice cake.

Kinako Ame -Soybean flour candy.
- February

Kusa Mochi - a rice‐flour dumpling mixed with mugwort.

Warabi Mochi -a jelly-like confection made from bracken starch and covered or dipped in

kinako.