Ok. I’m… actually trying to rein in the sweets now. Trying and failing. I tell myself that I can only have one sweet per day and somehow I keep breaking my rule. My newly acquired dancer body is taking a hit, even with the dancing and all the walking and bike riding I do around here. I’m about to add a daily walk up a mountain shrine path to try to help with my expanding waistline. I knew this would happen. I just wish I could just enjoy it without feeling guilty! Please tell me these sweets posts are worth it!
This stupid thing was really great. It was about 5x the size of a normal macaron and the texture was perfect. It was the best thing that happened to me on Naoshima Island. (The art was supposed to be the best thing that happened to me there. It was not.). 10/10. IF I ever go back to Naoshima I will definitely buy it again.
A semi-sweet blueberry bread for the 7-11. It was nice. 7/10. Will buy again.
This is part of the giant bean cake slab that dear Horiguchi-san gave me. I believe those are chestnuts in it. It’s good and I’m still working my way through it. I had it with tea as suggested. It was a nice afternoon snack! I’m definitely eating it but it’s not my first choice. 6/10. No need to buy again!
Coffee and a coffee and cream daifuku from a local place called the Mochi Cafe. The atmosphere in this cafe was fancy so I didn’t know how to approach the eating of the daifuku since they gave me that small lobster claw stick there in the front. Normally I’d just eat it with my hands but wasn’t sure how to proceed. I decided to try to chop up the sweet with the lobster claw and well… daifuku aren’t meant to be chopped up. Each time I chopped I had to apply pressure with would tilt the plate it was on and each time the plate would come down with a clink. I was embarrassed and the piece of paper that the daifuku was sitting on looked like a crime scene when I was done. Definitely going back though. 8/10.
A daifuku from a tiny store tucked in between two retail stores in Maebaru. Normally I’d be raving about a sweet that comes from a place like this. It was ok. 5/10. Won’t buy again.
Initially I bought this because of the name. This is the box. Just a commercial, processed, prepackaged cookie.
And the cookie. The inside is like a ferrero roche chocolate. Chocolate and hazelnut crisp. I CAN’T QUIT YOU CRUNKY! 8/10. I’m on my third box.
I saw a confectionary shop on one of my walks and popped in. It was a fancier place with pre-made boxes to give as gifts. It took wandering through the whole store to figure out that they didn’t really make fresh ones there and in the meantime one of the staff ladies poured me some tea and served a sweet with it, complimentary. It would seal my fate. After they did what seemed like a really nice gesture I realized it was a sales tactic. I ended up feeling beholden to them and then went to look at what these sweets would cost me. I needed to bring a bunch of something to a welcome party in the evening and after a long day I had decided that I would get something from here. It set me back a bit.
The sweet is nice with a refined paste filling inside. I can’t place the flavor but they are pretty good. I don’t see them as so good that I’ll go back though. I’m always thinking bang for buck and I’ve had better and fresher for less. 7/10. Won’t buy again.
A peach scone from a cafe where Ryder and I had a stellar meal. This place is called Kafuri Kibisu and is where I met Takiko Akita, the woman who drove me to the “nearby” paper factory. The scone is very flavorful and the scone shop next door is very popular with people lining up as they open. I’m coming back to this cafe more for Takiko and her lunch than the scone. 6/10. Could buy again.
This. This. THIS. It was weird and so goooooood. Takiko took me to a famous soba restaurant after our paper factory visit. This was a soba based sweet served warm with a toasted soybean powder coating the outside called “kinako.” I can’t wait to find it again and hoping to see it at my next soba restaurant. It’s got a texture halfway between mashed potatoes and mochi. SO GOOD. So unusual. 10/10. Actively seeking.
Ok. So I buy these frequently from Mitsuwa in Dallas. They are ok. HERE though, made fresh, they are quite a different story. This is my new replacement for the sakura sweets I had romanticized into something impossibly good. The leaf on the outside is a pickled edible leaf. I’ve eaten it this way before but I really don’t care for the leaf so I peel off most of it. 9/10. Buying regularly.
Ryder calls this my RAGE bar because of the font. I call it ice cream for men and shamelessly eat it at the 7-11 in front of every man I see. It’s really good. Inside are oreo bits. I’ve bought several. 9/10. Buying again for sure.
Lastly, there’s been a fresh made daifuku place right under my nose here the whole time. It’s not far from where I’m staying, maybe a mile away, and it’s an easy and safe bike ride through the rice fields. The white one is coffee and cream, green is green tea and cream, pink is strawberry and cream, and the shiny green is another kind of green tea. I’ve eaten two so far and they’re pretty good. They don’t hold a candle to the crazy good cream daifuku I got with Yasuko near the paper factory in Higashichichibu two years ago but I’ll buy more from here, certainly. They also do the wabarimochi. Ate some of it and loved it. 8/10. Going back.
OK! There’s my sweets! Look at all of them! I have a problem.
Love, an ever growing Furaidochikin.
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