Wagashi - Japanese Sweet

Wagashi (Japanese sweet) has such an unique style. Not only as a dessert, wagashi also shows an aspect of art. You may feel the certain harmony in the Japanese culture through eating wagashi.

Before the 17th century, the Japanese had rarely used sugar. Instead, they mixed rice, wheat, and azuki bean, in a certain way, and used the mixture for their sweet. The mixture itself was not as sweet as sugar though. They made an effort to create as good sweet as they can, and eventually made a wide variety of sweets all over Japan, which you can still enjoy. When they had some chance to accept western culture, the Japanese imported Portuguese sweets. Eventually, they recreate them, and adopted into Japanese sweets.


Tea ceremony was a big influence to Japanese sweets. Harmony among every single component is required during the ceremony. Attendants have to follow the certain rules. Sweet is accompanied with tea, and its shape and taste is an important aspect of the harmony. It must be just right; not too sweet, not too big, and not too small. Everything has to work right in order to create harmony in a room. In this situation, sweet was refined a lot.


Season is another factor; for example, in summer, people eat sweet which helps them cool down both physically and mentally. A lot of sweets remind people of a certain season.

There may be some image that Japanese sweet is healthier than western sweet. It is not right, probably. It just depends on the amount you eat. The Japanese serve a small amount of their sweet while western sweets are big.