Sweets
Yuzukan
Yuzukan — a refreshing yuzu jelly made with the whole fruit
A jelly made from yuzu juice is layered with slices of the peel and flesh for a refreshing dessert. Said to have become a popular casual treat in recent years in Naka Town, a major yuzu producer already known for preserved products like yubeshi.
- Origin: Tokushima Naka
- About 540 km west of Tokyo
Lineage
What it's made of
Yuzukan is a refreshing dessert made generously with yuzu peel, flesh, and juice, also known as yuzu jelly. It's typically made with "Kito yuzu," widely grown in Naka town, using the juice as the base of the jelly and thin slices of peel or flesh for color. A bite releases a light burst of citrus aroma and tartness, making it an easy, clean-tasting treat even in hot weather. Cutting a yuzu in half and hollowing it out to use as a cup makes for an especially festive presentation.
How it's made
Yuzu is squeezed for its juice, which becomes the base of the jelly liquid. The peel and flesh are often thinly sliced and added for color, and when the peel is used as a serving cup, the fruit is halved and carefully hollowed out. The jelly liquid is poured into molds or cups and chilled until set — a simple treat easily made at home.
Why it took this shape
The Naka town area is known for plentiful, high-quality yuzu thanks to heavy rainfall and a wide swing between day and night temperatures. In a region already known for processed yuzu products like yubeshi and yuzu vinegar, yuzukan appears to have emerged from a search for a simpler way to enjoy the fruit as a snack. Demand for it as a dessert is said to have grown in recent years, and it's now sold as a product as well as made at home.
Before you go
- How to shop in a depachika (department store food hall)A guide to browsing prepared foods and bento, choosing wagashi as a gift with a good shelf life, sampling etiquette, end-of-day discounts, asking for cold packs and wrapping, and finding your way around a depachika floor.
- At kissaten, cafes, and kanmi-dokoroThe difference between jun-kissa and chain cafes, the morning-set custom, and kanmi-dokoro staples like anmitsu and zenzai.
Dishes in the same style
- Abekawa MochiFresh-pounded rice cake is dusted in soybean flour mixed with sugar. Named for the Abe River, it's said to have been famous among Tokaido travelers as a teahouse specialty and to appear in the travel novel Tokaidochu Hizakurige.
- Iga ManjuSweet bean paste is wrapped in rice flour dough, then coated with dyed sticky rice grains. One account ties the name to the grains' resemblance to a chestnut's spiny husk, and in the western Mikawa region it's said to be offered to Hina dolls at the Doll Festival.
Ingredients and dishes from this land
Also from Tokushima
- Amego no HirarayakiA flat stone is heated over a hearth for hours, then a border of miso is built on it to grill amego trout, stone tofu, and konjac — an outdoor dish from the Iya valley. Its name comes from hirara, a local word for a flat stone, and it is said to have long served as a dish for entertaining guests.
- Awa BanchaA post-fermented tea from Naka and Kamikatsu towns in Tokushima, fermented by lactic acid bacteria. Coarser leaves picked from midsummer on are boiled, packed into wooden barrels, fermented for roughly 10 days to two weeks, then sun-dried — said to give a refreshing sourness.
- Awa BitonRaised in the mountains of Awa City, Tokushima, at about 400 meters, on a feed centered on rice. Handlers are said to adjust the feed mix daily and avoid genetically modified crops where possible.
- Awa GyuPedigreed Japanese Black fattened in Tokushima, which gained recognition after being shown at a Tokyo meat market competition in 1962 — said to have a moist, fine-grained texture and modest fat.
- Awa no ItokoniSweet potato that has been boiled then dried — yude-boshi style — is rehydrated and simmered slowly with red beans for about two hours over low heat. Fitting for a region where drying vegetables is common in winter, it is said to be a warming side dish built on the concentrated flavor of dried sweet potato.
- Awa UiroRed bean paste mixed with rice flour and Awa wasanbon sugar is poured into a mold and steamed into a chewy cake. Said to have first been made to celebrate the completion of Awa wasanbon sugar in the Edo period, with related uiro cakes also found in Nagoya and Yamaguchi.