Cotton Candy in Kyoto You Have to See to Believe!
Hi there! I’m Shiori Ochi, and this is my first time writing a post for our blog. I spend my days here at KINSHA supporting our sales division. It’s not the most visible work, but I always do the best job I can!
The place I’m going to introduce today is one that I’ve been wanting to go to for a while now. It’s a shop that specialize in making huge cotton candy. I finally got the chance to visit the other day, so please read on to find out more!
The store is called Jeremy & Jemimah and it’s in Gion, just south of Higashiyama Yasui. It’s super popular on Instagram, so I was really looking forward to seeing the cotton candy for myself!
As I approached the store, I could see that it was surrounded by people with huge sticks of cotton candy. I could hardly wait!
They have nine flavors, and after a lot of back-and-forth, I settled on sakura mochi (cherry blossom sweet rice cake)! I really wanted to try kuromitsu kinako (roasted soybean flavored brown sugar), ume boshi (pickled plum), and houjicha (roasted green tea) too...
While I was waiting, they gave me this cute little packet with a wet wipe inside. It’s such a small thing, but it made me so happy to see how much attention they pay to the details.
I couldn’t believe how big the cotton candy was when they finished making mine! It was bigger than my head! They even put green tea-colored powder on top of the pretty, pink cotton candy, making it look just like sakura mochi.
The cotton candy was fluffier than what you get at a summer festival stand, and the edges soon began melting in the sun. By the time we were able to take pictures, it had already shrunk a lot. It was like a big fluffy cloud all swollen with air.
As I took the first bite, the delicious aroma of cherries spread through my mouth as the fluffy substance melted on my tongue.
The flavor was neither too heavy nor too sweet, so you could easily finish one yourself; we couldn’t stop eating! We got one to split between the two of us, but I think next time I might get one just for me.
Here’s some pictures of the makers at work.
To make the cotton candy, first a member of staff holds a cone over the rotating sugar. As wisps start to form, they wrap themselves around the cone, and the candy starts to take on its distinctive shape. When it gets too big to fit in the glass dome, staff members start wrapping more wisps of sugar round the cotton candy by hand until it’s absolutely gigantic. I was wondering how they got it so big!
Eating cotton candy alongside others in kimonos, I got a sense of the elegant atmosphere Kyoto is famous for. If I get the chance, I’d love to visit while wearing a Japanese yukata or kimono, and then take a stroll through the streets of Kyoto with my cotton candy. Since the sakura mochi one was so good, I really want to come back and try the other flavors!
When I’m able to write for the blog, my posts will focus on photogenic food, so please look forward to next time!
◆JEREMY & JEMIMAH◆
http://www.jeremyjemimah.com/