Kikyouya

Do you know Yamanashi's famous Shingen Mochi? Shingen Mochi is one of the famous local products in Yamanashi. As you can see the name of the product came from Yamanashi's famous Daimyo, Shingen Takeda. 

Today I went to one of the company that makes Shingen Mochi called Kikyouya. Kikyouya is located in Fuefuki city, Yamanashi Prefecture. Here, I went for the factory's tour and saw how they make Shingen Mochi. The surprising thing is that the packaging of the products are not handled by machine, but by hands! As you can see in the pictures below, the packaging are handled by hands by these workers. I was amazed by the speed. They can finish more than 100.000 packaging a day! 

 At the end of the tour, guest can try to do the packaging for 390 yen. I tried it, but it is harder than I thought it was. It is really difficult. It took me 30 seconds until 1 minute to finish packaging one mochi. The surprising fact is that it only takes 6 seconds for the employees here!  The factory tour is free, but the tour is not every hour and it is only seven times a day. The tour hours are at 09:00, 10:00, 11:00, 12:40, 13:40, 15:00, and 16:00.

  

Here I also bought a shingen mochi soft cream. It is really delicious. The combination of soft cream, black caramel, shingen mochi and bean powder is amazing. The mochi was delicious the soft cream was so creamy and soft, the mix between the bean powder and black caramel was delightful. If you come to Yamanashi, this is one of the local sweets that you have to try! 

Fuji Shiba-zakura Festival

Today I went to Shiba-zakura Festival at the foot of Mount Fuji. The festival is held from 15th April to 28th May. From the festival site, I can see a view of shiba-zakura (mossphlox) flowerbed below the famous Mount Fuji. This year is the 10th anniversary of the festival. This festival is the largest shiba-zakura festival in Japan.


There are thousands of pink, purple, and white shiba-zakuras covering the festival area.The view of the shiba-zakuras were so magnificent and stunning.  When the wind blows, you can smell the fragrance of these flowers. You could also take a picture of the mini Shiba-zakura Fuji, a shiba-zakura flowerbed that shaped like Mount Fuji.



Beside taking picture you can also try the Panorama foot bath and the Panorama Cafe, where you can relax while enjoying the view of Mount Fuji and shiba-zakura. There is also a Photo contest that you can try to take part in, a souvenir shop to buy some limited-edition souvenir such as Fujiyama Cookies, Fuji Shiba-zakura Manju, Fuji Shiba-zakura limited "Shingen Mochi", Sakura leaf Rice Cakes etc. and you can also try some delicious Mt. Fuji Gourmet. Finally there are some live performances to brighten your day. That's all from me for today, see you on my next post.