It was more than a month ago but the first Japanese sweet making workshop of this year ended wonderfully. It became the workshop with the biggest attendees of mine. Everybody was very enthusiastic and the class went very smoothly.

Wagashi Making Workshop in January

The class didn’t have just many participants, it had several different nationalities of people with four male. It was very balanced class. I mentioned that the last class in December we had a group of friends using the class as the occasion to celebrate a birthday girl. In this January class we had not one, but two birthday girls so it had a very happy atmosphere for all of us. I was pleased that my workshop has been chosen for a celebration event and hope it will continue having more birthday girls/boys in the future.

We started making from a Plum flower. Plum flower is quite similar to Cherry blossom but one of the differences is that its petal has a round shape without any cut at the edge like a Cherry’s petal.

There are two new things I introduced in this class. One of them is using Raspberry filling for the Snow Rabbit sweet. I normally use smooth Azuki bean paste and that is because it is much easier to handle and suitable for a beginner. Although it was a trial to use flavoured filling this time but everybody managed handling it well.

I also introduced a technique to create some visual effect by using a tool you can find in your kitchen. Everybody wanted to give it a go with the tool and it was a great success. If you want to know what it was, please come to the class.

We made the sweet with plum blossom on a tree as the last one. I made it into a free design one. After wrapping the central filling together in a similar way all the particpants started creating their own design. Even for the snow rabbit sweet, one person brought a photo of rabbit sweet and tried to create the shape. It was a great pleasure for me to see participants enjoy themselves.

Whilst I was taking time to finish writing this report, we are now already in March and the date of the next Wagashi making workshop has been scheduled. It will be on the 22nd of March (Sun) and that is Mother’s Day in the UK. It will be a great event to attend with your mother or the sweets will be a unique handmade gift to her. The Havan store, the venue, seems like planning a special lunch deal for the participants (not definite yet though) so if you are interested in joining us, please keep an eye on my post.

Our workshop is quite small so we are going to continue with our special hygiene care.