Itohkyuemon, one of Kyoto’s most famous green tea shops which established in the latter part of the Edo Period, is now serving a takeout hydrangea parfait at its main branch in Uji, Kyoto.

Uji, the city where Itohkyuemon is based, is home to Mimuroto Temple which is famous for its hydrangea. The temple bustles with sightseers and tourists during Japan’s rainy season who flock to gaze upon the gorgeous flowers. The tea shop’s limited-time hydrangea parfait was first released in 2013 and has gone to become their most popular seasonal parfait every year. So that lots of people can continue to enjoy the popular dessert, Itohkyuemon is offering the parfait as a takeout option so customers don’t have to eat indoors.

The parfait is made with matcha and hydrangea mashed sweet potato and hydrangea-coloured crushed jelly, and is topped with leaf-shaped matcha cookies, blueberries, and other colourful treats that bring to mind Uji’s rainy season.

A section of Deloitte Tohmatsu Group and FC Imabari’s educational book Watashi, Chikyu (Me, Earth) has been turned into a short movie featuring Hello Kitty. Released on YouTube on Wednesday, the video is aimed at elementary school children to educate them on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a global initiative to create a sustainable future.

The 9-minute video takes Hello Kitty on a journey through earth’s life from 4.6 billion years ago, animal life on the planet, and the drastic changes that have come about from human activity.

At the end of the video, Hello Kitty has a message for kids: “I wanted to be in this so I can learn about what I can do for our future. I would love for this to get lots of people thinking about what they themselves can do, even if it ends up only being one person.”

Krispy Kreme Doughnuts Japan is releasing two new doughnuts themed popular seals in the aquarium and a floating ring from June 23 until July 22. 

Seal Custard

Watermelon Slim Ring 

Seal Custard is a seal motif donut. The surface of the fluffy dough coated with white chocolate and filled with custard cream using Hokkaido milk and vanilla beans. The charm point is a mouth drawn with milky and rich white chocolate on the face drawn with bitter chocolate. The charm point is a mouth drawn with a bitter chocolate on a face coated with milky and rich white chocolate.

Watermelon Slim Ring is a ring donut coated with white chocolate motif a large floating ring with a red pattern drawn with a juicy watermelon glaze. The colorful contrast of red and white gives you a summer-like breeze and sweetness. 

Why don’t you try the adorable donuts that are perfect for the summer?

The Snoopy-themed PEANUTS Cafe chain of cafes is set to open the all-new PEANUTS Cafe SUNNY SIDE Kitchen branch inside WITH HARAJUKU in Harajuku, Tokyo, this July, where it will serve an all-new, gorgeous healthy food menu.

The Peanuts franchise has been active in its marketing efforts in Japan this year, promoting messages of love and friendship, themes that are threaded through the globally-celebrated Peanuts comic strip.

PEANUTS Cafe SUNNY SIDE Kitchen keeps with those important themes, serving up a menu of healthy light food as well as sustainable products.

Their food line-up includes no-fry doughnuts, granola made with organic ingredients, open sandwiches stuffed with fresh vegetables, and more. The cafe also has its own collection of merchandise with kitchenware to promote healthy eating as well as environmentally-friendly and sustainable items.

If you’re staying in Tokyo and frequenting Harajuku but have had your fill of the district’s famous crepes, why not let Snoopy cook you up some healthy grub?

(C) 2021 Peanuts Worldwide LLC

New Era has announced its first collaboration with the Mother video game series, also known as EarthBound outside Japan. Two hats, one inspired by Ness’s hat from Mother 2, and a ‘SMAAAASH!!’ version, will be released at the Mother no Hiroba pop-up shop at Shibuya PARCO as well as at participating TOCHIBI stores in Japan on July 1.

NEW ERA® 9FIFTY™ SMAAAASH!!/Ness – ¥7,700 Each (Tax Included)

Both hats feature New Era’s iconic 59FIFTY® model, which was first released in 1954, and feature the 9FIFTY™ snapback adjuster. One is coloured red and blue with a white top, just like Ness, and the other is full black with the word ‘SMAAAASH!!’ on the front.

The Mother no Hiroba pop-up shop will be open at Hobo Nichijo on the 8th floor of Shibuya PARCO in Tokyo from July 1 to 11. EarthBound fans can get their hands on a range of related merchandise.

©SHIGESATO ITOI / Nintendo ©HOBONICHI

Takara Tomy Arts is rolling out a new sleepy collection of Sanrio character figures at capsule toy machines in Japan this month.

The adorably dozing collection

Pochacco

Tuxedosam & Hello Kitty

The line-up includes Hello Kitty, Kerokerokeroppi, Pochacco, Badtz-Maru, and Tuxedosam with their heads leaning to the right, perhaps exhausted from being cute all day long. This is the first line-up in a series of these figures. And if you line more than one up together, it looks like they’re sleeping on each others’ shoulders.

©2021 SANRIO CO.,LTD. APPROVAL NO. S620286

Bandai’s character-inspired Japanese confectionery series Tabemas released a new collection of traditional Japanese wagashi confections and tarts inspired by the Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba anime series at Lawson convenience stores across Japan on June 15.

Tabemas Demon Slayer

‘Tabemas’ is an abbreviation of the Japanese words taberareru masukotto, meaning ‘mascots that you can eat.’ It is a Japanese confectionery series that combines well-known characters and Japanese sweets made from ingredients like red bean paste, sugar and rice flour.

Their line-up of three confections are based on Tanjiro, Nezuko, and Zenitsu from the series, each of which captures their charm points in terms of colour and design. Tanjiro is chocolate flavoured, Nezuko is strawberry, and Zenitsu is custard.

Tabemas Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba 2021 | ¥285 Each (Tax Included)

Demon Slayer Tarts

Tabemas has also baked up some no-baked cheesecake tarts featuring designs of Tanjiro, Nezuko, Zenitsu, Inosuke, Tomioka, Kyojuro, and Shinobu.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Tarts | ¥249 Each (Tax Included)

©︎ 吾峠呼世晴／集英社・アニプレックス・ufotable

Kokonoe Honpo Tamazawa, a wagashi Japanese traditional confectionery maker that has been around since 1675, released its new emoji-themed ‘EMOCHI’ collection as part of the WA!GASHI Project on Wednesday, a day which also happened to be Wagashi Day.

EMOCHI | Pick Your Own Set of 3 | ¥1,512 (Tax Included)

EMOCHI | Recommended Set of 3 – A | ¥1,512 (Tax Included)

EMOCHI | Recommended Set of B – A | ¥1,512 (Tax Included)

EMOCHI | Recommended Set of 3 – C | ¥1,512 (Tax Included)

EMOCHI | Full Set of 10 | ¥3,996 (Tax Included)

Kokonoe Honpo Tamazawa is a 346-year-old confectionery company based in Sendai, renowned for their wagashi-making skills and original techniques while they use to constantly innovate on their sweets. This new collection of sweets with a smile features emoji in three flavours: white bean paste, yuzu bean paste, and miso bean paste.

The collection links how emoji are used to communicate feelings through text in the form of texts and emails like how wagashi, or traditional Japanese sweets, are often used to express gratitude as part of Japan’s culture of gift-giving.

There are 10 emoji to pick from, perfect for giving as a gift to someone to send a message or as a treat for yourself, and each comes with one of eight message cards.

Digital content enterprise Cocone has made Sanrio’s popular character dress-up game Hello Sweet Days available in the US, Canada, and South Korea. The app hit the overseas countries on June 10, allowing for fans outside Japan to enjoy dressing their avatars up like their favourite Sanrio characters.

Hello Sweet Days first launched in Japan back in August 2017 and has since amassed over 2 million downloads. It rolled out to Taiwan, Hong Kong, and Macao in 2020, and now an English version has finally been made available. There are plans to release the app to even more countries in the future.

Pre-registration opened early in South Korea on May 24 when it garnered 60,000 advance sign-ups. Those who registered early even received K-pop idol-style fashion items. Since releasing last Thursday, it is now being used by over 300,000 fans in South Korea.

Head on over to the App Store or Google Play and enjoy Hello Sweet Days in English now!

© 2021 SANRIO CO., LTD. TOKYO, JAPAN Ⓗ. APPROVAL NO. S620438 ©cocone corp.

Sanrio Characters’ Collab Café has extended the opening period of the cafe at Narita International Airport passenger terminal 2 until July 30. The café serves a menu of food and drink collaborated with Sanrio’s beloved characters Cinnamoroll, Hello Kitty and My Melody.

Additional Menu: Cinnamoroll’s Fluffy Egg Pancake

Cinnamoroll’s Fluffy Egg Pancake is on sale for a limited quantity from June 19 to celebrate Cinnamoroll’s 1st place at 2021 Sanrio Character Ranking. The pancake represents the fluffy clouds in the sky. Additionally, the 2nd edition of visit campaign limited to weekdays has been launched from June 14.  2 original coasters will be given for each menu item ordered for a limited quantity so don’t miss out! 

© 2021 SANRIO CO., LTD. APPROVAL NO.627430

Benzaiten opened its first store in 2019 and since then has opened over 50 branches up and down Japan. The confectionery brand, which specialises in fruit-filled daifuki, has now opened a new store inside Tokyo’s luxury shopping centre GINZA SIX.

Yellow Papaya | ¥950 (Tax Included)

Tayo no Tamago Red Mango | ¥1,500 (Tax Included)

Fig | ¥1,000 (Tax Included)

Kiwi | ¥650 (Tax Included)

Benzaiten has over 10 types of fresh seasonal fruits ordered in from the market every day to make their daifuku with, most of which use the entire fruit. They are very particular about the mochi used to make the daifuku to ensure the original delicious flavour of the fruit is maintained and maximises. They use two layers of high quality white bean paste and habutai to hand-prepare the daifuku every day.

Butter no Itoko and Samantha Thavasa opened their second collaborative store branch in the desserts area of Tokyo Skytree Solamachi last Tuesday.

Butter no Itoko is a Nasa-based confectionery company co-developed by Chus and Shinrinno Bokujo, a company specialising in milk from Jersey cattle. It opened a store in collaboration with Samantha Thavasa last year at Haneda Airport Terminal 2.

Samantha Thavasa Exclusive Butter no Itoko Salted Caramel

Banana Smoothie

Solamachi Exclusive Samantha Thavasa x Butter no Itoko Eco Bag

The new store will sell a whole range of tasty treats including the salted caramel Butter no Itoko which was first released at the Haneda Airport branch, Shinrinno Bokujo’s soft service ice cream, updated 90 Banana Smoothies, and more. There’s also a limited-edition complete box of milk, chocolate, red bean paste butter, and salted caramel Butter no Itoko youc na get your hands on which were first released in April.

If you spend over ¥3,000 on desserts at the new store, you can also get your hands on the exclusive eco bag. These are available on a first-come, first-served purchase.