Uiro at “Time Corridors”

Time Corridors 

¥ 1500 for tea service and admission

Opened in 2022, artist Hiroshi Sugimoto’s “Time Corridors” museum is one of the newest attractions on Naoshima, the “art island” in Japan’s Seto Inland Sea. Getting tickets is a little tricky—they’re timed and limited in number and the website is not especially user-friendly—so I was lucky to stumble right in just as they opened for the morning. The galleries house many iconic examples of Sugimoto’s work in a custom-built setting that manages to be both brutalist and emotionally sensitive. 

The admission fee includes tea and a sweet served in the Lounge. One room has tables made from the trunks of ancient holy trees, while the other has less exciting furniture but a better view of the glass tea room installed in a kind of moat outside the building (the tea room is mesmerizing even when empty and I can only imagine that I saw it in use I’d be speechless for days!).  

I ordered matcha and the sweet of the day, a serviceable uiro. On the spectrum of rice-based treat textures, uiro tends to be on the stodgier end—imagine mochi mixed with Big League Chew. I ate my way through it carefully and savored having a little extra time to look out at the tea house and the view of the island. 

Kyung-dan

Kyung-dan
Uwajima, $3.19/15

Teeth still on edge after several disappointing purchases of grocery store sweets (eg choco coffee mochi, banh xu xe), when I spotted the Uwajimaya superstore's display of Korean cakes, I almost kept walking. Something snagged my attention though--the colors? the textures? a whiff of cinnamon escaping the plastic-styrofoam trays?--and I lingered long enough to realize that these rice cakes were fresh and tender, not the thawed blobs I was expecting.

I chose a pack of small round kyung-dan (also spelled gyung-dan), dumplings made of boiled rice flour dough (much like Japanese shiratama dango). They were filled with an impeccably smooth red bean paste and rolled in five different but equally delicious toppings: confectioner's sugar, black sesame, two kinds of bean powder, and cinnamon.

Kyung-dan are among the many Korean confections manufactured at Han Yang Oriental Food in Lakewood, Washington (yep, that Lakewood) and sold in Asian markets around the Pacific Northwest. Judging from this cooking lesson, they're also reasonably easy to make at home.

Han Yang Oriental Food Mfg
3819 94th St.
Lake Wood, WA 98400

Aki no Ne

Day thirty-four: Aki no Ne
Baisao, Sendai-shi, ¥350

The 60-year-old Baisao sweetshop looks almost like a tear in the space-time continuum, a charming old-fashioned wooden building wedged between an unpaved parking lot and a glum modern apartment block on the north side of urban Sendai. A discreet path leads customers off the main street, past a pocket garden, and in through a discreet side door. Immediately inside, a large glass case displays an ever-changing range of "dry" and fresh sweets; any with overturned markers have sold out for the day.

Given the decidedly autumnal weather, I chose a fresh sweet called "Aki no Ne", or "The Sound of Autumn". The exterior is made of kanten, an algae-based gelatin, mixed with domyoji, cooked particles of crushed rice (think "bulgur rice"). More usually used in summer sweets, the kanten was here used to great effect, producing a sweet that is both materially and aesthetically attuned to the transition between summer and autumn. The liquid mixture is poured into glazed ceramic molds which can take almost any form, but the shape used here evokes raindrops rippling the surface of a puddle. Make that a muddy and mysterious puddle; a core of marvellously smooth white bean paste gives depth to the tinted kanten, and a single azuki bean lurks just beneath the surface.

I opted to eat my sweet on the spot in Baisao's peaceful tearoom, nursing a complimentary cup of tea (whipped matcha runs ¥370 extra) and listening to the rain drumming down outside.