TOKYO, Dec. 21 — Wooden boxes used to ship apples are proving popular as a decorative piece of furniture to add a stylish touch to homes and stores. Shinsaka Seikan in the town of Nanbu in Aomori Prefecture is a long-established manufacturer, which has been producing fruit shipping crates for more than 70 years. Even as plastic shipping containers have become the mainstream, the company’s craftsmen continue to handcraft wooden cases using red pine grown in Aomori Prefecture. A decline in demand for wooden shipping boxes prompted the firm to create and sell smaller crates for interior decoration purposes. In 2022, the boxes attracted attention after they were used as … Continue reading →

TOKYO, Dec. 16 — A variety of sweets made from Japan-made rice flour are coming to the market for the Christmas season. Sponge cake and Stollen made from rice flour offer a fluffy texture and are proving popular, particularly among people with wheat allergy. Many producers of rice flour desserts are seeing a large increase in the number of pre-orders compared with last year, indicating the possibility of rice flour sweets becoming a standard in winter. Tsuno Co., a rice oil manufacturer, sells Stollen made from rice flour as a winter only product at 1,728 yen. The firm uses rice flour made from the Hinohikari brand rice. While Stollen usually … Continue reading →

FUKUOKA, TOKYO, Dec. 9 – Yay! We have wagyu Christmas cakeｓ this year! Prices of ingredients of regular Christmas cakes, such as strawberries and eggs, continue to rise, and so does Christmas cakes. So, many businesses are actively proposing to brighten up the dinner table with products featuring wagyu beef served in a cake-like style. Meat stores and yakiniku restaurants that regularly have business with wagyu beef producing areas are taking this strategy to boost demand for wagyu at the end of the year. Meat Shop n Fukuoka City, Fukuoka Prefecture, regularly sells Kuroge wagyu beef produced in the Kyushu, the southernmost island of Japan. Today, it sells more than … Continue reading →

SAITAMA, Dec. 8 — Chichibu Yomatsuri, an annual night festival with a history going back more than 300 years, was held in Chichibu, Saitama Prefecture. The festival, which honors silkworm farming that had thrived in the district, is regarded as one of the three major float festivals in Japan. The other two are Kyoto Gion Festival in Kyoto Prefecture and Hida Takayama Festival in Gifu Prefecture. The Chichibu festival fascinates visitors with its spectacular, ornate floats and fireworks lighting up the winter sky. At 6 p.m. on Dec. 3, the day when the main festival was held, people pulling the floats shouted “Horyai!” along with the rhythmical sounds of Japanese … Continue reading →