Salted cherry blossom ✦

Fleurs de cerisier salées

What it is

About four fifths of Japan’s supply comes from one district of Hadano in Kanagawa, where the double-flowered kanzan is picked half open, salted, then steeped in plum vinegar. The almond and hay smell is made by the curing rather than the flower: salt breaks the glycoside and frees the coumarin, which the living blossom barely gives off.

In the kitchen

Rinse and soak five to ten minutes, then taste the soaking water — it is a light floral brine worth keeping for rice or tea rather than pouring away. Under-soaked, a few blossoms will salt a whole dish on their own.

Goes with

Adzuki bean Glutinous rice Matcha Junmai sake Rice White chocolate

Same species

Bergeron apricot Almond Almond flour Almond oil Amardine Amarena cherry in syrup

Also used with

Domyojiko

Something wrong here, or missing? Tell us