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Akizuki Castle Ruins Hita Town /Mameda Town Takatsuka Jizo Temple Aso Area Shimabara Unzen Ureshino Imari (Okawachiyawa Village)
Akizuki Castle Ruins
Kuzu Mochi
Kuzu is arrowroot in English. Kuzu mochi is a pudding-like arrowroot cake. It is made of kuzu starch. It is eaten with syrup and kinako (powdered soy beans with sugar).

Hand-made Washi, Japanese Paper
Washi is the traditional Japanese paper. Compared with Western paper, it has good preservative quality, so it tends to hold long. A lot of things are made of washi. You should feel the Washi paper, and you will find it soft and smooth.

Vegetable Dyeing
Due to the use of natural plants, this dyeing is unevenly colored and complicated, which gives unique artistic impressions. That means each cloth has its own outlooking.

Hita
Yokan, Azuki Jelly Paste (@Akashi-Hita-Yokan-Honpo)
Azuki bean sweet taste is the main ingredient for Japanese sweets. Yokan is its jellied paste. Azuki is often eaten with other ingredients like rice cake. Yokan is good for the people who want to eat only azuki, real azuki fan.

Geta Clogs
Hita is a town producing good cedar lumbers. They make a lot of commodities by using cedar wood. The most famous woodwork here is “Geta” clogs. It is a traditional footgear, but few wear them nowadays. But it has stiff soles, which may be good for your health by stimulating your foot soles.

Soy Sauce (@Hita Syoyu)
This shop in Mameda town produces and sells good soy sauce with rich and deep flavors. It goes well with Japanese meals.


Hita Cedar Woodwork
There are a lot of cedar woodwork sold in Hita. The wood features may be good decorations for your rooms.

Sponge Cake Roll (@Mameda-Roll-Iki)
This shop’s roll is one of the most popular sweets among the cake sold in Hita.

Yuzu Sweets
Yuzu is a kind of citrus, one of the specialties in Ooita Prefecture, which Hita is located. It tastes like refreshing lime juice. Yuzu juice is often used for the sweets here.

Takatsuka Jizo Temple
Amulets
Every Shinto shrine or Buddhism temple has its own amulets. You can buy one at the temple’s shop.

Praying Wood Tabtets
They are wood tables guarding you against every misfortune. Jizo God will be with you if you place it somewhere in your house.

Steamed Dumplings
The souvenir shops on the path to the temple sell this kind of sweets. They are made of rice with sweet azuki paste inside.

Yuzu Pepper
Yuzu Pepper is made by mixing Yuzu juice and hot chili pepper. It is one of the Ooita specialty food. It used to be eaten in and around Ooiita Prefecture, but now it has got very popular throughout Japan now. It goes well with soy sauce tasted Japanese food.

Jizo Dolls
Jizo Dolls are cute. This lovable dolls may be good souvenirs for you children, because Jizo is the god for guarding children.

Aso
Kumamon Goods
Kumamon is the mascot animal for Kumamoto Prefecture, where Aso is located. It is used for image characters for every kind of Kumamoto goods. Kumamon has no trade mark, so everyone can use Kumamon character.




Milk Sweets
In Aso area, there are a lot of dairy farming. They produce good quality of milk. In Aso, you can find good sweets using milk. They are good souvenirs.



Cheese
Also, they produce good cheese in Aso area.


Takana Leafy Vegetable Pickles
Takana is the vegetable distinctively produced in Kuamamoto. The pickles are very good with salty taste. It goes well with hot steamed rice.


Shimabara
Castella, Sponge Cake
Castella is the number one souvenir in Nagasaki Prefecture, where Shimabara and Unzen are located. It is rectangular-shaped sponge cake by baking the batter of eggs, flour, and starch syrup. The feature is the bottom, which is covered with coarse granulated sugar.

Kanzarashi, Sweet Dumplings.
It is a sweet of small dumplings with special syrup. Dumplings are made of rice flour and are iced in the cold water coming from the spring (this icing procedure is called ‘kanzarashi’). Syrup is made of sugar and honey. When you eat this, you can enjoy its delicate sweetness and the good feel of dumplings going smoothly through your throat.


Somen Noodles
Somen noodles is made of four like udon noodles, but somen noodles are thinner than udon noodles. Somen dishes are summer-feature food, and we eat somen cold with soy sauce dip sauce.

Unzen
Yusenpei, rice cracker (@Tomiya-honpo)
This is rice cracker. It is grilled one by one.

Other sweets in Unzen




Ureshino
Tea
Ureshino is the town producing tea, you can buy good tea leaves here. There are some tea packed in teabags. There are several types of tea as follows below:
*Gyokuro: Gyokuro tea has a full-bodied and sweet flavor because the sunlight is blocked by “yoshizu-dana,” reed screen, or other means when the new sprouts begin to open, increasing the amount of theanine, a component of umami (flavor).
*Sencha: Sencha is the most consumed tea, accounting for 85% of the tea in circulation. It is characterized by its fresh aroma and moderate astringency.
*Bancha: Sencha picked late in the summer or fall is called bancha. Because they are exposed to strong summer sunlight, they contain relatively high levels of astringent components.
*Hojicha: Bancha or sencha tea roasted over high heat.
*Matcha: This tea is made by removing the stems and leaf veins from “tencha,” which is made by drying young leaves grown under shade from the sun, and then grinding them into a powder using a millstone.
*Genmaicha: A blend of Bancha or Sencha with brown rice, which combines the aroma of Sencha with that of brown rice.


Macha Sweets
Macha is powdered tea, and normally it is used for tea ceremonies. It is often used as an ingredient for Japanese sweets. They are very popular flavor for sweets now.




Imari (Okawachiyawa Village)
Porcelain
Imari is a traditional place for making porcelain. It has some long history. You can find beautiful dishes. When we think of Imari ware, we thinki of white dishes with indigo designs. It also makes colorful ones.




Porcelain Wind Bells
The porcelain wind bells produced here are very popular. Wind bells are the device for making us feel cooler on hot summer days. The clinking sound has this effect.

