It was right in the middle of a sweltering summer during July. For the first time in a while, my friend and I planned a Girls Day Out.
We decided upon Kanazawa City in Ishikawa Prefecture, a place we had been wanting to visit for a while. Of course we were looking forward to visiting all the popular tourist spots, but we were most exciting about an activity that has gained popularity recently - visiting a tea house. To our disappointment, we were unable to visit a tea house on our trip.
My friend, however, discovered a program in Kanazawa that has different activities for people to try. One of them was making Japanese sweets. As a side job, I make, sell and give lessons for flower preservation so I was really looking forward to this opportunity to learn something new.
These lessons on making Japanese sweets are held in several locations (including the Ishikawa Prefecture Tourist Museum, Koshiyama Kanseido's Japanese sweets shop, and the Murakami Confection Shop) but we chose the one at the Ishikawa Prefecture Tourist Museum.
One of the attractions for this lesson is that you make three different kinds of gorgeous, vibrant Japanese sweets plus one more as a gift during your lesson that you can bring home with you when you are finished. A few other key points is the amount of time slots that are available for lessons, in addition to the reasonable price.
The teacher, who is a veteran at making sweets, was helpful as he demonstrated everything step-by-step during the lesson. Once you finish, you can enjoy one of the sweets you made paired with a cup of matcha green tea (price is separate from the lesson). If you want to take pictures, feel free to take some downstairs while you are enjoying your tea break (not a coffee break!).
Place: Ishikawa Prefecture Tourist Museum (Ishikawa-ken Kankou Bussankan) - 3rd floor in the multi-purpose hall
You can register online (Japanese only)
- Dates: Saturday, Sunday and Holidays - offered at 6 times throughout the day.
- Times offered:
- January to November: 10am; 10:45am; 11:30am; 1pm; 1:45pm; 2:30pm;
- December: One class at 1:00 pm on Saturdays, Sundays, Mondays, and public holidays.
- Length of the lesson: About 30 - 40 minutes
- Participation limit: 1 - 144 people
- Price: ￥1,500 (tax incl.) and includes a ￥500 gift voucher that you can use at the store on the first floor.
