Kanten and Fushimi: The Origin Legend, How It Is Made, and Why Production Moved Elsewhere

About the Appeal of Fushimi-Momoyama

There is a legend that kanten (agar), which is made from seaweed, originated in Fushimi, a place far from the sea. Making kanten requires not only a sea where seaweed can be harvested but also a winter climate in which tokoroten can be frozen and dried. Edo-period writings record kanten being made in Fushimi, and production later spread to regions better suited to cold and dry conditions.

Fushimi has legends about who discovered kanten, and 18th-century writings contain records of its production and trade. Even after kanten production moved elsewhere, neri-yokan made with kanten continues to be made as a Fushimi confection.

Kanten is made by removing water from tokoroten

The main raw materials of kanten are red algae such as tengusa (Gelidium) and ogonori (Gracilaria). In the traditional method described here, tokoroten, which is made by boiling seaweed and letting the extract set, is frozen outdoors in winter. As the frozen tokoroten thaws, water drains out of it, and when it is dried further, it becomes kanten that can be stored and transported. The photo at the top shows powdered kanten; it does not show a process in which outdoor-dried kanten is turned directly into powder. The freezing is not done so that the tokoroten can be eaten as it is; it is a step for removing water and drying it. [11, 12]

To use kanten, it is boiled until it dissolves and then cooled again so that it sets. This is because the components of kanten, which loosen when heated, link together into a mesh-like network as they cool and hold water inside. Because the dried material can be stored and the amount needed can be dissolved by boiling when it is used, kanten can also be used in confectionery. [12]

The story that Minoya Tarozaemon discovered it

According to the legend presented by Ina Food Industry, in the winter of around 1658, Tarozaemon, the master of the Minoya inn in Kyoto, is said to have left some tokoroten outdoors and forgotten about it. As it froze at night and thawed during the day, water drained out of it, and it became like a dried food. When he boiled it until it dissolved and let it cool, it set again, and he is said to have discovered kanten in this way. [11]

Fushimi also has a story that the discovery came about from the leftovers of a meal served to entertain a party of the Shimazu family, lords of the Satsuma Domain. In addition, the name “kanten” is said to have been given by Ingen Ryuki, a monk of the Obaku school of Zen, and it is explained in connection with the production method: tokoroten exposed to the air during the cold season. There are variant accounts of the scene of the discovery and of the naming, and they cannot be combined into a single, continuous, established historical account. [11, 13]

Written records show that Fushimi was a center of production and trade

Kyoto City’s tourism guide notes that the entry for “sekkasai (tokoroten)” in Wakan Sansai Zue, an encyclopedia from the early 18th century, contains a description of kanten being made in Fushimi. Fushimi Kagami, a late-18th-century topographical record, also lists kanten as a product that was first made in Fushimi and records that a kanten guild (nakama) was located in Okago-cho. [13]

What these writings convey is the reality of production and commerce: by the 18th century, kanten was recognized as a product of Fushimi, and there was an organization of people in the trade. Kyoto City further states that a Minoya in Okago-cho can be identified in modern land registers. However, the existence of a household with the same name in the modern period does not by itself prove the details of the 17th-century legend. [13]

Okago-cho is in the old town north of Otesuji, separate from the sake brewery district of Minamihama-cho. If you want to include the history of kanten in your walk, a route that only heads south from the shopping street to Chushojima will not take you there. The monument to the birthplace of kanten and the shop where you can buy neri-yokan are also in different places. [13, 34]

The original text also mentions red kanten, temple cuisine, and uchiwa fans

Wakan Sansai Zue is an encyclopedia compiled by Terajima Ryoan, a physician in Osaka, and completed in 1712. The “sekkasai” entry in Volume 97 lists places where the raw material comes from, including Uwajima, Kamakura, Saganoseki, the coast of Izu, and Kumano-ura. The list of place names itself shows that the places where the seaweed was harvested were far from the places where it was dried, processed, and used. [R2P001]

The same entry describes a production method in which the material boiled at night is placed outdoors in the severe cold of winter, and it also mentions “iro-kanten” (colored kanten), which is dyed red with a decoction of sappanwood (suo). It then records that kanten is made in Fushimi and that it is used in temple cuisine. Kanten was involved not only as a white dried food and an ingredient for yokan but also in dishes that made use of color and shape. [R2P001]

The entry also describes a use in which a thick boiled liquid is spread on paper and dried to decorate uchiwa fans. The properties of the material, which dissolves when boiled and sets when cooled, were also used outside of food. Rather than applying present-day uses directly to the past, reading the culinary and craft uses listed together in the encyclopedia of the time makes it possible to consider concretely what the kanten made in Fushimi was sought after for. [R2P001]

Miyata Hanpei spread a method of making it thin to speed up freezing and drying

As kanten making spread from Fushimi to other production areas, it did not simply move to colder places; the processing method was also improved. Miyata Hanpei, a native of Hara Village in Settsu Province, in what is now Takatsuki City, learned kanten making in Fushimi in the late 18th century and brought it back to his home village. Takatsuki City gives the time as around 1787–88. [DXP10]

According to an explanation by the Historical Museum of Osaka Medical and Pharmaceutical University, Hanpei improved the production method by forming blocks of tokoroten into thin, noodle-like strands so that they would freeze and dry more easily. This is “hoso-kanten” (thin-strand kanten). This change, from a method of freezing large blocks all the way to the center to remove water to a method of shaping the tokoroten thinly to move the process along, changed the conditions involved in freezing and drying. [DXP09]

In Takatsuki, “tentsuki,” in which tokoroten is pushed out of a container called a “tenzutsu,” is still practiced today. The thin strands of tokoroten are spread out on reed screens (yoshizu), and freezing and drying proceed in the winter air. Tracing the discovery legend and the later improvements to the method separately shows how kanten made in Fushimi spread into an industry that could be carried on repeatedly in other places as well. [DXP10]

Not only the cold but also the conditions for transporting raw materials changed where it was produced

Because seaweed can be transported from other places, the places where the raw material is harvested and the places where kanten is made do not coincide. Production, which is said to have begun in Fushimi, later spread to northern Osaka and then toward Tamba and Shinshu. Kyoto City’s guide explains that production moved to areas with even harsher winter cold and that kanten is no longer produced in Fushimi today. [13]

According to Ina Food Industry’s account of the history, around 1840, Kobayashi Kumezaemon, a peddler from Suwa, learned the production method in Tamba and brought it back to Shinshu. Shinshu’s dry winters were well suited to freezing and drying, and production is said to have spread as a side business for farming households. Then, in 1905, the opening of the Chuo Main Line improved the conditions for transporting the raw seaweed and the finished products, supporting the expansion of production. Both the winter climate and transportation were involved in the development of the production area. [11]

Fushimi still has neri-yokan made with kanten and a monument to its birthplace

Kanten is also used in neri-yokan to set the bean paste. According to Kyoto City’s explanation, neri-yokan became a Fushimi specialty in the period leading into the Taisho era. [13, 27]

Fushimi Surugaya Honten in Shimo-Aburakake-cho opened in 1781 as a branch of the family business, serving as a waiting place for passengers boarding boats at the port, and it makes yokan using ingredients from various regions, such as white azuki beans, dainagon azuki beans, and wasanbon sugar. Because dried kanten can be transported, Fushimi’s confectioners were able to continue making neri-yokan with purchased kanten even after kanten production moved elsewhere. [DXP11]

On December 27, 2020, a monument inscribed “Kanten Hassho no Chi” (Birthplace of Kanten) was erected at Kyoto Municipal Fushimi Junior High School, which is adjacent to Okago-cho. Because it is on school grounds, it differs from a tourist facility that anyone can enter freely. You need to check in advance whether it can be visited. [13]

Neri-yokan and sweets made with sake lees differ in how their ingredients came to be connected with Fushimi. Those differences and the items you can buy today are covered in Fushimi Specialties and Souvenirs. You can read about how Fushimi’s port served as a relay point for people and goods in The Edo-Period Port Town.

Tokoroten, dried kanten, and neri-yokan are three forms produced through different processes. Tokoroten is seaweed that has been boiled and allowed to set; kanten is what remains after water is removed from tokoroten by freezing and drying; and neri-yokan is made by dissolving kanten again by boiling, combining it with bean paste and sugar, and letting it set. The single phrase “Fushimi, the birthplace of kanten” includes the work of the people who transported the raw materials, the makers who dried it in winter, and the confectioners who made use of its setting properties.

References

• Ina Food Industry: History of Kanten
• Ina Food Industry: What Is Kanten?
• Kyoto Kanko Navi: Birthplace of Kanten (Kanten Hassho no Chi)
• Keihan: Fushimi-Momoyama and Chushojima Strolling Map
• Kyoto City: Company Profile, Fushimi Surugaya
• DXP10: Takatsuki City, January 28, Reiwa 8: Kanten Making at Its Peak
• DXP09: Historical Museum of Osaka Medical and Pharmaceutical University, Takatsuki Kanten Miscellany, Part 4
• DXP11: Kyoto City Tourism Association, Fushimi Surugaya Honten
• R2P001: Terajima Ryoan (ed.), Wakan Sansai Zue, Volume 97, Sekkasai

Featured image: Cafe & Sweets Parade Kyoto.