midst(MONAKA)
Wagashi is a Japanese confectionery made by kneading glutinous rice flour, spreading it thinly and baking it, and filling the space between the two sheets with various types of bean paste such as tsubu-an, koshi-an, uguisu-an, shiro-an, yuzu-an, and sesame-an. It is said that this type of wagashi originally originated in the late Edo period when a wagashi store in Shin-Yoshihara Nakano-cho began selling leftover rice crackers filled with red bean paste. The name “makuchu” comes from the fact that the shape of the rice crackers, which are now available in a variety of forms, were initially circular and were made to resemble the full moon on “Jugoya,” or “the night of the fifteenth day of the month,” or “the middle of the month.
