“Kantaro: The Sweet Tooth Salaryman” – Anmitsu 101

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“Kantaro: The Sweet Tooth Salaryman” is hands down my favorite Netflix series. It’s literally dessert porn for sweets lovers! If you haven’t seen it, it’s about a blue-collar salesman, Kantaro, who plays hooky from work to have desserts. The show is adapted from a manga series called Saboriman Ametani Kantarou (which I just ordered online!). All the sweet shops on the show are real places in Japan (mostly in Tokyo). See the list at the end of the post. Here’s the first dessert he had: Anmitsu (あんみつ):

In the very first episode, Kantaro went to a dessert shop called Kanmidokoro Hatsune to have anmitsu. I never heard of this dessert before so when I went to Tokyo this January, I stuffed myself silly with anmitsu. I was in sweets heaven! It was so refreshing and satisfying that I went on a anmitsu binge for several weekends .

Anmitsu = An [bean paste] + Mitsu [syrup]

Anmitsu (あんみつ) is a traditional Japanese dessert served in a small bowl. A basic anmitsu has cubes of agar jelly [kanten] at the bottom topped with a scoop of red bean paste [anko], fresh fruits like tangerine, apricots, strawberries or cherries, a couple of mochi and a sprinkle of boiled red peas [mame]. It is served with a drizzle of brown or white sugar syrup [mitsu].

There are many variations of anmitsu. You can order anmitsu with matcha or red bean ice cream, soft serve, chestnuts, extra fruits and more. I usually order the basic anmitsu to taste each ingredients. The one place I ordered 2 anmitsu was at Kanmidokoro Hatsune because it was so damn good.

I made a little review system for my favorite anmitsu spots: