Christmas, the New Year, and Valentine’s Day are all perfect times to exchange treats and sweets with partners and friends. They may not seem like days connected to whales, but whale-themed delicacies actually exist. One shop even sells cookies made with whale meat.
Japan is full of delicious regional foods. Ideally, we’d travel around the country to enjoy both the flavors and landscapes of each. However, visiting all 47 prefectures at a leisurely pace takes time and money. Many people turn to mail-order specialties instead. Fewer have probably tried ordering an entire set of products from a single prefecture.
In Wakayama, however, there is a product line that lets you enjoy the prefecture’s specialties all in one series. It’s a colorful assortment of cube-shaped items called “Boxes.” Yes, it even includes whale meat cookies.
What exactly is this playful product? We asked Toshihiro Ishikura of Otera Mae Anchin, who planned and developed the series, and Kyohei Yutani of Jutaya Yutani Shoten. Excerpts follow.
A Project to Showcase the Region
What inspired the development of “Boxes?”
Ishikura: It all started in 2019, just before COVID-19. Anchin was selected as a grant recipient under the government’s Joint/Cooperative Sales Channel Expansion Support Program for improving the productivity of small and medium enterprises. That led us to bring together 12 companies from within Wakayama Prefecture, including Jutaya Yutani Shoten, and launch the project.
Anchin runs a tourism-oriented restaurant at the gate of Dojoji, the oldest temple in Wakayama. With that in mind, we applied for the grant to promote local specialties to visitors. But the following year, the pandemic hit, and tourism collapsed. We had to rethink how we could still share Wakayama’s appeal with as many people as possible.
As we pooled ideas, someone suggested a unified product line of 12 specialty items crafted by producers across the prefecture.
And that’s how “Boxes” came to be? Sweets highlighting each specialty, all packaged in the same cube-shaped boxes?
Ishikura: At first, we even considered unifying the series with deli-style dishes. Another idea was to let people enjoy Wakayama specialties from morning to night. For example, whale tsukudani with breakfast and a fruit-based dessert for a 3 PM snack. However, including meal-type items would narrow the target audience. So we eventually decided that sweets were the best option.
How did you approach the design of the boxes?
Ishikura: We wanted a design that would immediately catch the eye. Appearance is crucial when selling to tourists in sightseeing areas. We also created Tiffany-blue take-home bags to give the whole package a jewelry-box-like elegance.
Thanks in part to those efforts, we now sell around 70,000 boxes a year through hotels, roadside stations, and online shops. They’re popular not only with visitors from outside the prefecture but also with locals who use them as gifts when traveling.
For instance, government officials often take them on business trips to Tokyo. When they present them along with a map of Wakayama, it doesn’t promote just one company — it helps showcase the appeal of the entire prefecture.
Developing the contents must have taken time. Did the whale meat cookies, in particular, require extra trial and error?
Ishikura: Yutani has worked with whale and fish processing for many years. He’s an expert at handling whale meat. Therefore, highlighting the distinctive flavor of whale was a natural direction to consider.
However, early testing showed that the cookies were much more appealing when the smell was minimized. So that became a key focus during development.
Yutani: Because people experience taste and smell differently, we worked on adjusting the flavor so it would appeal to the widest range of people. The ideal outcome was to spark interest even among those who have never eaten whale before.
A Savory Snack
In what kind of setting would you like people to enjoy the cookies?
They’re not very sweet, so I’d actually recommend pairing them with wine or sake. The flavor works more like something you’d enjoy with a drink rather than a typical snack. I’d be thrilled if people who like alcohol tried them that way. Personally, I think they’d be even better with a little cream cheese on top.
Wakayama is home to umeboshi, mikan, whale products, and many other specialties. And it also produces excellent miso and soy sauce. In many ways, it embodies the foundations of Japanese cuisine.
It’s also an ideal travel destination, only about an hour by plane from Tokyo. I hope “boxes” encourages more people to take an interest in whale culture and in Wakayama itself.
They’d also make a great Valentine’s Day gift, especially paired with a nice bottle of wine or sake.
About Anchin Co, Ltd
Located at the gate of Dojoji, the oldest temple in Wakayama, the restaurant Anchin offers dishes, local specialties, and hands-on experiences that showcase the region’s “delicious” and “fun” side. It believes that visitors should experience Wakayama as a whole rather than in fragments. Therefore, the company continues to share useful information and highlight the prefecture’s many attractions.
About Jutaya Yutani Shoten
Based in Taiji, Wakayama Prefecture, the company specializes in processing and selling whale meat and other seafood products. Its website not only offers whale meat for purchase but also provides trivia, tips, and delicious ways to enjoy whale dishes.
(This report is brought to you in cooperation with the Institute of Cetacean Research in Japan. A version of it was first published in Japanese in the Suisan Keizai Daily News on January 20, 2022. Let us hear your thoughts in our comments section.)
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Author: Suisan Keizai Daily News