Blender

White Bean Yokan

  • Dessert

Try our simple spin on a traditional Japanese dessert (wagashi). This white bean yokan has a silky, jellylike texture and is perfectly sweet. Best part, you can make it with everyday pantry ingredients!

  • Servings 8
  • Preparation
  • Cooking

Ingredients

  • 1/2-16 oz can of white beans with juice (solid amount 8.1 oz/liquid amount approx 8oz)
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • a pinch of salt
  • 1 tbsp agar powder
  • 2/5 cup water

Directions

  • Place white beans, can juice, sugar and salt into the blender container and firmly secure the lid.
  • Turn the dial to start the blender and set the speed to “2” or “3”. Blend for 2 minutes.
  • In a pot, combine the agar powder and water, bring to a boil to dissolve the agar. Add the mixture from #2 and simmer on low heat.
  • Pour into a mold and chill to set.

Using red kidney beans will result in a red product.

ONE OF JAPAN’S OLDEST DESSERTS

Yokan has been making the dessert rounds for a long time! For hundreds of years, this sweetened azuki bean confection has been on dinner tables and in sweet shops in Japan. Yokan is a jellylike paste made with mashed beans that have been mildly sweetened with sugar, firmed up with agar and set in a mold. It’s then sliced and eaten with a kashiyouji (a Japanese wooden pick for sweets). Well, we’re using canned white beans for this simplified recipe. Not only are white beans delicious, they can be way easier to track down at the grocery store. But this is one of those traditional Japanese desserts that is just as much about the texture as it is the flavor.

HOW TO GET THE BEST TEXTURE

For perfectly smooth yokan paste, add the beans, sugar and salt to the jar of your Tiger Edge blender. Blend for 2 minutes on a low speed (around 2 or 3 on your blender’s dial). No need to blast the mixture on high! In blender terms, that’s low and slow. But the bean puree comes out just right for yokan.

TIPS AND VARIATIONS

Add nuts or dried fruit. A new generation of yokan makers have been very busy in Japan, elevating this dessert to new heights. Walnuts work really well. As do dried fruits like raisins, persimmons or figs.

Try a splash of booze or matcha powder. If you’re over 21, a tiny bit of rum or brandy can deliver a little more oomph. And a little matcha (powdered green tea) delivers a pleasant herbal grassiness to the otherwise sweet dessert.

Use different beans. The traditional Japanese choice is adzuki beans. But yokan works with kidney beans as well. Fun fact: the color of the beans will determine the overall color of the finished yokan!

Products used in this recipe

SLB-A10U

Buy now This Angle is the Tiger Edge Your browser does not support the video tag. Your browser does not suppor […]

LEARN MORE

Blender

LEARN MORE