In Japan, a new year for schools and companies starts in April.
I don’t know for other countries, but from the first business day of April, students will join new classes / new schools, and new grads will join their companies… it’s a season of new hellos and ligering farewells.
And Sakura/桜 – cherryblossom – is the symbolic flower for this season. It’s so magnificiently beautiful – yet with such a short bloom.. we kind of overlap the new start, new encounters, ephemerality to them.
During the sakura season, we’d enjoy them in daylight, and in evening as “yozakura/夜桜”… hanami/花見 (flower viewing) is a thing.
I wanted to have some of that sakura element though away from Japan- I baked a “Diamant Sablé Cookies” with salted sakura petals.
I chopped some petals into the dogh, and decorated with petals – slightly salty, and yum…!
Not to forget, it’s not only the beauty, the flavor of sakura is too, is so delicate and special…🌸
Super quick tips on what they are:
These salted sakura petals “桜の塩漬け/sakura-no-shiozuke” maybe found as confectionary items, or as… teas🍵.
We see this throughout the year in Japan, we’d put some petals in hot water and enjoy the salty sakura tea (like a soup kind of, like kombu-cha /昆布茶, kelp tea).
I also like sakura an-pan, filling with white bean & sakura petals.
When using them in sweet recipes, we leave them in water for a while to take out salt – but it’s also nice to have a bit of saltiness left.
🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸
タイムラインで美しい桜を拝見しながら、私もこの季節を味わいたくなりました🌸
桜の塩漬けでディアマンクッキーです。
桜のほのかな風味、たまらなくほっと、懐かしくなります。
この時期になると、卒業や新生活、周囲が何かがいろいろ変わっていきそうな、楽しみなようなソワソワする気持ちを思い出します。