"Kinkato" - Sugar Confectionery

Colorful sugary sweets for the Hina Matsuri festival.

These sweets are often placed on doll stands during the Hina Matsuri festival – the Japanese doll festival in March. It is a Japanese custom to decorate the house with dolls once a year in households with daughters.
These sweets represent the ingredients from the mountains and the sea.
There are many theories about the origins of these sweets. The most probable one is the influence of western confectionery introduced by the Europeans during the feudal era. These sweets are called "Konpeito" in the Nagasaki area and "Kinkato" in Kanazawa. The sweets from Kanazawa are generally larger and decorated more abundantly.
These sweets can also be consumed as sugarreplacements for coffee or they can be used to add taste to boiled dishes.