Have you ever heard of "Tarudora"? It's a famous and popular sweet from Rokumi, a long-established confectionery shop in Otaru. This is a special dorayaki (a type of Japanese pancake) packed with the history of Otaru, making it the perfect souvenir for your trip. Let's dive into the charm, deliciousness, and hidden history of Tarudora.

What is Rokumi's "Tarudora"?

Tarudora comes in two varieties: with chestnut & mochi (left, 350 yen) and with mochi only (right, 315 yen) (Image: Rokumi)

Tarudora is a palm-sized yet impressively thick dorayaki. The batter, made with Hokkaido wheat flour and honey, is baked into moist pancakes that sandwich a homemade sweet red bean paste (anko) cooked over an open fire. There are two types: one with mochi (rice cake) inside the anko, and another with both mochi and sweet-simmered chestnuts. You can imagine it as something like an ohagi (a rice ball coated with red bean paste) tucked inside a dorayaki.

What Makes "Tarudora" So Incredibly Delicious?

The pancake and mochi are delicious, but the anko is absolutely divine!

What's so great about Tarudora, besides its eye-catching appearance, is that the homemade anko is just too good to be true.

Rokumi's anko is a masterpiece, made by slowly simmering high-quality azuki beans from Hokkaido and carefully kneading them with local sugar. The water used to make the anko comes from Otaru, which is said to be pure and smooth on the palate as there are no factories upstream of the rivers.

Made with high-quality ingredients and a time-honored, painstaking method, Rokumi's anko has a smooth texture and a mellow sweetness that is simply exquisite! Thanks to this anko, despite its thickness, Tarudora has a clean bite and is easy to eat, with a moderate sweetness that is never overwhelming. It's perfect for a 3 PM snack and makes a great little souvenir.

Was Otaru a Town of Mochi!?

Today, Otaru bustles with tourists, but it was once a city of logistics and economy, far from tourism.

When you think of Otaru's cuisine, things like sushi, ankake yakisoba (starchy sauce fried noodles), and hanmi-age (half-fried chicken) come to mind, and Western-style sweets have also become very popular in recent years. However, Otaru was originally a town of mochi and wagashi (traditional Japanese sweets). Let's take a brief look at Otaru's history.

After the railway opened in the early Meiji era, Otaru became a port for shipping coal from inland Hokkaido. At the same time, various goods were transported to different parts of Hokkaido via the Otaru port through the Kitamaebune (trading ships). For a long time, Otaru was the center of Hokkaido's logistics and economy, and goods from both within and outside Hokkaido gathered in the city through its port.

The "Former Temiya Line Site," a tourist spot in Otaru, is the remnant of a railway that opened in the Meiji era.

In an era without heavy machinery or trucks, port work relied on manual labor, so there were many port workers in Otaru. These workers were said to favor a certain food that was portable, easy to eat, and filling.

That food was mochi.
As a logistical hub, Otaru gathered ingredients like azuki beans from within Hokkaido, and rice and sugar, which couldn't be grown there at the time, from outside the region. It is said that many shops making mochi and daifuku (mochi stuffed with red bean paste) sprung up in Otaru to utilize these ingredients and provide food favored by the port workers.
*There are various theories as to why there are many mochi and wagashi shops in Otaru.

For this reason, there are still several long-standing mochi and wagashi shops in Otaru today. One of them is Rokumi.

Rokumi is a Long-Established Confectionery Shop in Otaru

The old Rokumi store. When it was founded, its name was written with a different character for "mi" (六味). (Image: Rokumi)

Rokumi was founded in 1931 as a mochi shop, selling daifuku and dango (dumplings). In the 1960s, the shop began to seriously produce wagashi such as dorayaki. Today, it manufactures and sells both Japanese and Western-style sweets and has been loved by locals for many years.

Although Tarudora is a more recent creation, it is a local sweet born from Otaru's history and Rokumi's tradition. That's why the filling uses real mochi instead of gyuhi (a softer, mochi-like confection) inside the homemade anko. By the way, the sweet-simmered chestnuts are also homemade.

A Must-Buy When You Go to Otaru!

Tarudora lined up at the Rokumi store. They're popular, so it's best to go early!

You can find Tarudora at the Rokumi store, located in a residential area about a 10-minute walk from JR Otaru Station, as well as in small quantities at "Tarche," a shop inside JR Otaru Station. When you visit Otaru, you must give Tarudora a try!

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