Fresh green leaves mean it’s time for the Aoi Matsuri: a procession of five-hundred people winding through the Kyoto streets, as if out of an ancient picture scroll. For our May course, we offer a hot pot with Japanese peppercorn flowers (hana sansho) and either Tango surf clam (torigai) or Wagyu beef. Try also the season’s first bonito and a chilled bowl full of hairy crab, Kyoto eggplant (kamonasu), and a plant called water shield (junsai). We invite you to experience the aroma and refreshment of these dishes.
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Kyoto is awash in a cherry-blossom hue this time of year. Special garden openings and nighttime sakura tree illuminations. Geisha and maiko unveiling the fruits of their training in annual dance performances (Kyo Odori and Miyako Odori). Flushed cheeks of new students. The budding of spring takes many forms. Our April course offerings reflect the freshness of the season: sea bream boiled in a simple thin soup, beautiful “morning dug” bamboo shoots from Oharano simmered in a broth, and more.

The Doll Festival, or Hina-matsuri, is a time to pray for the health and happiness of your young daughter. Originally, it was a day set aside to wash away any troubles with running water. Shimogamo shrine continues this tradition by setting paper dolls to float away in the stream that runs through the shrine, taking any evil away with them.
Kyoto Wakuden’s course for March celebrates health and the coming of spring with a bowl of clam and fresh seaweed, beef and mugwort mochi with a bitter leaf bud sauce, and a special sushi with shellfish.
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