Koan 狐菴 experience

Koan 狐菴 offers a unique pairing experience next to the beautiful Daitokuji temple complex in Kyoto. The space blends wagashi with tea, coffee, sake and other beverages like gin. The pairing changes regularly, so check their Instagram account @kiss.a.co before dropping by.

As a tea and coffee drinker on one side and a wagashi devourer on the other, I was attracted to this space from the moment I heard about it. More recently, my newly found appreciation for sake made the discovery of this space a true wonder. I was greeted by a space sparsely decorated at first sight, but with plenty of design details all over the place and plenty of tiny figurines and fox masks all over the place. The staff was shocked as I entered, perhaps because I accidentally tried to access it from the wrong door, creating an embarrassing situation. If you visit, use the sliding doors in the centre.

That day, there was unfortunately no pairing with tea, but a dark roasted coffee and Wagashi pairing. Apparently, the day before, they had a pairing experience of Gin and Wagashi too. The choice of drink was quite simple, as they explained to me with no other context, I could either get the coffee beans preferred by the jet black-haired woman in charge of the brewing. Or the preferred beans by the pink-haired man, who openly admitted his profile was more of a punch-in-the-face drink. Ultimately, embracing my old coffee-related job, I decided to give it a go for both of them. They gave me a choice of two sweets to pair it with, and I decided to go for the anko-filled manekineko wafer sweet. The anko was relatively chunky, my favourite.

This is a tea blog, so it's strange to talk about this particular coffee pairing. While I enjoyed my pairing set, we engaged in an interesting conversation about the craftsmanship of tea, coffee and other beverages. It was interesting to see how they approached the pairing of sweets depending on the drinks offered that day. How, depending on the style of sake, a sweet would make the pairing more fresh or more fruity. How tea or coffee affects the approach and the appreciation of the flavours of the sweets.

We also shared an interesting conversation on Japanese black tea production, a great topic of discussion in my opinion. A touch too on Kamairicha production and some of the producing areas. I am looking forward to visiting again and experience what other wonderful creative pairings they come up with next. The staff are welcoming, the space has both a mysterious and relax atmosphere, with its dim light and nice incense. But definitely because it gave me a new appreciation and ideas on how we approach tea and its brewing. Note that only cash is accepted.