A small, deep-red East Asian legume sweetened into a paste (*anko*) that fills mochi, daifuku, and dorayaki — and the secret sweet ingredient in Japanese desserts everywhere.
A bean that’s mostly a dessert
In East Asia, adzuki beans are most often eaten sweet, not savory. They’re cooked with sugar into a thick paste called anko (Japanese), dousha (Chinese), or pat (Korean) — the most common bean filling in Asian sweets:
- Daifuku — soft mochi wrapped around a sphere of red bean paste.
- Dorayaki — pancake sandwich with anko filling (Doraemon’s favorite food).
- Mooncakes — Chinese mid-autumn festival pastries with red bean paste.
- Anpan — Japanese sweet roll filled with anko, invented in 1875.
- Bingsu / Patbingsu — Korean shaved ice with sweet red bean topping.
- Red bean ice cream — a global summer flavor.
Two paste styles
- Tsubuan — chunky paste with whole or partly mashed beans.
- Koshian — smooth paste with skins strained out.
The choice affects mouthfeel and the dessert’s overall texture. Both are sweetened to roughly 50–60% sugar by weight, which is lighter than European jam.
Savory uses (rarer)
In China, adzuki beans appear in some savory soups and zongzi (rice dumplings); in India, they’re sometimes used like other small beans. But the dessert tradition dominates so heavily that savory adzuki preparations are rare even in Asia.
Also on our other sites: puns about adzuki beans.