Melonpan
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Melonpan, also known as Melon Pan or Melon buns, is a sweet bread from Japan. It is a soft, round bread covered in a crisp, cookie-like coating. Its appearance is supposed to resemble a melon, such as a rock melon. Typically, they are not melon flavoured (although melon essence is sometimes used in order to enhance the aroma). There is at least one known variation which involves placing a few chocolate chips in between the cookie layer and the bread layer.
The word has an interesting etymology, since Melon is a loan word from English, while Pan is a loan word from the Portuguese for bread.
Melonpan and Pineapple bun from Hong Kong is very similar for its way of cooking and naming by the shape.
Popular culture
- In the very popular Japanese children's cartoon Anpanman, Anpanman has a girl sidekick named Meronpanna (a slight pun on "Melon pan" + the name "Anna") who is an anthropomorphic version of the bakery item.
- The popular manga and anime series Yakitate!! Japan also features melonpan. Most prominently, the main character Azuma Kazuma, invents a new style of melonpan where the cookie dough and bread dough are cooked separately and attached with melon-flavoured paste, the resulting bread being called "Sushi-style Melon Ja-pan."
- The anime DearS also frequently features melon bread, as all the DearS seem to love it.
- Shana, main character of the manga and anime Shakugan no Shana, has an attachment to melonpan (it's the only thing she ever seems to be eating.)
See also
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