Fukuda Pan

Little knownBarely documented in English. This is the kind of place the site exists for.

Researched and written by Hinato

Fukuda PankoppepanMoriokasince 1948local bakery

Photo: Yasu (talk) / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0) · original

Fukuda Pan is the kind of Iwate food stop that locals recommend before any restaurant with a sign in English.

Fukuda Pan has been making koppepan — a soft split bread roll — since 1948, originally supplying school lunches, and it is the food Morioka people are most sentimental about. You choose two fillings from a board of around fifty and they are spread onto the roll in front of you: peanut butter, red bean and butter, jam and margarine on the sweet side; potato salad, yakisoba, katsu and egg on the savoury.

The combinations are the whole culture of it. Everyone in Morioka has a standard order and will tell you what it is. The main shop on Osada-cho has a queue before it opens at seven in the morning and sells out when it sells out, and it is a working bakery serving a working city rather than anything designed for visitors.

Eating essentials

Price range

¥200–400 per roll

Best season

Year-round | Morning, before the popular fillings run out

Hours

7:00 AM – 5:00 PM | Closes earlier when sold out

Closed: Closed over the New Year and Obon

How long to allow

30 minutes

How to reach it

Directions

Osada-cho 12-11, Morioka. About a short walk from the east exit of JR and IGR Morioka Station, with 11 parking spaces. Closed over the New Year and Obon. Phone. Around fifty fillings are available and two are chosen per roll, spread to order. Other branches operate in the city, including one at the station complex.

Insider tips

**Two fillings per roll.** Chosen from the board and spread in front of you. One sweet and one savoury is a common Morioka combination and sounds worse than it is. **Seven in the morning, and there is a queue.** The line forms before opening at the main shop. Later in the day the popular fillings run out. **Peanut butter is the default.** If you cannot choose, the peanut butter and butter combination is what most locals were raised on. **It started as school lunch supply.** 1948, feeding the city's children. That is why every adult in Morioka has an opinion about it. **There are branches.** Including at the station, which is the practical option with luggage or a train to catch. The main shop is the one with the queue.

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