2016, when Nicole Yamana-
ka moved into her grandpar-
ents’ old house in Mountain
View, she and her then-
fiancé, Byron, became the proud caretakers of two
large Hachiya persimmon trees in the yard. Throughout
Nicole’s childhood, her grandparents would pick, air-
dry, and hand-massage the fruit each year to create hoshi-
gaki, a succulent and naturally sugar-frosted Japanese
deli cacy often served as a snack. The technique, which
goes back centuries, came to California with Japanese
American farmers. Nicole (pictured on the left below),
a chiropractor, and Byron (far right), a data analyst, de-
cided it was their turn to carry on the tradition.
The couple’s first harvest came a week before their
wedding, and the just-ripened fruit needed to be pro-
cessed right away. “We had more than 900 persim-
mons! Our friends came and helped,” says Nicole, who
didn’t want to let the bounty go to waste. “I felt like
Grandma and Grandpa were nearby, cheering us on.”
Today, the Yamanakas mark each October as the
start of their harvest. “It’s always around baseball
playoffs,” says Cyndi Sakuma, Nicole’s mom, who has
seen decades of persimmon action at this house with her
husband, Nolan, often with the radio or TV broadcast-
ing strikes and runs in the background. Nicole and
Byron gather the fruit, and then 10 to 15 relatives and
friends come to wash, peel, and suspend the persim-
mons from racks in the garage. “The process is the
same whether you’re drying hundreds or a few,” says
Cyndi. “In Japan, everything is small. People might
have one string hanging from a balcony.”
After five to eight weeks of drying and massaging
(how long depends on temperature, humidity, and the
size of the fruit), the persimmons shrivel until chewy
but still moist. Nicole’s dad takes them back to his house
to lay them flat and keep an eye on them until the natu-
ral sugar migrates from the inside outward, forming a
fine white coating. Then he vacuum-seals the hoshigaki
to keep and to share with loved ones as far away as Can-
ada and Japan. The family savors the concentrated, date-
and-honey flavors throughout the year, enjoying them
whole or in strips, sometimes with tea.
For Nicole, the weeks of work and their sweet results
are completely worth the effort. “It’s remembering our
grandparents and carrying a piece of them forward,”
she says. “It also tells us we did a good job. We took
care of the trees, and they’re still alive.”Food & Drink
ALANNA HALE (2)