Actually Easy Shiroan (White Bean Paste)
Shiroan is a sweet white bean paste used in Japanese sweets. Usually the process is laborious and time consuming, but NO MORE! If you’ve got an Instant Pot or other pressure cooker, use this easy shiroan recipe to make a bulk batch for all your mochi making.
Do you guys know what my most popular videos on Instagram and Tiktok are? They’re my “What’s in this Daifuku?” series of videos! Honestly, I’m not quite sure why, but millions of people seem to enjoy watching me cut into a daifuku and revealing its guts. I guess what those millions of people don’t know is that it’s basically the same recipe over and over. I get a fruit, I wrap shiroan around it, and then I stuff it inside some mochi dough. So you can guess that having some shiroan on hand is pretty key for me.
What is Shiroan?
Shiroan is a sweet white bean paste used in a variety of Japanese sweets. Typically it’s made by boiling large white beans (like lima). Then you have to individually peel each bean by hand. After that you can finally mash the beans with sugar, then drain the excess water. Et voila! White bean paste.
The idea of peeling each bean by hand has always put me off making my own. I mean, really. Who has that kind of time?! Typically, I buy shiroan at our local Japanese market.
BUT SOMETIMES THEY ARE SOLD OUT. FOR WEEKS. And of course, it’s the one thing that you can’t buy on Amazon.
So it is this kind of predicament that has finally led me to make my own at home… but with some shortcuts, of course.
Fast Way to Make Shiroan
In my quest for a more efficient way to make my mochi treats, I stumbled upon this cookbook by Kaori Becker. While I’ll leave a full review of the book for later, one recipe I appreciated was the shiroan recipe! Kaori’s pro tip: Use baby lima beans and you won’t have to shell each one!
Aaaaaaand given that I’ve always made beans in a pressure cooker… well there’s your shortcut for making shiroan! Baby lima beans, Instant Pot, mix everything in a food processor, and then drain excess liquid in cheesecloth. The whole thing still takes a few hours, but that’s a lot faster than the multiple days it normally would take. There’s also a lot less active cooking time and more downtime just waiting for the Instant Pot to cook.
What To Do With Shiroan
Well, now that you’ve made a big batch of shiroan, what are you going to do with it? My recommendation – split it up into one cup serving sizes. Put whatever you’re going to use in the next week in the fridge. The rest you can freeze!
You can use shiroan in any daifuku recipe. You can also mix it with black sesame paste or matcha and use it as a topping for dango. You can also mix it with gyuhi (mochi dough) for nerikiri, which is one of the fanciest of Japanese sweets. You can bake it in manju or bread buns, mix it into buttercream… get creative! The options are endless!
Daifuku Recipes
Looking for some daifuku inspiration? Check these out:
Actually Easy Shiroan (White Bean Paste)
Ingredients
- 1 lb baby lima beans
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- water
- 1.5 cups sugar
Equipment
- Pressure Cooker
- Food processor or blender
- Cheesecloth
Instructions
- Put baby lima beans in pressure cooker with enough water to cover the beans by about 2 inches.
- Add baking soda. Pressure cook on high pressure for 45 minutes and then quick release.
Drain cooked beans and put into a food processor or blender. Add sugar and blend until smooth.
Put bean paste in a large cheesecloth and set over a strainer. You can let it sit for half an hour or use a spatula to press out some of the excess water. The end result should be about 700g or 3 cups, and have mashed potato consistency.- Scoop whatever bean paste you will be using in the next week and put in an airtight container in the fridge. You can freeze the rest for a few months.
