If you'ever been to a Japanese bakery, you've no doubt noticed a variety of tasty breads and pastries to choose from, but one recent tread, perhaps inspired by melon bread, is the baking of breads that mimic of the shape of something. In the past year, we've seen this with watermelon bread loaves and bunny-ear shaped bread, but the most recent, and perhaps popular of these was the pre-sliced cat-shaped bread loaves from the Blue Jin cafe and bakery at Osaka's Hankyu Hotel.

Now the Blue Jin Cafe and Bakery is adding a new wrinkle to its feline lineup with some new flavors. They've dubbed the new series the Ironeko Bread+, and its standout loaf is the sakura (anko), cat-shaped bread cherry blossom flavored bread with red beans (azuki).

While pink might not be the most realistic color for a cat, the distinctly Japanese ingredients more than make up for it in terms of flavor. Plus, whatever cat you own is probably deathly afraid of toasters and would definitely not let you spread butter all over them, right?

The sakura cat bread will be sold in a set along with macaroons and cookies for 2,220 yen from February 21st to 24h. The Ironeko Bread (Black) is already on sale for 350 yen for a bag of five pre-sliced pieces.

You can find both at the Blue Jin Bakery and Cafe located in the Hotel New Hankyu Osaka, open from 8:00 AM to 10:00 PM.

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By - Big Neko.