In Japan, November 8th is known as “good tooth day”, due to some fun wordplay (in Japanese: ichi=one, hachi=eight, both combined together, ii-ha= Good tooth). Inspired by that, traditional Japanese dessert chef, Miyake Beniya (@beniyamiyake) gets creative and makes specially designed good tooth day sweets every year with his Nerikiri confections (traditionally made with sweetened bean paste and glutinous rice flour).

It all started when his patrons requested specially designed Nerikiri.

Now, it's became so popular, and his desserts just look so adorable people are even hesitant to eat them!

Take a look at this adorable creation of art!

Two teeth looking concerned at the third one with a cavity, almost as if they are consoling each other. Their facial expression alone is just so sweet.

In fact, he has been doing this tooth shaped Nerikiri since 2017, and this is what it looked like originally.

Every year, he added a few changes to the design, and it slowly evolved with time. In 2019, his tooth Nerikiri series came out with doubled the cuteness… see below!

For the 2020 version, he added even more unique facial expressions to the existing versions.

There is Koshi-an (sweetened red bean paste) inside these Nerikiri, making it look like it has a cavity when it’s sliced. This is also kids-friendly as you can see (I mean, look how cute they are), and inevitably was promoted as a part of “Shoku-Iku” (Food education) culture.

There was a lot of positive feedbacks on his post:

This is a special Nerikiri dessert you can also enjoy with your eyes.

Once you enjoy this special treat, make sure to brush your teeth thoroughly to prevent cavities!