This time of year, Japanese food retailers and shops have a ghoulishly good excuse to concoct their most colorful and tasty creations in the spirit of Halloween. For example, we've seen Krispy Kreme Japan come out with a collection of sweet and spooky donuts, Baskin Robbins Japan made a glow-in-the-dark Halloween ice cream and McDonald's Japan sent shivers down our spine with their pumpkin and chocolate sauce-drizzled fries. As these examples indicate, Halloween is very attractive to foreign brands operating in Japan.

However, Japanese brands have also begun to embrace the holiday and this even includes a few traditional Japanese confectioneries. Suehiroan, a wagashi manufacturer based in Kawasaki, Kanagawa Prefecture, with a 65-year history, has been creating a limited-edition series of Halloween-themed sweets for several years, to the delight of its customers.

This year, Suehiroan has a sure-to-please line up which not only fits the Halloween theme but also appeals to fans of the recently-popular kimo-kawaii, or cute-and-gross, aesthetic.

First, these eyeballs-shaped dumplings will leave you googly-eyed in surprise when you open the box and see them staring back at you. Made from a base of Suehiroan's mizu-manju dumpling, a jelly-like confection made with agar, these "Medama Mizumanju" are filled with a smooth koshi-an paste of azuki red beans from Hokkaido blended with Hokkaido milk.

These flavorful zombie finger cookies are made with a mix of fresh and fermented Hokkaido butter, carefully crafted and decorated with a peanut fingernail.

Finally, Suehiroan offers these cute ghost sweets in the jo-namagashi style, a variety of wagashi with which shops make their most sophisticated and artistic creations.

To find out where you can buy them and to learn more about Suehiroan's confections, please visit their website.