Anpan (あんパン, 餡パン) is a Japanese sweet roll most commonly filled with red bean paste.

[1] The Meiji era was a period in which Japan was becoming increasingly modernized, and many samurai who lost their jobs were given work that was totally new to them.

One day, while wandering around the area where many employed in new jobs worked, Kimura found a young man making bread, and decided to start his own bakery, named Bun'eidō (文英堂).

Kimura thus figured out how to make bread akin to manjū, raising the dough with traditional sakadane liquid yeast.

[citation needed] Emperor Meiji and Empress Shōken later acquired a fondness for anpan after Kimura, via chamberlain Yamaoka Tesshū, prepared it for them to eat during hanami.