I can’t recall if I had ever been to Fresno, California. Of course, being a Northern California native, you know about Fresno. It sits there in the dry and yet agriculturally rich San Joaquin Valley, halfway between Sacramento and Los Angeles. Possibly having passed through it when I was ten-years-old when my Nino and his old lady got the brilliant idea to take me and my cousin to Disneyland for the first time. Tweaked out of their gourds on that 1990s military-grade deadstock rock, I was in my own bed at 7AM, on Splash Mountain (during its premiere weekend) by 2PM, and back in my own bed by midnight. They had made a round trip drive from Sacramento to Los Angeles, from Los Angeles to Sacramento and in less than 18 hours. It’s a helluva drug.
Fresno is home to a large and tightly knit Hmong community - most coming to the states in the 1970s after more than 200,000 refugees fled Laos after the Vietnam War - and now also home to Northern California’s largest Hmong supermarket, Asia Supermarket. But, it wasn’t always this way. If you’ve ever been to Fresno’s Downtown area, you’ll notice remnants from a previous era…a previous people. And those people are the Japanese during the turn of the century.
All of these Japanese business owners were sent to internment camps during the 1940s.
“As Chinese immigration waned, Japanese immigrants moved to the area in search of farm labor — and, eventually, farm and business ownership. Chinatown became a hub for the Japanese community in the San Joaquin Valley. In 1940, over 130 Japanese-serving businesses were located in the heart of the district.”
If you’re walking around Fresno’s Chinatown/Japantown area today, things seem lost. Most of the area is still choked off to construction for a high speed rail project that was first publicly mentioned in 2003 and still hasn’t come to fruition. A project that some would say helped to keep the area asphyxiated. Vacant building after vacant building, all venerable, all retaining their vintage architectural integrity and all containing possibility. There’s so much possibility in the buildings left abandoned, some with broken windows and their original 7UP advertising signs.
“Fresno's Nihonmachi (another term for Japantown) had a large concentration of Japanese businesses and associations. It became the center of social, economic, religious, and political activity for Japanese in the Central Valley by the early 1900's. After the first Japanese arrived to the valley in the 1890's to farm at a Muscat grape vineyard, ranchers began recruiting Japanese workers from Sacramento and Stockton; and by 1897, nearly 3,000 Japanese grape pickers were working on ranches in the valley. Because of the region's scale and distance between the large ranches, Japanese businesses were set up in small towns for the growing number of migrant laborers.
Fresno's Nihonmachi was established adjacent to Chinatown, on Kern and G Streets, and along Chinatown Alley. Japanese would frequent Fresno's Nihonmachi from the surrounding towns of Selma, Fowler, Reedley, Clovis, Parlier, Sanger, Kingsburg, and Madera, and from Kings and Tulare counties. By 1910, the Japanese population in Fresno County grew to 2,233, with 122 businesses and 9 organizations; and doubled in size by 1920 to 5,732 residents with 187 businesses.”
Kogetsu-Do
Above Image: The interior of Kogetsu-Do
The first time I ever had mochi was from Oto’s Marketplace. It was the summer of 1998, I was still a student at Thurgood Marshall Continuation School and Oto’s was nothing but a mere several blocks from the heathen’s haven. Still in its old location, the mid-century modern wooden building sold nothing but Japanese foodstuffs. My frenemy at the time took me down the frozen aisle and reached deep into the sliding freezer coming out with a box of strawberry mochi. The slightly frozen sticky chewy exterior melting on your gums as it gave way to an even more frozen solid ice cream; both made of strawberry. Disintegrated before I could even open my eyes, the only reminder is the confectioner’s sugar left on my fingertips.
The second time I had mochi was at Ippuku in Berkeley. Someone ordered the grilled mochi and my impatient ass tried to swallow the entire thing, the marshmallow square damn near lodged in my throat and killed me.
But, the mochi I had at Kogetsu-Do (Lake Moon) was like neither of these.
“During World War II, Lynn Ikeda’s grandfather, Sugimatsu Ikeda, who founded Kogetsu-Do in 1915, was incarcerated in a Japanese internment camp. To avoid losing the business, Ikeda leased the store to a Chinese family who ran it until their return in 1945. Many Japanese-American businesses in Chinatown were lost during internment and after their release as they faced significant local hostility and, in some cases, government seizure of their property.”
I was anticipating rows and rows of mochi sitting on wooden shelves. What I got were a few dozen, sitting in ancient jewel display cases, all the way in the back of the shop. Lynn Ikeda is the granddaughter of the founder of the shop, Sugimatsu Ikeda. She now runs the shop. The reason for there being a few dozen at a time? Lynn, now 65-years-old, makes the mochi from scratch! Combining sweet rice flour and water until it becomes the ubiquitous sticky and stiff dough. She fills the dough with a plethora of flavors like peach and apricot, using in-season fruit from local farmers.
She was sold out of the cookies and cream mochi ice cream. I had to settle for the chocolate mochi with chocolate ice cream and pieces of Kit Kat. At least, I thought I was settling. She told me to give the mochi about five minutes to soften, as they were frozen solid. I didn’t listen.
As soon as I stepped outside I peeled away a piece of the plastic wrap that was protecting the mochi ball and sunk my front teeth into it. My now frozen and ringing front teeth. Remember when I said the dough was sticky and stiff? Cue the “wrong” answer buzzer sound. The exterior mochi layer was melting under the heat of my mouth by the time my teeth reached the chocolate ice cream and large chunks of the iconic Kit Kat.
This mochi was delicate. This mochi was chocolatey. This mochi wasn’t trying to choke me out! Although it was the size of a softball, I quietly stood under a tree nearby the shop and finished the entire thing in the San Joaquin Valley heat.
I haven’t traveled all over California, or even the surrounding area. But, I’m willing to make a safe assumption that a mochi like this isn’t going to exist anywhere else in Northern California.
Above Image: Lynn Ikeda, “I make these myself, so I don’t have a favorite.”
Above Image: Handmade Chocolate Mochi with Chocolate Ice Cream and bits of KitKat
Komoto’s Department Store
Above Image: Komoto’s Dept Store still standing and with this cute sign! Photo taken by: Me
“Komoto’s Department Store dates back to 1901 when Riichi Kamikawa called upon his brothers from Japan to open Kamikawa Brothers, a general merchandise store located on Kern Street between G Street & China Alley. The Kamikawa Brothers were a group of Issei (first generation Japanese immigrants) who eventually owned a multifaceted immigrant business enterprise in Fresno and the Central Valley.
Originally known as Kamikawa’s Department Store, Komoto’s was built in 1908, catering to Japanese-Americans. The ground floor served as a general merchandise store while the second floor was a hotel. During the early 1900’s the Chinatown district was bustling with business, Fresno’s Japantown was located adjacent to Chinatown on Kern, G Street & China Alley drawing in Japanese customers from all over the San Joaquin Valley. When Riichi Kamikawa returned to Japan in the 1920s, the Kamikawa Brothers’s enterprises began to close. The general merchandise store closed in 1936.
Two years later, "Mr. Kanichi Komoto purchased the building and opened Komoto’s Department Store operating on the street level and basement.
The store closed during 1942-1945 after the family was sent to an internment camp during World War II. Although the store was closed, the family continued to make payments on the property during the war. Komoto’s reopened in 1945, with the first floor serving once again as a department store and the second floor operating as the Asia Hotel. Komoto’s remained in operation until 1993, today, only the building remains waiting to come alive once more.”
Honorable Mention: Ho Ho Kafe
If you’d like more information on historic things to do in Fresno, check out this driving tour of sites on the national register created by a Fresno historian.
Thank you for your mesmerizing account of Fresno's Japantown/Chinatown! You weave the stories and history of places and food together so well.
What an incredible story, and legacy. Thank you so much for sharing this experience. I will be craving mochi (handmade!) like crazy now!