Japanese festival food: jaga-bataa

Jaga-bataa ジャガバター translates into butter potato in English. Its most commonly written as Jaga-butter, a hybrid of Japanese and English, when referring to the dish in an English language post. It is really popular and personally it is one of my favorite foods to buy at a Japanese festival. Its made from mashed potatoes with a generous dollop of butter on top. They usually salt them too. And some 'yatai', festival food stalls, also offer other seasonings, such as cheese or cod roe.

Because its so popular, you can normally find Jaga-butter stalls at most medium to large festivals. I often see a Jaga-butter stall at even small festivals that only attract a few hundred attendees, such as local community festivals. At this time of year the new potatoes are harvested and they are absolutely delicious. Its the best season for jaga-bataa in my humble opinion.　

We're coming into the main festival season now - there are hundreds, if not thousands, of festivals on in Japan during the summer holidays. So there will be plenty of opportunities to taste some Japanese style butter potatoes in the coming weeks, if you haven't already. Moreover, for those that love it as much as I do, its just something else to look forward to this summer.