Tsumi-chan, A Butter Melting from Guilt and Other Living Food by Nagomiya

Tako
2023/03/03

This sad looking buter’s name is Tsumi-chan; tsumi (罪) meaning “sin” in Japanese. Tsumi-chan is created by Nagomiya (@nagomiyanosekai) who makes clay figurines of living food. 

Why name it “Sin”? 

You must be wondering why this poor sad butter is named “sin”. This comic explains it. 

Because butter is sinful. High in calories and fattening, the poor butter is blamed and called names like “forbidden”, “tsumi (sin)”, “terrorist”, “dangerous”, and “demon”.

Today too, the sinful butter Tsumi-chan burdened with guilt just melts away… 

It sounds depressing, but I can’t help but find Tsumi-chan adorable. I, for one, love a huge serving of butter on my toast, which is what some of the comments said. Thank goodness Tsumi-chan has great fans with excellent taste! 

The “Tsumi-chan, the Butter (バターの罪ちゃん bata no tsumi-chan)” series consists of several clay figurine designs of guilt-ridden Tsumi-chan melting on food. There’s buttered toast, pancake, buttered jacket potato, butter scallop, and ogura toast (red bean toast). 

Other Living Food to Discover

What other living food are there? Let’s discover some of them. 

Chinese Steamed Buns 中華まん

There’s curry-man, pizza-man, niku-man, and an-man, the classics that you can find in convenience stores. Their little feet and round ears are so cute. 

Kissa Nagomi Series 喫茶なごみシリーズ

A kissaten (喫茶店) is a Japanese-style coffeeshop whose menu items are quite standard, so naturally Nagomiya had to make living food out of them. 

Cream Topped Pudding プリン

Cream topped pudding in various flavours! There’s a panna cotta hiding among them. 

Puddings that stand on their plump legs. 
Cream ears are their charm point. 🍮

(Translation)

Sandwiches サンド

Assortment of sandwiches, with stubby bread feet, and ingredients as ears. There are sandwiches with strange ingredients mixed in though… 

Twitter Link

Stomach-ache Series『胃痛』

A menu that gives you a stomachache ?! 

More classic kissaten dishes, there’s wiener coffee, pancakes, pudding, melon cream soda, and a parfait. But these guys don’t look so good… and you won’t either after eating them. 

Kaki-chan 牡蠣ちゃん

Kaki is “oyster” in Japanese. These lovely baby oysters named Kaki-chan come either naked, with diapers, or fully clothed. 

Twitter Link

Kushi Dangos 串団子ズ

Nagomiya’s bizarre skewered dangos are cute but also puzzling. Is the stick part of its body? Are the 2 balls on its sides arms? 

They come in 5 flavours of mitarashi (sweet soy glaze), anko (red bean), shoyu nori (soy sauce seaweed), three-coloured, and uguisuan (green pea). 

Twitter Link

Onigiri おにぎり

There’s also a variety of rice balls standing on their plump rice legs. Can you figure out what flavours they are? 

They Are Not Teddy Bears! 

You probably thought these are teddy bear living foods because of their short rounded ears. But no! According to Nagomiya’s minne profile, these are short eared rabbits! Shocking! 

耳がみじかいうさぎのフェイクフードを製作しております。
食べ物に憧れ、食べ物に紛れたり、埋もれたり、合体したりしています。
そんな、うさぎの夢が叶った瞬間を切り取った作品です。

Making fake food of short eared rabbits.
Yearning for food, mixed, buried and merged with food. 
These works capture the moment when rabbits' dreams come true. 

- minne

Support these rabbits’ dreams by purchasing some of Nagomiya’s merchandise. 

The minne store (@nagosa) sells acrylic stands, keychains, figurines, and stickers. For wearables like T-shirts, sweatshirts, and bags, visit the suzuri store (@nagomiya_sekai).

Follow Nagomiya’s social media to see more adorable living food clay figurines. 

Photos provided courtesy of Nagomiya なごみ屋 (Twitter, Instagram, Minne, Suzuri)

Writer

Tako
Originally from Malaysia, came to Japan to study in 2019 and stayed on for work. I love travelling and dream of one day visiting all 47 prefectures in Japan. What I love about Japan is the nature, culture, and food!

Our Social Media ソーシャルメディア

Where we share the latest news about Japan in 9 languages!

  • English
  • 한국어
  • Tiếng Việt
  • မြန်မာဘာသာစကား
  • Bahasa Indonesia
  • 中文 (繁體)
  • Español
  • Português
  • ภาษาไทย
TOP/ Japanese Culture/ Pop Culture in Japan/ Tsumi-chan, A Butter Melting from Guilt and Other Living Food by Nagomiya

Our website uses Cookies with the goal of improving our accessibility and quality. Please click "Agree" if you agree to our usage of Cookies. To see more details about how our company uses Cookies, please take a look here.

Cookie Policy