From screen printing to wood grain pattern tools: the pastry techniques of Masanori Hata, winner of the 2025 CMP

Masanori Hata was part of the Japanese team that won the 2025 Coupe du Monde de la Pâtisserie with works based on the concept of the “Land of the Rising Sun.”

In this demanding competition, the chef presented new pastry techniques that we featured in so good.. magazine 34. Why wait to incorporate them into your creations?

Correspondent, Reiko Matsuno __ Photos, Noriko Carlow

Discover so good.. magazine 34

Screen printing, incredibly famous in Gifu

The Garden Scent creation represents a love for his hometown. Gujo City, Gifu Prefecture, which is home to one of Japan’s three major Bon dances, is designated a UNESCO Intangible Cultural Asset, and is also famous for its weaving and dyeing industry.

The screen printing that Hata incorporated in his latest work as a new chocolate design technique, was the first established in Gujo in Japan. With a desire to make this technique, which has few successors, sustainable for the future, he attempted to apply it to chocolate making. He ordered the development of mesh screens with an asa-no-ha pattern at a factory operated by the family of his high school classmate. The screen printing worked beautifully on chocolate.

Discover the Garden Scent recipe in so good.. magazine 34

Hemp Leaf Pattern

“Asa-no-ha,” or hemp leaf pattern, was used in various parts of the Japanese world champion team’s artwork to express the uniqueness of 19th-century Japanese culture as a symbol of refinement. This traditional geometric pattern has been applied to numerous designs, including ornaments and kimonos, for over a thousand years. Hata created acrylic plates with sauce stencils and silicone molds for decorative cookies with this design.

Discover Miyabi’s recipe in so good.. magazine 34

New tool made of stainless steel inspired by the traditional sugar art tool magyfleur

Hata always explores “doing something new” and is passionate about creating original molds.

In Orange Amanatsu, he uses a  rubber wood grain pattern tool and an originally made stainless steel stamp. He got inspired when he saw a traditional tool called Magyfleur used for sugar flower art. A dropshaped chocolate sheet with a wood grain pattern is floated in a chocolate bath, heated with a hair dryer, and then pressed with the frozen stamp to make a chocolate shell with a wood grain pattern inside. The pattern on the chocolate will never be the same. It constantly changes due to the heat blowing from the dryer.

Discover the recipe for Orange Amanatsu in so good.. magazine 34

Distilling to Activate the Five Senses

At the Coupe du Monde, Masanori Hata brought a distiller to offer the judges a fresh lemon marigold aroma, both in Miyabi and Garden Scent. To amplify and convey the herb’s distinctive scent, he released an aromatic mist into the air.

Distilling is a technique he learned while handcrafting gin at the Tatsumi Distillery in his hometown, and one that will be part of his future pastry.