Curry bread sales world record smashed at Sapporo Snow Festival

Curry bread, Japanese curry wrapped in a soft yet crunchy fried dough exterior, is one of Japan’s most popular foods, often found at convenience stores and bakeries.

A wooden plate holding four pieces of curry bread — Curry bread is a popular snack in Japan

Known in Japan as “karepan”, this week the delicious fried snack hit the headlines as they were involved in a record breaking feat in Japan’s Hokkaido Prefecture.

Co-operative Network Hokkaido set a new Guinness World Record for the “Most Curry Bread Sold in 8 Hours” during the prestigious Sapporo Snow Festival.

Odori Park in Sapporo during winter — Odori Park in Sapporo is one of the main locations for the Snow Festival

The record-breaking feat was accomplished through a dedicated sales effort on February 8th. Sales commenced at 11:00 AM and continued for six-and-a-half hours, concluding at 5:30 PM.

Despite the limited sales window, an impressive 11,208 curry breads were sold, surpassing the previous record of 8,340 held by Pan No Tora.

A food vendor in Sapporo selling paella — The festival sees a wide variety of food vendors set up stalls

This remarkable achievement was assisted by the popularity of a unique “Luxury Smoked Scallop and Rich Beef” curry bread.

Crafted with premium Hokkaido-sourced ingredients, this special two-piece set, priced at 500 yen (approx. $3.22 USD/£2.60 GBP), tempted festival-goers into buying two curry breads at once, which was a clever tactic employed by Co-op Network Hokkaido to boost the sales total.

The exceptional quality of the regional themed curry bread, with its exquisite blend of smoked scallop and rich beef flavors, garnered widespread praise from customers.

A Seven-Eleven convenience store in Japan — 7-Eleven holds another curry bread world record

Curry bread does have other entries in the books of Guinness World Records, most notably with 7-Eleven’s record of “Best-selling Freshly Made Curry Bread Brand”, which was added officially recorded in 2023 after record breaking in-store sales of a whopping 76,987,667 units.

The now record-breaking “Luxury Smoked Scallop and Rich Beef” curry bread will soon be available at Co-op Sapporo supermarkets in Hokkaido, so if you’re heading to Japan’s northernmost island in the near future, we’d recommend trying one while stocks last.

Source: Guinness World Records