Tokyo Treats

The theme of April’s Box was Cherry Blossoms or Sakura which bloom in Japan during the month of April. The Premium Box contained a limited edition bottle of Sakura flavored Pepsi. The Small Box contained six treats.

Meiji’s Pucca Chocolate 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

Think of these as the equivalent of Pepperidge Farms’ Pretzel Goldfish if they were filled with chocolate. While I was in Japan I tried many of the local brands of chocolate with my favorite being Meiji so it was no surprise that I would enjoy these. Pucca come in the shapes of what I assume are sea animals such as fish, jellyfish and octopi. The crunchy outer shell is offset by the smooth chocolate inside. The taste is similar to eating breadsticks covered in chocolate.

I read some hints online that suggested heating them up in a microwave to melt the chocolate or putting them in the refrigerator to harden the chocolate. I put a few in the microwave for 20 seconds and the already smooth chocolate melts in your mouth as you bite into it for a pleasant experience. I placed some more in the refrigerator for about an hour. The harder chocolate gives the snack a bit more body when you bite into it similar to biting into an M&M. Of the three states room temperature would be my preference.

Karamucho Hot Chili-Flavored Chips 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

These are very similar in taste to Barbecue chips but not as sweet. Also there is a few seconds delay to when the spicy flavor hits your taste buds. Not overly hot but just right. Nothing too different from BBQ chips but I would try again.

Raw Ramune Candy 🙂 🙂

Ramune soda is a popular brand of soda in Japan known for the marble found in its spout. While I never tried any during my stay in Japan, my brother had some during a recent trip to Disney’s Epcot Center in the Japanese Pavilion. Ramune is the Japanese transliteration of the word lemonade which was the original lemon-lime flavor but now one of many.

The only way I can describe this candy is weird. The cube-like candy has a strange texture – part spongy, part gritty – which easily dissolves in your mouth. There is a strong tart aftertaste which combined with the strange texture wasn’t a great candy experience for me. As suggested by the manufacturer, I tried placing the candy in the refrigerator to change the texture. Although it became more solid and spongy, the effect and taste were pretty much the same. I gave this one a low score since I wouldn’t go out of my way to try it again but wouldn’t mind the flavor in its original soda form which is probably less concentrated than its candy counterpart.

Crunchy Panda Z 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

You can’t go too wrong with me when it comes to chocolate and this snack certainly didn’t disappoint.

Each snack has a chocolate panda face while the back is a chocolate cookie. The chocolate is some perfect balance between regular and dark chocolate – not too sweet but not too bitter either. The taste is similar to other chocolate covered cookies you might have tried. This one is definitely the pick of the box and my favorite for the April box.

Baby Star Yakisoba Sauce Flavor 🙂 🙂 🙂

This snack consists of baked yakisoba noodles. They are crispy short pieces of noodle coated in a soy or teriyaki sauce. It pretty much tastes how you would expect. To me it sort of tasted like eating stir fry without the vegetables or meat. I give it a “Meh” since it didn’t wow me enough that I would need to try it again and boy did it take me a while to get the flavor out of my mouth.

Meiji’s Plum Pati-Chan 🙂 🙂

This is basically plum flavored pop rocks. In theory this would have tasted great and gotten four smiley faces but for some reason there is something extra added to make it salty…very salty…to the point of overpowering the sweet plum flavor. Even though it is only a small packet with a small amount of pop rocks inside, I couldn’t finish it all.

Overall Box Score: 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

With three out of six items getting four smiley faces the small box was still overall very good. The only disappointments being the Raw Ramune Candy and Plum Pati-Chan. Definitely a good start for Tokyo Treat.

The theme of May’s Box was nature and most of the treats were Japanese green tea or “matcha” flavored. The small box contained six treats.

Kabuki Actor, Shido Nakamura’s Potato Curry Chips 🙂 🙂 🙂 🙂

This was a unique flavor of potato chip I had never tried before. I like curry flavor so it was no surprise that these were quite enjoyable and tasted much like I expected. This one is definitely the pick of the box and my favorite for the May box.

Gudetama Character Seal & Gum 🙂 🙂 🙂

I was a little apprehensive as this thin rectangle of gum smelled like the ramune candy from the April Box. However it tasted much better and was enjoyable for about two minutes of chewing after which the flavor is gone. I knocked a point off since this gum is no different from the chewing gum you would buy in a dime-store candy shop which quickly loses its flavor. The package did contain a sticker of Gudetama which my best guess is an egg yolk cartoon character.

Lotte Crunky Matcha 🙂 🙂

I really like green tea (hot or iced) so I fully expected to enjoy a green tea flavored chocolate. Crunky is made by blending white chocolate with matcha powder. It also adds in pieces of crispy wafer which give it the texture and appearance of a Nestle Crunch bar. However the taste was more like vegetable flavored chocolate which is not terribly bad but not really good either. I ate half of the bar anyway and offered the other half to friends and family to try. Of the eight other people who tried it most didn’t hate it but also didn’t want to try it again so thus the two smiley faces.

Yochan’s “Sweating Spicy Snack” 🙂 🙂

I quickly figured out from the description that this was a squid (calamari) based snack. Dried cod-flavored squid is not my thing so I gave to my nephew who loves calamari to evaluate. The description of the item warns that the spices “pack a powerful punch” and his evaluation was that it was too strong and he wouldn’t really want to try it again.

Plum Jam Crackers 🙂 🙂 🙂

These were really thin rice cakes with a packet of plum jam that you spread on the crackers. Like the Plum Pati-Chan from April’s Box, the plum jam was really really salty. I am guessing they grow salty plums in Japan because I have never tasted a salty plum before. As a result I spread maple syrup on the rice crackers instead which tasted like ice cream cone wafer. If the plum jam was more sweet than salty this treat may have gotten four smiley faces.

Thick Uji Matcha Brownie 🙂 🙂 🙂

After my run in with the Crunky Matcha I was apprehensive about the Matcha Brownie. The top layer of the brownie is made of a chocolate brownie made with whole grains, infused with uji matcha and chocolate chip chunks. The bottom layer is matcha chocolate similar to the Crunky. While the bottom layer tasted identical to the Crunky the top layer which contained more chocolate evened out the taste for something a lot more pleasant than the matcha chocolate by itself. Not great but much better than the Crunky.

Overall Box Score: 🙂 🙂 🙂

With three out of six items getting three smiley faces and one item getting four smiley faces this box was overall average. The main disappointments being the Crunky Matcha and Yochan’s Sweating Spicy Snack. While I thought I might enjoy “matcha” flavor infused into sweets this was not the case (sort of glad I didn’t try the matcha ice cream while I was in Japan).