Category: Japan

December brings another unique box of snacks from Japan.

As usual Japan Crate includes a booklet / mini-manga that explains what everything is, has instructions for the DIY kit, and various additional content. The bonus item for the Premium Crate this month isn’t food, but 1 of 11 possible Legend of Zelda Mini-Figures. While I don’t recognize the character I got, the figure is quite detailed for the small size and looks good.

Now let’s look at the edibles.

The Excellent

As I’ve mentioned before (repeatedly), I adore cola flavored candies. So the Hia Shuwa Cola hard candies, one of the Premium exclusives, were easily my favorite item this month. The three “levels” (types) were all good, although I’m not sure why one was called “gummy.” I understand the fizzy and soothing ones. 😉

Naga-I Sawagumi Orange is described as a “sour gummy tape,” although I got more of a sweeter version of the candy I know as orange slices than something sour. Regardless, I loved it.

Both named flavors in the Black Bean & Soy Sauce Scones were extremely subtle, but that was perfect here and the underlying corn taste tied it all together. This is my favorite savory cheetos variation so far.

This month’s Premium Crate’s drink is Celio Lifeguard Drink. Subtitled as “Super Life” in the booklet, this was almost a combination soda / energy drink. Honey and royal jelly give it a much more pleasant flavor than normal for energy drinks.

Demitasse Pocky is apparently a new limited edition flavor made from seasonal ingredients. The coating was thick dark chocolate, and as such these were fantastic.

The Decent

I liked this month’s Umaino Sticks better than the previous flavor (beef tongue). They were less salty and the fact that we got three different flavors to try instead of just one was great. The veggie salad tasted more like the corn snacks I’ve gotten (and enjoyed) in the past than a combination of veggies, the Tonkatsu didn’t quite taste like Tonkatsu to me but was fine, and the cheese was similar to cheese puffs. All three were good, but I liked the cheese the best.

The delayed item from last month was Fujiya Lollipop Bag, a bag of classic style lollipops in four flavors: orange, grape, apple, and strawberry. Exactly what you would expect here.

There were a LOT of drinks / drink mixes this time. Awa Moco Moco powder formed a fizzy, creamy fruit drink. I got strawberry, which would have been my preference among the 3 possible flavors (banana and melon were the others).

The DIY kit this month was Cute Tororin Parfait DIY Kit, which is intended to make a strawberry parfait with pink candy topping and icing. I doubt I’m the target demo here, but I like this all the same. It mixed quickly, and well and made a good tasting parfait with a creamy texture.

Bad Kid Beer was supposed to be in fact a “magic powder that creates a creamy grape soda when mixed with water.” The grape flavor was very light but this was a fine soda-ish drink mix.

There was another “drink in a flexible plastic bottle packaged like candy” this month, and they still amuse me in presentation. I took the advice of the booklet and tried freezing my Pachishuwa Dynamite Melon Soda. There was no indication of how I was then to get it out of the package, but the soft plastic sliced easily enough and I poured the slush into a bowl. This Premium exclusive had a strong melon flavor and I liked it better than the previous beverage of this type. The freezing idea was a nice touch.

The Meh

Nothing this time. YAY!

Conclusion

Great batch this month, with a lot of variety and several unique inclusions. The Premium exclusives continue to provide some of my favorites, and the upgrade is easily worth the additional $5.

November’s here and so is my box of varied and unique snacks from Japan.

As usual Japan Crate includes a mini-manga that explains what each item is, has instructions for the DIY kit, and various additional context, pictures and promotion. The bonus item for the Premium Crate this month isn’t food, but a Naruto Blind Box Mini-Figure. Good inclusion to capitalize on the popular anime. One of the items listed in the book (Fujiya Lollipop Bag) wasn’t available in time, so an email was sent out explaining that it would be in next time and that two snacks had been added in its place. Nice touch.

So let’s look at the edibles.

The Excellent

Both replacements were from Glico, and the Cookies & Cream pejoy ended up being my favorite snack of the month. Kind of a “reverse pocky,” these vanilla cream filled chocolate cookie sticks were delicious. The chocolate items were a big hit with me in general, as the Bar-None-like Black Thunder candy bars were fantastic.  The other replacement was also great: Hot Chili Salad Flavored Pretz, nicely seasoned pretzel sticks with a decent dose of spice.

The Decent

This month’s Premium Crate’s drink is Chunosuke Water. I got the Apple flavor, and it’s a nice lightly flavored drink. Superstring Q is also a Premium exclusive, and is a 50 inch gummy string with two different types of grape flavored sections. It was decent, although I while I could tell the difference in taste between the two types it was more “sweet and different sweet” than “sweet and sour.”

Meiji Dice Caramel and Glico Man Caramel & Toy are both amusingly packaged caramel candies. They were fun inclusions and the caramel was decent, but in both cases it was a bit too sweet for me.

The DIY kit this month was Funassyi Furi-Furi Shake DIY Kit, which is intended to create a sweet pear flavored milkshake by adding milk and an ice cube to the provided powder. I got almost more of a banana flavor from it personally, but it mixed to a nice consistency and was decent for what it was. “Add milk and ice and shake” is also far and away the least work required for one of these so far.

Another Premium exclusive, Parchishuwa Grape Soda Mix, is one of the most unique candies I’ve tried yet. It’s like a bit a pop rocks mixed in with a powder that fizzes a bit and some chewy pieces for texture. The book describes it as “exactly what grape soda would be like if you could eat it instead of drink it,” and they’re right.

Uranai-KKO Bubble Gum is a nice recreation of fortune sticks. The gum itself is decent and seemed to have a slight cola flavor. The book and blog provide a little to help try to translate the fortunes, but it’s not nearly enough and I found the most I could determine on the sticks I got was good or bad luck.  Spy vs Spy Sour Gum contained two identical looking soft sticks of lemon gum, with one much more sour than the other. This was one of the Premium Crate exclusives and I enjoyed both versions.

The Meh

Fluffy Long Neck Marshmallow is a twisted rainbow marshmallow stick. It’s fine for what it is, but a marshmallow doesn’t impress me. I wanted to like the Purple Sweet Potato Sticks, which taste as advertised, but I really didn’t for some reason. So it goes.

Conclusion

This was the weakest Japan Crate so far for my personal tastes, but I still appreciate the chance to try all of these unique snacks. The Premium exclusives continue to provide some of my favorites, and the upgrade is easily worth the additional $5. Despite less to love than usual there wasn’t a lot I severely disliked either, there were still high points,  and I continue to be impressed with the variety of selections, not only within each box but across the shipments I’ve received.

October’s here and my usual box of varied and unique snacks from Japan has arrived.

As usual Japan Crate includes a mini-manga that explains what each item is, has instructions for the DIY kit, and various additional context, pictures and promotion. The bonus item for the Premium Crate this month isn’t food, but a Food Dog Gashapon. Yes, little keychain figures of puppies inside food items. So odd, but it’s a suitable inclusion that will amuse some.

Now let’s look at the 11 edibles.

The Excellent

As I’ve mentioned before I adore soda flavored candy, and this month provided me with a lot of it to enjoy. Mysterious Soda Balls (gotta love that translation), one of the Premium exclusives, are like soft Skittles flavored like various Japanese sodas. Poifull Soda Beans are excellent soda flavored jelly beans.

Another great Premium exclusive is Sour Fruit Gummies. There was just a hint of sour to these, and the flavor and texture was fantastic. Vitamin C Lemon Drops are exactly what they sound like – a lemon flavored hard candy loaded with Vit C. Interesting and cool  inclusion.

Moving on to the savory side of things, Tohato Caramel Corn is what would happen if Cracker Jack replaced the popcorn with carmel flavored cheese puffs. Quite tasty. Chocolate Mini Pancakes is another snack exactly as advertised. Tastes just like two tiny pancakes with chocolate filling between them.

The Decent

This month’s Premium Crate’s drink is Bireley’s Orange. The book explains it’s a drink that originated in California but was discontinued and is now only made in Japan. The origin makes sense, as this kind of tastes like a soda version of Sunny Delight. Rich Cheese Scones are exactly as described – essentially Cheetos with a more creamy and buttery cheese taste.

I got Strawberry Soft Candy (Rum Raisin was the other possibility), a pleasant chewy candy in the described flavor. Grape Gummy Ribbon has a nice, slightly tart grape flavor and a very unique soft, almost dough-ish texture.

The DIY kit this month was Chitto Soda DIY, which is intended to create mochi with a ramune flavored glaze. This was an intriguing one and I had fun attempting it. The texture was a bit odd, but that was likely due to me having some trouble mixing all the powders properly (my candy certainly didn’t turn out particularly pretty). It was a little bit bland, as the glaze needed a stronger flavor, but a neat experiment with a fine end product overall.

The Meh

I give  Gyutan Umaino Stick points for trying, and letting us sample the cow tongue flavor is exactly the type of absurdity I want from Japan Crate. But while the airy corn stick did actually manage to capture the flavor of cow tongue, I found it an odd combo and these were also way too salty for me.

Conclusion

Still really enjoying my Japan Crate shipments. Even the snack I didn’t like was interesting to try, and there were a lot of great things in this month’s box. The Premium exclusives continue to provide some of my favorites, and the upgrade is easily worth the additional $5. I continue to be impressed with the variety of selections, not only within each box but across the shipments I’ve received. Highly recommended.

After a good batch with nice variety last month I was excited to get my second Japan Crate.

As with last month, the crate is certainly packed with unique and varied edibles from Japan. It also includes a mini-manga that explains what each item is and has instructions for the DIY kit and various additional context, pictures and promotion.

August’s crate came with 13 items. I’m giving the Pokemon Puzzle Gum to my nephew, so won’t be reviewing it (although I feel safe in assuming gum and stickers would have received at least a “decent” from me).  Here’s a look at the other 12:

The Excellent

There were two awesome soda flavored candies in this one, which makes me very happy. Shuwa Shuwa Soda Candy is a hard candy with a “fizzy” center in cola, orange and grape flavors. Soda Mixing Jelly Beans (one of the Premium Crate exclusives) came in five flavors of Japanese soda and are meant to be tasted in various combinations. The Premium Crate had another crunchy savory snack this month in the form of Japanese BBQ Scones, which had the consistency of Cheetos with a light, sweetish BBQ flavor.

There was a lot of great chocolate this time, including Chocolate Pucca (pretzel shells filled with chocolate) and Puzzle & Dragons x Bikkuriman Wafer (standard chocolate filled wafer with a collectible playing card). The DIY kit was also chocolate related. There were two possible kits, and I got the Apollo DIY, which had white, strawberry and milk chocolate tubes and a mold with which to create little chocolate treats. This was easy to do and amusing. The mini-candies to put in the chocolates to give them crunch was a nice touch, and it all tasted quite good.

The Decent

Mario Kart Gum is a thread style packaging of small flat squares of gum in wrappers adorned with characters from the game. Was softer than the hard bubble gum usually packaged in these types of things over here. Wow, Such Banana?! is a banana shaped/flavored marshmallow treat filled with chocolate, if you can call a tiny thread running through the center “filled with.” The chocolate was tastable though, so I’ll give them a pass on that. The packaging of Crayon Shin-Chan Candy captures the particular humor style of its namesake show. The candy itself is essentially mini-gobstoppers.

This month’s Premium Crate’s drink is Creamy Melon Soda, which tasted exactly as expected. Crackling Cotton is an interesting cotton candy textured snack with little bits of pop rocks throughout. Not something I’d have often, but unique and quite good. There were two possible savory pretz flavors, and I got Tom Yum Pretz. I’ve never had the soup so can’t compare, but this did have a spicy edge to it along with a sweeter undertone. Not entirely my thing, but I liked it much more than I expected.

The Meh

Nothing this month. YAY!

Conclusion

A great month, where there was nothing I actively disliked and several things I would buy on my own if I could. The Premium Crate exclusives continue to easily be worth the $5 upgrade. I continue to be impressed by the quality and variety of snacks in Japan Crate and am looking forward to the next one.