Morinaga Dars Bitter Chocolate

おはようございます！

I am back from an excellent excursion on Disney Cruise Line's Dream ship. The only way to console myself on the fact I'm back at work in a Japanese treat! I was able to stop my Mitsuwa on the way back from an NYC day trip last weekend and picked up this Dars chocolate bar.

I love dark chocolate. Unless there is an interesting flavor like salted caramel in a milk chocolate or white chocolate bar, I never pick up anything but dark for personal enjoyment. I've always seen interesting dark chocolate bars in Mitsuwa but they tend to be pricey. Even this little package was $1.99! Then again Hershey candy bars are over a $1 in most places. I remember they used to be 2/$1 at nearly every pharmacy!

The packaging is very mature looking with black being the prominent color and not too much in the way of decoration. There is not really even any product description aside from "bitter chocolate". I really appreciate the way the box opens! This is probably why it's $1.99 versus the little thin sleeve Hershey bars come in.

 

The great packaging continues inside the inner wrapping. The little chocolate pieces are actually on a cardboard tray! I know I've said it a ton of times but the attention to detail in the physical packaging of Japanese treats is incredible. The chocolates themselves are not attached but small individual bricks with Dars stamped on them.

I like Morinaga products, though in the past I've mostly had their chewy fruit flavored candies. Trying their chocolate for the first time was exciting and did not disappoint. The chocolate is very smooth and on the lighter end of dark chocolate. It was a little bitter but slightly sweeter than Hershey's Special Dark. I felt it was a good solid quality dark chocolate and while nothing particularly special, I would pick it up again.

Calbee Hitokuchi Bizen

 こんばんは!

I saw these on sale at Mitsuwa for $1.99 and was psyched. I love whole grain-y and fruit snacks and bars and these Calbee Hitokuchi Bizen biscuits embody everything I look for in a treat. However when I got home and checked my receipt, I discovered I was charged $5.99 for them! This officially makes this snack the most expensive one I've reviewed so far.

(Hitokuchi means bite-size, hito=1 kuchi=mouth)

The box is great as it lays out exactly what is in the snack. There were a couple of other varieties as well but this combo was the most appealing to me. Not to be repetitive but I really love the box design...

 

This variety contains figs, prunes, bananas, walnuts and two different grains.

 

There are 4 packets in the box which contain 4 bite-size pieces. The bags are punched with a hole at the top...usually I see this when you expect to hang them on a peg in a store. I'm not sure why these particular bags sport that feature.

 

I'm torn on the flavor. My first impression was that it tastes like bread crusts. As I ate the rest I felt that the flavors of the banana, prune and fig were nearly undetectable. There was a slight hint of banana but nothing else. The fig did leave it's mark in the texture as it had the same some of small scale crunchiness that Fig Newtons have. I was not as impressed with this treat as I had hoped to be, though I will finish the bags. For $5.99, I will most definitely pass over these on my next Mitsuwa trip.

Bourbon Petit Cakes

 こんばんは!

Today I decided to try Bourbon's Petit Cakes with some tea. This little package was merely $1.99 at Mitsuwa and since I like few things more than pastries, I figured it was worth the price. I've tried Bourbon's Tomato and Chili crackers in the past (check it out here!) and they were just OK. I suppose like anyone, the company was worth a second shot.

The only choice was the choco chip flavor which did not bother me. The packaging is fine though slightly unremarkable compared to some of the snacks I've reviewed in the past.

 

It looks more like a double chocolate flavor to me! The little cakes are a cute-sized bite or two. It's hard to compare a treat like this to anything in America. The only snack cakes I tend to see in stores are the large and preservative filled Hostess/Tastycakes/Entenmanns.

 

(This shot isn't half bad! Thank you for forgiving my terrible photography!)

The flavor of these little cakes are funky. The chips give a nice burst of chocolate but the cake has some off notes that I cannot put my finger on- chemicals? The texture is very airy and slightly moist. I doubt I would buy these again due to that mystery flavor. I appreciate the size and idea of this treat but it falls flat.

Milk Chocolate Salty Pocky

 こんにちは！

I apologize for the slightly slower updates the past couple of weeks...I've had quite a bit of hours at my real world job. The excessive hours should be ending this week and so I will update regularly- thank you for your patience!

Though I am a fan of Pocky, I find I don't purchase it that often as there are so many other interesting snacks out there.  I picked this variety up at Mitsuwa for $1.99 due to the fact I enjoy salt with chocolate. On a side note, my first review ever was a pumpkin flavored Pocky. Since it's quickly becoming autumn, I am hoping to find that particular option on the shelves soon. It's really a delicious flavor!

I love most Pocky packaging. The colors are vibrant and eye catching. This blue box practically yells at you from the shelf.

 

I don't know how I feel about their new slogan "Stick to fun!". I guess it's because it is sort of awkward and I don't know what they mean exactly. Is it "stick to fun!" like "you should stick to having a good time, because a bad time is not fun!"?

 

It looks much like your average milk chocolate Pocky but if you look closely you can see small granules of salt. I did not actually taste much salt when I tried it. It's there, but very very subtle. I do not think I would purchase this over your regular flavored Pockys since the salt did not add much to the experience. Now, putting sea salt on Men's Pocky (dark chocolate) would be incredible!

Morinaga Hichew American Cherry

 こんばんはみんなさん！

Today I will review my first Morinaga Hichew! Hichew seems to be a pretty common Japanese candy but for some reason I have never gotten around to trying it. I picked these up for a very reasonable $.99 at the check out counter of Asian Food Market. I'll admit I was curious simply because it was some sort of American flavor.

This treat seems to be in a series of "world fruits". The packaging has a dated postcard looking picture of New York City on it. What makes me curious is why an American cherry flavor has a picture of New York City on it! Being in the shadow of the city, I am fairly certain there are no cherries grown there. I am also fairly certain there are no cherries grown on the east coast. In any case, I actually really like the packaging and it was originally what drew my eye when I spyed it on the shelf.

 

Having never had a Hichew, I naturally assumed I would be consuming a chewy candy. Well guess what folks...I was right! The texture is plasti-cy and takes quite a while to chew. I would compare it to a slightly softer Laffy Taffy.  It was very sweet but had a slight sour note as well which helped with the balance of flavors. I'm not a huge chewy candy fan and I would rate this as a mediocre treat. It's fair enough if your like that sort of thing but I don't think it is much better or worse than other Japanese and American chewy candies.

One Piece Hello Kitty Gum & Magnet

I have a real treat for you all today! When I see something really odd, I get very excited and this Japanese snack was the perfect quirky treat. I picked this up at Mitsuwa for $3.49 which is a little more money than I usually like to pay.

I'm sure everyone is familiar with Hello Kitty. I don't think you have to be a huge anime fan to know One Piece either. Now, combine them and stick them on magnets and VOILA! I'm not sure exactly why this product exists but, honestly, who cares! It's adorable and fun.

 

I love the packaging. It;'s colorful and full of promises of what may be inside. This sort of package is exactly the type that draws my attention on a crowded store shelf.

 

There are apparently 12 different magnet designs and there are 2 randomly assorted sheets in each box. The first one I pulled out is mostly pink and has 4 magnets. One Piece is not an anime I am familiar with so excuse me while I call the one character AntlerGuy. AntlerGuy and Hello Kitty are chilling with their respective skull and cross bones logos.

 

The second is primarily red and has 5 separate magnets. AntlerGuy and Hello Kitty are waving awkward positions. There is an odd assortment of auxiliary magnets including test tubes, a doubloon and a black bag. The magnets are really good quality! They are thick and stick strongly to the fridge.

I've come to not expect much out of these gum and collectible prize combo packs. The gum in this pack continued the trend. It is strawberry flavored and coated in a candy shell. The flavor is not bad it but lasts for about 5 seconds.

Glico Caramel Soft Candy

こんにちは！

If you have read a few of my blog posts, you may be able to tell why I picked this Japanese snack out. I could tell you that it's the first candy that Glico, popular mostly for their Pocky products, made or I could simply say I was in an Olympic-inspired mood. However, those are blatantly incorrect...I really wanted to see what cute little wooden toy I would get. Can you really blame me? Not only is there the promise of a prize, it's WOOD...not a cheap little plastic top.

Look at all of the possibilities! And yet...I got the lamest of them. My little prize box contained a "face puzzle". I can't even really figure out what to do with the 4 wood squares. I understand the eyes but not the triangles.

 

Despite the let down, there are other interesting things about this snack. According to a little research...Mr. Riichi Ezaki was inspired by a seaside town whose children seemed very fit due the the large amount of oysters in their diet. By adding glycogen from oysters, he aimed to create a healthier treat.

  

(Under ingredients it lists "oyster extract")

 

There are only four individually wrapped caramels in the second box but I wasn't really buying it for the candy itself. The caramels are rich and chewy and have a sort of citrus note to them. I really enjoyed them! Don't worry, there are no oyster notes. The whole box was $2.99 and 64kcals. All in all, I would purchase these again. They appear to have different prizes occasionally and I will happily try again for something less lame.