Just putting up a bit of everything. This kind of content takes surprisingly long to pull together, and since so many of them turned out to be misses, there is the problem that it is not all that helpful..
NewJeans advert
They are being advertised all over the place in Japan. Their popularity has already exploded. To think they would even turn up on the Kohaku Uta Gassen..
Nissin Raoh Kani to Miso
As someone who eats cup noodles a lot, miso has such a strong flavour of its own that it is hard for it to taste bad, whether it is proper ramen or a cup noodle. And it is winter, and there is crab stick on top, so of course it was going to be good. The problem is the price, but one or two a season is probably fine.
Meiji Rum & Raisin
It is a Meiji chocolate with rum and raisins in it, much like Rummy, and at first I thought it was a Rummy knock-off, but once I tried it, it was so loaded with rum that it was almost excessively fragrant and smooth. In some ways it feels like a better whisky snack than Rummy. They are made from similar ingredients, and yet the character is quite different. This one was very satisfying too.
The mala ramen that is popular in Hong Kong
Hmm.. not great.. For a start it is not spicy.. It feels heavily rearranged for Japanese tastes, I suppose..
Smoked bonito flavour cheese
This sort of thing is really the nutritious snack for middle-aged blokes, I reckon.. Satisfying, that is to say..
Cheese Dessert, Kobe-grown Chardonnay
Perfectly edible, that is about it..
Pakitto
Italians must never see this.. it is an ultra-easy pasta sauce where you snap the noodles in half, drop them into the sauce and microwave it.. but it does not taste all that good, and it is not all that convenient either. Why? Because you have to use really thin noodles for them to cook through, and you have to microwave it not for a minute or two but something like eight minutes.. it is hard to tell how done the pasta is, and if it is going to take that long, I figured I might as well just boil it in a pot. The taste was ordinary too.
Bake Creamy Cheese
It is a cheesecake made into a snack, and it was perfectly fine.
Jagabee limited edition, truffle butter flavour
It is made with a special variety called Fontaine, and the truffle is just a supporting act – the potato itself was seriously delicious. A taste packed full of nuttiness, if you like. It is not easy to get hold of, so spotting one is a Lucky Vicky moment, I would say.
Napolitan ketchup
Boil some pasta, fry up a few ingredients, stir this in and you have Napolitan on the spot! – that seems to be the pitch. They also sold a companion sauce for topping pizza; there seem to be a lot of these novelty products.
Rich cheese kamaboko
Perfectly edible, that is about it..
Lotte Cacao no Megumi
It is 72%, so a touch sweet, but it was perfectly all right.
Carre de Chocolat Cacao 88
This one is so-so as well.. there is no big difference, it is the quantity, the price and the packaging that differ.
Meiji Brandy & Orange Peel
This one looks like it was benchmarked against Grand Marnier, and again, they make it well.
Umakara shichimi flavour potato
This one was not as spicy as I expected and did not have much character. Probably far too mild for a Korean.
Saikyo Donbei kamo-dashi soba
Once winter comes around there is this thing called toshikoshi soba, so you end up eating warm soba. Maybe that is why so many new soba products come out around winter. The Saikyo kamo-dashi soba did not really manage to bring out that distinctive duck-fat flavour in a cup noodle. Well, that is only natural I suppose, but I think it is a textbook case of failing while trying to recreate a premium ingredient on the cheap.
Join the Discussion