Sunday, April 25, 2010

Japanese Soda Candy #2.5: Japan - Land of the Rising Sun and Deception

So in my last entry about Japanese soda candy, I wrote about this package of soda candy that was fizzy all the way through and that was better than the first soda candy I wrote about, despite it having only five flavors. Probably two days ago, I went to a Japanese market again and this is what I see:

I mean, are you kidding me? Less than a week after buying that bag of candy with five flavors, I see this bag with TEN! So basically for the first bag with five flavors, I was cheated out of five other flavors! Also take a look at the top right of the bag, it's important for later


Notice the 10 on the left side that is mocking me for buying a bag that had only five different flavors


Top: Mango, Strawberry
Bottom: Peach, Cola, Lemon

This is apparently where the cola flavored candy is to be found. The cola flavored one is also twice the size of the other candies. I guess it's because people love the flavor of cola. Anyway, how did these candies rank?

1. Strawberry: This one really surprised me because I thought to myself, "Ugh, strawberry...what a generic flavor" but it turns out that I liked this one the best. The reason is because these taste just like the Marukawa strawberry flavored gumballs. These can be found usually in any Asian market and they come in little boxes. Definitely my favorite flavor of the new contenders.

2. Peach: This tasted a lot like white peach. I really like peach flavored candy, so it's hard to go wrong with this. If it weren't for the fact that I liked Marukawa gumballs more, this probably would have made the top of the list.

3. Mango: This was interesting because I've never had mango flavored soda candy. I didn't know what it would taste like, but surprise, surprise it tasted like mango. This made me think that mango should be in more Japanese soda candies or chewy candies. Chewy candies that aren't Hi-Chew that is.

4. Cola: Eh, I've never really be a fan of cola flavored candies anyway, so it's no surprise that this wasn't ranked that high. It's not bad at all, and is actually quite good, but it faces stiff competition when it comes to the new flavors. As stated before, this was larger than the other candies. I was hoping they'd sneak in an extra flavor at the end, but it was just cola flavored throughout.

5. Lemon: Again, eh... It wasn't bad, but it was too generic for my liking. It's one of those flavors where it's nice to have, but I don't think it's necessary. The best way I could put it is it didn't offend my taste buds.

After this revelation, here is how I would re-rank the candies:

1. Strawberry
2. Apple
3. Peach
4. Melon
5. Mango
6. Cola
7. Soda
8. Lemon
9. Orange
10. Grape

Yep, I'm still a big fan of the Apple flavor and it gets 2nd place. I don't know why this candy and Marukawa do the strawberry flavor so well. Maybe I really like them just because that flavor reminds me of my childhood. Either way, here's how I felt about the new flavors. I just know that next week I'm going to find a bag that has like 20 different flavors and one mystery flavor or something now.

1 comment:

  1. These are my all-time favorite...you should try these, too... Not quite candy, but ice cream bars still count, right? Melona bars are fantastic!
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melona

    ReplyDelete