Butterfat and rum in Fran

Fran is another Pocky-like snack, where there's a stick dipped in chocolate. But Fran is a bit more fancy. The dipped chocolate usually has other things in with it, like nuts and stuff. But this one threw me off a bit. The ingredients in the dipping was listed on the outside of the bag.



Looking closely, you can see this list:
raisin
white cream
butterfat
rum
vanilla
wheat flour

The butterfat being listed was really gross sounding. I don't know of anyone who would find it appetizing upon hearing that. But people might like seeing the rum ingredient. Let's get drunk off of Fran?

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Store: Kohyo Supermarket

Pumpkin Pretz

Pretz has had a variety of flavors, and while I don't like many of them, they never seemed strange to me. Until now.

It's pumpkin flavored. I don't know if it's just me or what, but it's very strange to me that they would choose pumpkin, of all things. But then again, I'm biased against them...



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Store: Kohyo Supermarket

Ramen chip fries

They're not really chips like the way we have them, in slices, but they're more like chip-fries. They're chips, but in the shape of fries...

It really is ramen flavored. Well, ramen-made-with-thick-pork-belly flavor. According to the Kanji, at least (濃厚豚骨 - noukou tonkotsu). And I guess that according to Yahoo! Japan, it was the best ramen flavor of 2007-2008. Interesting, to say the least.

Also, sorry for the blurry picture. I didn't realize it was all blurry like that when I took it...



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Store: Lawson

Wasabeef chips

Wasabeef (わさビーフ), a combination of the words "wasabi" and "beef". That says it all. It's chips, in wasabi and beef flavor. I can't even imagine how that would taste. Or that this combination could ever even exist. But, alas, it does...



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Store: Lawson

Rose-scented chocolote

Here's another Meiji chocolate. It's strawberry flavored, but is also rose-scented (ローズ香り - roozu kaori). Looks pretty, doesn't it? Too bad for them I don't like strawberries or roses.



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Store: Lawson

Toppo flavors

Here are a bunch of new flavors from Toppo! Some of them are a bit strange.


This is praline flavor. I'm not really sure what it is, but it's some kind of French confectionery made with nuts and sugar syrup.


This is some kind of Asian chestnut (和栗 - waguri) dessert flavor. Dessert made with it is really yummy, so I might try it if I see it on sale somewhere.


Next, eclair flavor! I can't figure out what that Kanji says. It's not in my dictionary so I can't even look it up. If anybody knows what it is, let me know!

EDIT: So I found out what the Kanji is. It's coffee. I never knew there was Kanji for that... Anyway, it's 珈琲 - koohii. Learn something new every day.


The last one, strawberry omelet flavor. I find this to be the strangest. The picture looks more like a crepe, and the English on the side says "Strawberry Cream Soft Cake".

These last three are part of the adult (大人 - otona) series. I guess it's for grown up people with more refined taste? I can understand the chestnut dessert and the eclair flavored ones, but I don't see how the omelet/cake one fits into an "adult" taste. Hmmm...

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Store: Kohyo Supermarket

New Meiji chocolate flavors

Here are some new chocolate flavors from Meiji. They both seem rather fancy, and sound pretty yummy too. They're very tempting, but not with that price (210 yen). I'll see if they hit the 99 conbini later on. They look like they'd be good dessert chocolate.


Cheesecake tart. I'm not sure why they called it a tart though. It looks like a regular cheesecake to me. But I love cheesecake. Especially the crust. Though I guess they can't really put a crust in these tiny square chocolate pieces, huh.


This one is strawberry mille-feuille. Looks really good too, except for the whole strawberry part.

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Store: Lawson

Banana crepe koalas

I've always loved the koala-shaped chocolate-filled snacks by Lotte. The most variation I've seen are vanilla or strawberry-flavored filling, and sometimes I saw a chocolate-flavored koala. But this is the most interesting filling flavor I've ever seen. And I actually might go back and get some to try. I love banana crepes. This is an awesome combination.



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Store: Lawson

[Review] Beef tongue chips

I also got a bag of the beef tongue chips. The first impression I had of it was that there was a lot of pepper. I could smell it when I opened the bag, and I could see all the pepper sprinkled in with the chips.

The taste was definitely a lot stronger than the sakura chips, if mostly just the pepper. I could taste a bit of beef tongue every now and then. It's the BBQ kind, not the kind of beef tongue you would find in Western Chinese restaurants that come in steak-like form (which I personally find to be delicious). It was a bit too salty for my taste, and the pepper added to that effect too. I finished the bag, but by the end I felt like I was drowning in salt.

I might not eat this more than once either, but I liked it more than the sakura chips. This one at least had a discernible taste.

[Review] Sakura Chips

I recently bought a bag of the sakura chips that I had posted about earlier. When I first opened the bag, there was an immediate waft of flower fragrance that smelled sweet, but not too overpowering. I'm not sure if it really did smell like sakura, because it felt like there was something else along with it.

The taste was a bit weird at first. It took me a while before I could eat a second chip. It had a strange aftertaste, but not a strong one. Just felt like there was something left over that you hadn't been able to completely get rid of. I can't pinpoint a taste, but I think it was more sweet than anything, which might have been what caught be off guard, because chips aren't normally sweet. But after a while I got used to it and I finished the whole bag. It really did feel like I was eating flower petals though. Not necessarily in the texture, but mostly because of the smell, I think.

I wouldn't eat this more than once though.

Banana bread

Banana bread isn't all that weird. My mother makes some damn good ones. And then I saw this today, and was completely caught off guard.



Yes, it's banana bread. In the shape and color of a real banana. Apparently it isn't actually made of banana, it just has banana filling on the inside. Think of it what you will.

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Store: Lawson

Beef stew

Japanese conbini's aren't just about the quick grab of some random snack to keep you over til your next meal. You can get that meal right there. And they'll heat it up for you! Yay! While I've known this wonderful fact for a while, this is the first time I've seen this on the shelves.



It's a bowl of beef stew. I was actually kind of surprised to find this at the conbini. It just never seemed like something so liquidy would be sold. I've always just seen rice and noodles with sides of katsu or something, but never actual stew. It looks pretty good too...

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Store: Lawson

Cheesy ramen flavors

I walked by the ramen (real Japanese? ラーメン - raamen) section and saw these two very unsettling flavors.


First I saw this Cheese & Garlic thing.


And then I looked to my right and saw this Cheese & Tomato thing.

These just sound very unappetizing to me. Really. Gross. There's curry ramen, and I'm totally ok with that (though I still need to try it). But cheese? With garlic? And tomato?! No thank you.

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Store: Lawson

Setsubun sushi

Today is Setsubun (節分), the official day before spring (doesn't mean it's getting any warmer though, unfortunately). Traditionally, you throw roasted soybeans (炒り豆 - irimame) out the door (or the more entertaining way, throw them at a member of the family wearing a demon mask) while chanting "鬼は外。福は内。" ("Oni wa soto. Fuku wa uchi.") It's telling the demons, or all the bad things, to go out and the luck, or all the good things, to come in. You can also eat the roasted soybeans for luck. We got some in class today, and it actually wasn't too bad.

There's also apparently a special kind of sushi (寿司) for this day here in Osaka. It's kept in a roll form instead of being cut up like normal. You're supposed to eat the whole thing while facing a certain direction (east I think?) without saying anything.

The Lawson I usually go grab lunch from was selling them. I asked to take a picture, because one of the guys was wearing a demon head thing, and got talked into buying a sushi roll as well.


Guys outside selling sushi to people in the rain. I accidentally cut off the horns of the demon head thing. ::sad::


The sushi I ended up getting. It has fried egg, bamboo shoots, mushrooms, cucumber, fish, and other stuff I don't know what in it.

It also came with this Rirakkuma (リラックマ, the Relax Bear) compass toy. They gave me four. Because when they asked why I wanted to take a picture I said it's because I'm American and wanted to show my friends, so they gave me more to give to my friends. So uh...if anybody wants one, I can save it for you.



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Store: Lawson

Beef tongue chips

I love beef tongue. It's really yummy. My mom would cook up a bunch for dinner. And it's also really good at Korean BBQ. But as chips flavor? I'm really not too sure. Maybe I should try it anyway. What do you think?


牛タン塩 - ushi tan shio

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Store: Lawson

Ninja chips

Because when you're a ninja you eat a special kind of chip. Obviously.



Bag on the left with the red ninja is sea urchin (雲丹 - uni) flavor. The things people here use to flavor snacks just baffles me.

Mr. Blue Ninja on the right is normal salt (塩 - shio) flavored. But this is Japan. And he's a ninja. It's gotta be extra special salt. Yup.

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Store: Lawson

Various Japanese apricot/plum-flavored chips

These are chips that are flavored with Japanese apricot/plum (梅 - ume). I personally really don't like them, but it goes with a lot of traditional Japanese meals. Each of these have their own variation on the taste.


Faint plum flavor (ほんのり梅味 - honnori ume aji).


Plum kelp flavor (梅こんぶ味 - ume konbu aji).


Plum tuna/bonito flavor (梅かつお味 - ume katsuo aji), on what seems to originally be an edamame-flavored snack.

I think that's right. The last two just makes me really confused about the combination of flavors...

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Store: Lawson

Christmas in February?

Yes, for some reason there is still left-over Christmas chocolate. I'd feel a little scared to buy this, but maybe that's just me.



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Store: Lawson

More strawberry stuff

On the left, we have Kinokono Yama with honey-flavored (はちみつ風味 - hachimitsu fuumi) strawberry milk (いちごミルク - ichigo miruku) flavor. What? Right. I don't know either. On right, it's Takenokono Hoshi with regular strawberry milk and flavored cookie (味わいクッキー - ajiwai kukkii)? I think it's that dark part at the bottom?

For something seemingly so simple, I sure am confused.

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Store: Lawson

Sakura chips

Behold, O'Zack chips with cherry blossom flavor!

It says it uses sakura leaves. Not quite sure how that'd taste...


Cherry blossom salt flavor (桜塩味 - sakura shio aji)

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Store: Lawson