Orangina Blood Orange Soda: A "born in France, bottled in Japan" flavor of Orangina featuring blood orange, one of my favorite citrus variants. The color is a tad more red than grapefruit juice; it's pulp-less, unlike normal Orangina. Doesn't have the same tart flavor you'd get from fresh blood orange fruit but does have a distinct berry-like flavor that distinguishes it from regular orange juice. On the sweet side but still refreshing. 3.5/5.0
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Orangina Muscat Sparkling Soda: A special edition grape flavored Orangina introduced for the Japanese market, this soda still contains citrus (orange, grapefruit, and lemon) with the addition of "Muscat of Alexandria," a type of white wine grape. Like normal Orangina, it only has a small percentage of actual juice (12%) but tastes less artificial than Sunkist or other orange soda alternatives. The main flavor is still orange soda (as opposed to tasting like grape soda), but it does have a different enough aftertaste that... (read more) 3.5/5.0
drinks japanese soda orangina muscat sparkling 3.5
Yifang Matcha Brown Sugar Bubble Tea: I was delighted to come across the Taiwanese bubble tea shop Yifang in Shin Okubo, the Koreatown of Shinuku in Tokyo. I wish I were able to read the menu of fruit tea options, but I had to go by the pictures and decided to try their matcha latte with brown sugar, a drink that has a fixed amount of sugar (unlike some other menu items, where you can adjust how sweet you'd like it to be). I did find the drink to be sweet for my taste, but the combination of bitter matcha with sweet brown suga... (read more) 4.0/5.0
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Fanta Premier Peach Soda: Fanta has all sorts of flavors in Japan that you can't get in the US, including melon, pineapple, and now peach. It's made with 13% actual juice (Minute Maid branded) to give you a sense of a potential gap between packaging / marketing and actual contents. The soda has a champagne gold color and tastes very much like peach-flavored candies. In particular, I used to love eating Kasugai Japanese fruit gummies that came individually wrapped and were shaped like half domes; this drink is like... (read more) 3.0/5.0
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Tou Lan Tea Strawberry Latte with Boba: I had some bad experiences with several bubble tea shops when I first came to Japan (ones I didn't bother to review), but there was a highly rated spot not too far from the university that I decided to check out. They feature a handful of classic herbal teas along with a wider menu of fruit teas, smoothies, as well as a whole section of banana lattes (I'm not sure why!). The strawberry latte was excellent, like a milder and less sweet version of strawberry ice cream (I had it at their "les... (read more) 4.0/5.0
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Otsuka Match Jelly: Match Jelly is a popular citrus soda that's the color of electric yellow Gatorade and is similarly fortified with "nutrition" like Vitamin B6, Niacin, and Vitamin C. I haven't actually had Match soda before, but it's a standard vending machine staple. While vending machines have full-sized bottles, they also usually have a small selection of half-size containers, which I like to buy when I'm thirsty but not wanting more than a single serving. I purchased this "jelly" version of Match f... (read more) 4.0/5.0
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