Morinaga Marie Lemon Tea Cookies: Lemon tea is a common drink you can find in grocery stores in Japan, basically like iced tea in the US but generally less sweet. Marie is normally a very plain circular biscuit from Japanese food giant Morinaga (hockey puck shaped and the type you'd see labeled as "digestives") but this box contained lemon-tea flavored sandwich cookies that had a surprisingly solid herbal black tea flavor with a bit of sweet lemon acidity. The biscuits themselves are crumbly and much more like cookies than... (read more) 3.5/5.0
recommended japanese coop morinaga marie lemon tea 3.5 cookies
Calbee Fried Chicken Potato Chips: Thickly cut, ridged potato chips whose seasoning is reminiscent of fried batter and chicken bouillon with a deeply savory flavor. It tastes like when you lick your fingers after eating fried chicken, which is it say you get the sort of greasy flavor of fried foods with a hint of meat, rather than full on chicken flavor. 3.0/5.0
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Ginza Akebono Strawberry Daifuku: For the most part, I've been able to try all the major traditional Japanese confectionary treats in my time in Japan, so I generally haven't been going out of my way to visit particular shops. However, if I see that a shop has a line, I'll take a look, especially as there are essentially no tourists in Tokyo now and so any place with a line is a local favorite. I hadn't known about this small shop in Ginza that opened right after WWII (about 60 years old), but their ichigo (strawberry) dai... (read more) 4.0/5.0
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Sogetsu Kuromatsu Doriyaki: This doriyaki was an unexpected special gift from someone I met who knew about my snack blog. Because it was given to me, I didn't get to visit the shop directly, but the red bean pancake comes from Sogetsu, an almost 100-year-old brand whose shop in Kita-Ku attracts very long lines. The doriyaki has a marbled color, which is where its name Kuromatsu (black pine) comes from, as it resembles the bark of a tree. This coloring comes from a combination of brown sugar and honey used in the bat... (read more) 4.5/5.0
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Doritos Taco Tortilla Chips: While I'm aware that Doritos were originally taco flavored, I think most people with the US would associate Doritos with their signature nacho cheese flavor. This Taco flavor that I found in Tokyo is more of a taco seasoning, which taste not so much of cheese but more of a sort of meaty chili powder and cumin spice mix. Very savory and reminiscent of those Ortega seasoning packets, which aren't very good but somehow scream "taco night." 2.5/5.0
queensisetan junkfood doritos taco tortilla chips 2.5
Capi Blood Orange Soda: When visiting National Azabu, a grocery store known for its international selection, I purchased two bottles of this Australian brand of soda: their spicy ginger ale and the blood orange flavors. The spicy ginger ale wasn't particularly good, so I didn't have the highest expectations for the blood orange kind. The soda itself is a little cloudy, a sign of it being made with real fruit, and the taste is definitely distinct from regular orange soda or grapefruit soda – a little more tart but... (read more) 3.0/5.0
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