Kanro Pure Lemon Cola

Pure is one of my favorite Japanese candy brands. If you like sour gummies, Pure is definitely worth a look. It's very cheap in Japan (around 100 to 120 yen, if my memory is correct), and pretty cheap in import stores in the USA, too. I bought this flavor at Mitsuwa Marketplace for just under $2.

Since I'm not a big soda drinker, I'm not sure if I've ever had actual lemon cola. I will have to give it a taste on my next Sonic run (preferable to committing to a 2-liter bottle or a 12-pack of cans).


These gummies did not smell good. The lemon scent seemed artificial and bordering on floor cleaner. Thankfully, they tasted much better than they smelled. Both the lemon and cola flavors were distinct and well-executed.

Both flavors were tart and tasty, and the gummies had that firm but chewy texture that I've come to love. The lemon cola flavor was different and fun, and these would be sure to please sour gummy fans.

A-

Pure website

Poca Nori Seaweed Chips

Here's yet another product kindly provided by my globe-trotting boss. This time, she and her husband went to Vietnam for a vacation filled with hiking and kayaking, but they also spent some time in larger cities. One of the snacks she brought back to share with the office was seaweed flavored potato chips.

Seaweed isn't a strange flavor to anyone familiar with Japanese snacks, and the dominant flavor in seaweed snacks is typically salt. These particular chips were made by Lay's, which is called Poca in Vietnam. Several of my coworkers tried the nori chips, and most enjoyed them.


The chips got a bit damaged in transit, but not crushed too badly. They smelled salty and a bit sweet. The chips had the texture of Pringles (Lay's calls their version Stax). As expected, the seaweed chips mostly tasted salty, with just a hint of sweetness and a very faintly "fishy" aftertaste.

Overall, the flavor was very mild. The aftertaste was noticeable, but not unpleasant. I like seaweed, but even people who don't like it enjoyed these chips. They were pretty addictive!

B+

Pepsico website (Vietnamese)

Stride Whitemint

Press Sample

The Olympics Games are a big deal in my house. Professional sports just don't interest me, and my lack of knowledge of team sports is almost embarrassing. The Olympics are different. I will watch any (or every, if possible) Olympic event, and the way I track medal standings is borderline obsessive. I know the Winter Olympics have a lackluster reputation in comparison to the Summer Olympics, but I like the Winter Games better.

So, when Shaun White puts his name and face on a product, it totally works for me. The man is a snowboarding god. These samples were kindly sent to me for review by a PR representative, but just so you know, I would have bought this gum anyway. May I also add that the PR sample packaging was the cutest I've ever seen?


The bold colors on the outer package were very eye catching and tied into the promotion nicely. The gum wrappers themselves were pretty, too! I loved the metallic white and blue motif. The gum itself was a cool and sweet mint. There were no hints of wintergreen or spearmint, just a nice, easy peppermint. I liked the sweetness, but some of my coworkers found it to be too sweet.

The texture was great: soft but not mooshy, and it didn't seem to harden as I chewed. The cooling effect was pretty strong, and I found it to be a good after-meal breath freshener. Stride delivered on the long-lasting flavor, too. I was sick of chewing gum before the mint had completely worn off (probably about 10 to 15 minutes - gotta start timing these chews better). Whitemint is a safe flavor, but with the fun celebrity tie-in, it certainly left a good impression on me.

B

Stride website

Gandour Unica

My sister gave me a nice selection of candy bars from a Lebanese grocer recently, and it's about time I got to reviewing them. The first one I tried was the Unica bar, a chocolate wafer bar.

It's worth mentioning that I have never been a fan of wafer bars. I didn't even like KitKats until college, and those plain delicate wafer cookies? Still not for me. So I am somewhat biased.


The Unica bar was very pretty, with a nice-looking, rippled milk chocolatey coating. It smelled pleasant, like a mild cocoa. The chocolate was extremely mild, in fact. It got a bit lost in the wafers, which were also subtly flavored.

The cream between the wafers was slightly salty with a hint of vanilla. They had a light, delicate crunch, which was really the main experience of the bar. It felt very unsubstantial, but as I mentioned, wafer bars are not my thing.

The wrapper said Wafers coated with milky chocolate sensation and the website says Wafers Coated with Chocolate Flavour, so draw your own conclusions about that. There's nothing really wrong with this bar, but it's just too bland for me.

C+

Gandour Website

Dolfin Chocolat Au Lait au The Vert Sencha du Japon

For my brother-in-law's birthday, my sister ordered chocolate from Chocosphere, but since they offer flat rate shipping under for orders under $50, she asked me to order some things to get the total order closer to that level. Honestly, it was hard to limit myself! Don't be fooled by the 1997-esque web design - there is some quality chocolate to be ordered.

I had to try more Dolfin chocolate, so among other things, I ordered their Sencha (green tea) bar for myself and the Lavender bar for a friend of mine. That friend was kind enough to give me a bite of the Lavender bar - I never liked lavender before, but consider me converted! It was that good.


Though I prefer matcha, sencha is pretty good, too. It's made from dried tea leaves and it's the most common kind of green tea in Japan (and probably the kind most Americans drink, too). In this bar, the sencha aroma was delightfully grassy and bitter. The tea leaves broke up the smooth chocolate with a slightly gritty crunch.

The green tea melded perfectly with the milk chocolate, which was some of the best milk chocolate I've had the pleasure of tasting (my husband loved it, too). It was smooth, not overly sticky, and neither too milky nor too sweet. This is absolutely the best green tea bar I've ever had. Although it was sencha, I found that it had more of a matcha essence than plain green tea. The green tea and chocolate weren't competing for flavor dominance; they were just in perfect harmony and balance.

A+

Dolfin website