Japanese "Candy" of the Night: Animal Biscuits!

[thistlechaser]

I have four different candies/cookies/claimed-food-items left to try before I have to go shopping for more. One looks okay, one looks "oh my god, why did I buy that?", and the other two are in the middle. As mentioned in my last post, I'm hungry. I let that influence my decision on which one to try. We're going for the okay-seeming one!

"Ginbis Animal Biscuits" look so cute. They're actually the only one of these candies that I bought because I wanted to and might have bought even if I wasn't trying all of these new things. (Well, okay, I might have bought that "Jelly Drink" one because I saw them drinking it in Digimon, but ... *twitch*twitch* ...if we continue to talk about Jelly Drink, I'll never be able to finish this one.)

So anyway, these Animal Biscuits (which I'm strongly hoping will be mostly just animal crackers), come in a way too cute box. A pink kitty cat and a ram sharing milk (next to a happy cow drinking something yellow), a lion and a hippo offering plates of cookies... And look at that cute alligator!

Turning the box over, we come my next reason for wanting to buy these. Check out all those shapes these come in! Panda, bat, goat, hawk, sparrow, rat, porcupine, pelican, peafowl, macaw... Why don't American animal crackers come in so many shapes? This is just too cool!

Opening the box, I see they come in a foil wrapper (much like most every other foreign cookie/cracker). Printed on it are the animal names in English and in (I assume) Japanese. Another bonus!

Ripping open the foil... There's a little bit of an odd smell, but not too too bad. Wheaty. No sweet smell at all, it smells just like strong wheat. The cookies are handily marked with what they are. (Oh look! There's one of Hyper! I would have taken a picture of the cock shaped one (heh heh heh) for Chia, but I didn't get one in my bag.)

On the side of the box is even a recipe! While it's not in English, it looks simple enough to follow: Alternate layers of cookies and what must be (I hope) chocolate pudding.

So I guess it's time to try it... As has becoming my norm, I'm checking the box for a list of ingredients before I try one. (I worry that some Japanese company somewhere is slipping squid or tofu or some poisonous puffer fish into their candies to try to trick us unsuspecting Americans...) In the order listed:

Wheat flour (which would explain the smell), sugar (good choice there), red bean powder (?? Uh?), oil, condensed milk, leavening, calcium (odd), salt, flavorings

Well, nothing in that list should kill me. So let's try one! How about tortoise?

How very odd. My first thought (and second and third) was that they have no taste at all. Nothing bad, nothing good, just a crunchy no-taste thing. Trying another one, I get the faintest taste of sweet. If I hold it in my mouth a while after chewing, I get a really distant wheat taste. The surface of the cookies are unpleasantly oily to the touch, and I need to wipe my fingers off before typing. And, after eating two, my tongue feels like it has a coating of oil. That's pretty gross.

So, if not for that oil issue, they... ew. Just ate a third one, and it must have had a big lump of salt in it. Blech. With the oil issue, their score needs to be reduced some. However, the packaging gives them a bunch of points, so picking some number at semi-random, let's go with 7/10. If I come across them again, I'd buy more, but only to have the boxes to display.

Comments

[laurelwood.livejournal.com]

I'm really going to be sorry when your box of exotic delights is empty. You do these reviews so well!

I love the picture of the crocodile on the front of the box. (Actually, all the animals are pretty cute.) Did you get a "peafowl" in your package?

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Once I run out, I'll just have to make a trip to get more! (Unless the one thing I'm fearing to try is as bad as it seems, in which case I might just not have time to go buy more. ;) )

Nope, no peafowl. The only bird I had was the "horn owl".

going to Japan next week...

[elo-sf.livejournal.com]

...any recommendations?

Any suggestions of what to bring as gifts, I was thinking of See's candy?

Re: going to Japan next week...

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

From what people tell me, folks around the world like See's chocolates. (Which, I suppose, should be good reason for me to try them some day...)

...any recommendations?

Avoid the Jelly Drink! ;) Seriously, I'd skip over anything chocolate. It all tasted odd to me.

Re: going to Japan next week...

[elo-sf.livejournal.com]

Thanks, See's it is.

[hamburger.livejournal.com]

red bean powder (?? Uh?)

In Japan, until fairly recently, dessert isn't quite as big a deal as it is in some other countries. One of the favorite ingredients for many Japanese desserts is a red bean paste. Not as sweet as what we're used to for our desserts over here. To quote directly from this website:
Japanese sweets are called wa-gashi in Japanese, and western-style sweets are called yo-gashi. Common ingredients for wa-gashi are rice flour, azuki (red beans), and sugar. Butter and milk are rarely used in wa-gashi cooking, so wa-gashi tends to be lower in calorie than yo-gashi. Anko (sweet red beans) is a typical ingredient in wa-gashi.

Aren't you glad you have me around to provide this useless knowledge? :)

[evilgrayson.livejournal.com]

American palettes tend towards the sweet anyway, even from a British point of view. Things that you lot eat regularly would put me in a sugar coma.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

I heard something like that, yeah. But better tending towards sweet than tending towards steak and innard pies! ;)

[sillysophia.livejournal.com]

Sort of. I lived in Japan a few years and grew to like some of this stuff. But tell me, what's wrong with eating a bag of pixie sticks, huh? Huh?

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

Still, the idea of /beans/ being in a cookie... *shudder*

[quasilemur.livejournal.com]

I do so love your reviews, but when every single candy, regardless of edibility or toxicity, receives a 7/10, I think it's time to hang up the rating system.

[thistle-chaser.livejournal.com]

*laughs* Do they all get a 7/10? Really? I mostly just make numbers up... I guess I'll need to widen the range more. That or keep it always 7/10, as that might be funny.