Korean Snack Reviews #3

 Well it's been about 3 months but now there's another one of these. How are you doing? How's the family?

1.

Translated Name: King Sura

Review:

I didn't take a picture of the snack because what you see on the package is pretty accurate. The only thing I would say is that they look orange on the package but they're more brown in person. These are like thick Frosted Flakes with a thin crispy crust - not just what they look like but what they taste like - but then at the end there's a subtle flavor of something like sesame seed. I immediately was wondering how popular these are. I can see myself being at work and being in the mood for cereal so I'd get these out of the vending machine.

2.

Translated Name: White Heim - White Hazelnut

Review:

So with a name like "White Heim" you'd guess that it's probably the product of another country but perhaps popular in Korea but AskJeeves tells me it really is from Korea. Perhaps they give it a European-sounding name for flair. They look like this:

When you were a kid, did your grandparents give you Sugar Wafers? These are like a fancier version of that. This was excellent, although it's not so exotic, it's one of the best things in the whole collection. If I'm being really critical, there is a strange aftertaste that isn't pleasant. Perhaps strange, more complex flavors come with attempting fanciness. I don't know. Really good.

3.

Translated Name: Sweet Red Bean Jelly

Review:

Well with the name "Sweet Red Bean Jelly" I think the review writes itself. In some sense it tastes like nothing but yet it somehow tastes really gross. How is that possible? Buy some for yourself. 

I actually took a photo of the actual food but this post has been in development for 4 months. So I recently looked at the photos on my phone, saw the photo of this, didn't remember what it meant and said "What the heck was that?" - Delete. Just imagine a rectangle of dark jelly substance.

4.

Translated Name: Banana Kick - Banana Puff

Review:

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to combine the form of cheese puffs with the taste of banana? No? Well here it is:

What you think of these hinges on how you feel about that artificial "banana" flavor. I love banana flavor so I'm onboard.  Did you ever wonder why artificial banana flavor doesn't actually taste like banana? It's because the "banana" flavor was originally based on a type of banana that no longer exists. The banana that is most common today has a flavor that's more chemically complex and harder to replicate so candy producers keep using the old one.

Puff snacks with the taste of banana - that's pretty much it. Every once in a while you may hit a vein of salt but not much.

Generally going through all the snacks, there's an apparent tradeoff between exotic and good - the things I'm tending to like are things that have American analogs - but this is one of the few things in the entire collection that is both really weird and pretty good.

5.

Translated Name: Syrup Coated Rice Senbei

Review:

So, first off, "senbai" is a Japanese word meaning rice crackers. So this is a Korean product with an English transliteration of a Japanese word. And not only that, it also has Chinese writing on it. It's tri-lingual.

Just picking it up, you know something's different. There's a certain heft that comes with a cookie whereas this is very, very light. Aaaand, true to form it tastes like the other rice cracker I ate (See: Korean Snack 2.2). Rice crackers be not my thing, yo.

So that's everything. Was it worth the wait? Perhaps we'll have another installment in another 4 months. We can have up to 3 of these per year and this can go on indefinitely.