Month #10 - South Korea Snacks

 Well this month is the snacks of South Korea and I've kind of already done this one. In the last Korean snack review post I declared that I'd be "done with this forever." Sproing! Well at least, most of these are new and so there is not much overlap, hopefully it won't be too boring.

Starting with some facts about South Korea..

Everyone in South Korea shares the same birthday. Everyone celebrates their "birthday" on New Year's Day, incrementing their age by one. Not only that, ages also start at 1 - when someone is born, they are already 1 year old and after 1 year of life, on New Year's Day, become 2! And so forth, and so on.

Imsil-gun is home to a cheese-themed amusement park.

South Korea boasts the highest average internet speeds in the world. Their internet speed is 4 times the world average and double the average of the U.S.

In South Korea, dreaming of pigs is considered good luck.

Green Onion Chex is a real cereal flavor in South Korea - though I will not be reviewing them. Come on...

1. Shrimp Chips

Review:

When I hear the phrase "shrimp chips" by taste buds don't exactly tingle with anticipation. I like shrimp as much as, or more than, the next guy but anything that's only the real thing. Anything that's "shrimp flavored" is suspect.

First off, these are not the usual "chips". They're airy and inflated, like Munchos - no hint of potato. Then there is the shrimp flavor. I'll give it credit, it isn't the disgusting "pet store" flavor I was expecting. Rather than tasting vaguely like a pet store, they taste vaguely like a Red Lobster. I give these a "pass" but it surely could've been worse.

2. Spicy Chicken Flavor Corn Puffs

Review:

When foods that are "Cool Ranch" flavor are exported to other countries, they are often labelled as "Cool American" flavor - the term "Ranch" doesn't have an equivalent in other languages. Given the red-orange packaging of this item I wondered if "Spicy Chicken" would have anything to do with Buffalo chicken. It doesn't.

But here's the good news. There is a flavor that you'll see around sometimes and they sell it at Whole Foods called "Honey Sriracha." The "spicy chicken" tastes like that. Or I might be thinking of "Mikes Hot Honey" or maybe it tastes like both. 

As for the "corn puff" part, unlike the "chips," these are excellent. The corn puffs just taste like popcorn, perhaps they are popcorn.

So the end result is popcorn covered with Mike's Hot Honey and that's a great snack, as far as I'm concerned. You got your hot, but then you got your sweet. Highly recommend, if that kind of thing is up your alley. 

3. Couque D'Asse - White

Review:

Don't read that out loud!

This is the first repeat review. You can read my original review here. 

A few updates. The packaging, this time, has the additional texts "Mascarpone & Cream" and "Italian style Cream Cheese & Ultra rich Cream." The surprises never end. It's a Korean snack with a seemingly French name of an Italian food.

One other thing: it still tastes the same, it's still good, but this time I may have gotten an old batch or maybe something happened because there's a slight aftertaste that I would label "spray paint fumes." Eating these, I was instantly transported back in time to 6th Grade Industrial Arts class. Ah, the memories.

4. Sweet & Sour Chewy  - Grape

Review:

If you imagined that Sweet & Sour Chewy candy would taste like chewy, waxy grape blocks, you'd be absolutely correct. They remind me of an American candy (or perhaps several American candies) but I don't recall which ones. Maybe Now & Laters.

The grape taste is pretty extreme and the upper-right of the packaging says that they contain Vitamin C. Healthy. They taste very good, even if there's nothing exceptional about them. They make me continue to wish Bonkers were still around. Remember Bonkers? Various articles say they're "coming back" in 2018, there's a website that says "coming soon." I can't get my hopes up, the hurt is too deep.

5. Choco Pie - Black Sugar Milk Tea

Review:

And this is the second snack that was already reviewed. I noted that it tasted like a Moon Pie or a Tastykake. Nothing has changed. Still good, but nothing exotic.

6. Peach Gummies

Review:

These remind me of the Japanese Kasugai gummies; perhaps we might generalize about the Asian gummy genre in general... They offer a more natural, more realistic fruit flavor but with a less gummy, less chewy consistency. Consistent with that standard, these have a great peachy peach flavor but the gumminess is not as gummy as the American gummy consistency I prefer.

Would you stop saying "gummy" so much? 

The packaging suggests that the gummies have a jelly filling. I bit a few in half and was not able to confirm any inner pocket.

If you want to try a peach gummy candy, this is a good one.

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So that's it for for this installment but before I conclude, I think this would be a good place to advertise the best South Korean snack I've discovered so far (and it wasn't covered in this post, nor the 6 other South Korean Snack posts).

The best South Korean snack I know of, so far, is Haitai Honey Butter Chips.

These are the classic American potato chip with a slight sweet honey taste. You've got your salty, you've got your savory, you've got got your buttery, you've got your sweet. It's everything. And I'm not even a potato chip guy, normally.

Be aware: when you buy potato chips that have been shipped from South Korea, you're going to pay a markup for a fairly cheap product. But I'm enamored enough with these that I've done it 3 or 4 times. And they are available on Amazon so it really is just a matter of the money and shipping.

So that's South Korea.