You can't tell from the picture, but this KitKat is in one of the most beautiful boxes you're going to find on a run-of-the-mill candy bar. It has a star pattern embossed across it which you can only see when the box reflects the light in just the right way. It's very sparkly and quite attractive to people who are easily impressed by shiny things.
Across the bottom of the box, it states that there is 2.8% cranberry, 1.1% blueberry, and 1.9% strawberry. On the back, it mentions that this content is included in powder form, so don't expect little bits of real fruit to enliven the taste of this bar.
Even though there is supposed to be more cranberry than strawberry, the bars smell pretty much like strawberry. It's a muted smell which seems a bit like strawberry frosting. The berry flavor is infused into the bar both in the pink filling between the wafers and the marbled white chocolate exterior.
I'm always suspicious of white chocolate-based KitKats, but this was surprisingly good. While it's a little sweeter than a regular KitKat, the berry flavors are multilayered and enjoyable. The first note is muted cranberry, followed by strawberry and finishing with the blueberry. The only thing that is missing is the sharper or sometimes sour notes of the respective berries, but I'm not sure that would have worked well in a KitKat anyway.
As with most Japanese KitKats, the box contains two packages with two fingers and I ate two fingers for my sampling. While I really liked the bars and felt the flavor was very well-balanced, I still had that throat burning sensation that one sometimes gets from having eaten candy that's too sweet. These KitKats aren't any more sugary than average (115 calories per two fingers is in line with the usual for KitKats), but the sweetness seems to build in your mouth as you eat more. Also, there's a definite cloying berry aftertaste that lingers after you eat half of the box.
This is a nice bar, and I did enjoy it, but I think it'd be better with some coffee or tea to cleanse the palate a bit between fingers. If you see it, you'll want to buy it for no other reason than it looks pretty, and it's so very Japanese looking.
This is also reviewed at Tasty Japan.
I am drooling reading your review!
ReplyDeleteToo bad I couldn't find this kind of kit kat at States. :(((((
I saw these the other day. The box really is beautiful in that sparkly over the top Japanese way Japanese women so love. Didn't prompt me to buy any, but they do catch the eye.
ReplyDeleteYun: I wonder why there isn't an outlet that does nothing but offer these as imports. Given the notoriety and variety of such KitKats, I'd think there would be an internet mail order market that might be exploited. That being said, they'd probably be pretty expensive once shipping was factored into the equation.
ReplyDeleteSherry: These first showed up around July (or at least that's when I first saw them), so I wondered if the star motif was related to tanabata festivals. It is one of the tastier KitKat variants, but it depends on your feeling about berries and relatively sweet candy.
Thanks to both of you for your comments!
Hum, could be Tanabata related. I was gone during the summer so I musted have missed them back then. I use a co-op so rarely go to the store. I thought it was perhaps a sparkly Christmas related thing since all the Christmas stuff is up already.
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