The Japanese are famous for taking something successful and improving upon it. It's nice to know that they are also capable of taking something successful and making it lame. This gum, made by confectioner Bourbon, is based on the "Cube" series by Lotte, which I reviewed favorably before. I think that the name might be a fusion of "cube" and "drop", but I have no idea what it really means. A lot of the English names of products mean nothing and foreigners who try to make sense of them are looking for meaning where none actually exists.
I picked up this sugar-free gum because it is a big container of gum that looks like "Cube" brand for a lower price. It was on sale for 399 yen ($4.74) at Okashi no Machioka discount sweets shop. That may sound expensive for 85 grams (3 oz.) of sugar-free gum, but it is cheaper than similar containers.
Strawberry: Weak, slightly tangy and too sweet. It seems to get sweeter as you chew it more until all of the flavor leeches out.
Grapefruit: This has a nice grapefruit flavor, but like the strawberry is too sweet and the flavor diminishes pretty quickly.
Grape: This is the sweetest, and has a lot of the same flavor of the type of purple lollipop you used to fight with your sister or brother over when
Green Apple: Unsurprisingly, this has the same fake green apple flavoring that you get in most candies. It's fine, and even has a bit of the real feel of an actual apple once the initial burst of stronger flavor wears down a bit.
Comparing this to the product it clearly is ripping off made sure this ended up looking worse than it might. The outside of the "Cube" brand gum is kind of crispy and feels a little candy-coated. This is just gum in a cubic shape. That doesn't make it bad. It's just not "good", particularly since the flavor isn't' especially intense and tends to fade fast.
As gum goes, this is just "okay" but I wouldn't buy it again unless it was super, super cheap (300 yen or less). I'd rather just buy real "Cube" gum with all of its textural qualities and stronger flavors. Since the cubes are small, the best way to have this is to chew on 2 or 3 different flavors at once. You get a second-rate Juicy Fruit gum experience that way, and that's about as good as it's going to get.
I am disappointing this gum doesn't have any bourbon in it. If you're going to name your company after alcohol, every product from it should have alcohol.
ReplyDeleteBut that's just me. Although, I'm sure sukebe Japanese businessmen would also enjoy alcohol gum.