Random Picture #141

Snacks are pretty common prizes in crane games in Japan. Most of the time though, they are full of sweets and salty treats in order to cater to the tastes of youthful gamers and bored salary men who prefer to get their otsumami (snacks to be eaten with drinks, usually alcoholic ones) after their skillful ministrations rather than simply by going to a convenience store.

For a game, I can understand putting in what could be considered "fun" food prizes. By "fun", I mean junk food. This machine has boxes of Calorie Mate. For those who don't know what this is, well, you can read my reviews or take my word for it that they are food-like substances that resemble a cruddy shortbread cookie. They're made essentially as meal substitutes for those who want nutrition without the bother of actually eating nutritious food. So, my though was, what sort of person both finds Calorie Mate and playing games appealing? I always saw Calorie Mate as something that people who were a shade more interested in working or studying than in relaxing would pursue, especially since, while not a bad bit of psuedo-food, it's not exactly something you turn to for pure enjoyment.

As a little reminder to readers who may have missed it, or to those who haven't gotten around to entering, I'm offering a box of the current Tokyo regional KitKats (rum raisin) as a contest prize. You can read about it and enter here. The contest ends on Christmas day 2012, so enter early, but only once, please. Also, please remember that comments are moderated so there is a delay between your making the comment and it being posted. Many people are submitting comments two or three times because they are not showing up immediately. Rest assured that your comment will be posted and it is not necessary to submit multiple times. 

Otsuka Calorie Mate Chocolate

 

Looking at the Calorie Mate packaing, I imagine they have one of the smallest design department staffs in the entire country. Every box of Calorie Mate is the same generic design with only a small variation in color and product naming. It must take all of a minute to roll out a new box when a new flavor is dreamed up by the alchemists who press together these little fortified biscuits.

Since I liked the maple flavor of Calorie Mate that I sampled, I decided to give the chocolate a try as well. Okay, I'll be perfectly honest about this review. It's a leftover from my "week of diet food" lot from long ago. In fact, there were several leftovers that didn't make the cut with only five slots to fill. I guess you can consider the chocolate Calorie Mate the "Miss Congeneality" of the lot from the diet and health foods week. 

In fact, I think that "congenial" is actually a pretty good word for this bar. It's pleasant enough, but rather bland. The chocolate flavor comes across as flat because there isn't enough sugar or fat in the bar to prop it up. Like all Calorie Mate bars, this is a bit on the dry side and is like low quality shortbread. Each cookie is 7 cm x 4.25 cm x 2 cm (2.8 in. x 1.7 in. x .8 in.) and there are 4 of them in the box I bought at Tomod's drug store for 150 yen ($1.62). As with all varieties of Calorie Mate, each cookie is 100 calories and you're meant to consume two cookies at once as a meal replacement.

This wasn't bad. It just wasn't especially good. There was so little chocolate as part of this chocolate cookie bar that I felt there was some lack of truth in advertising. If you're looking for inoffensive bar-type food which has been fortified, you could do worse than this, but I'd personally choose the maple flavor over the chocolate.

Otsuka Calorie Mate Maple

Click on this picture to see a bigger one that will allow you to read all of the ingredients clearly.

Calorie Mate is one of those things which nearly everyone who has been in Japan is aware of, and thanks to a video game appearance even those who are not in Japan may have heard of it. I'm not so sure that everyone who has seen it has tried it. I know that I had no inclination to sample it until I started this blog.

I've never been 100% sure of what the point of Calorie Mate is supposed to be, but I've always guessed that it is meant to balance people's bad eating habits by offering them a couple little fortified blocks. One of the reasons I never saw the appeal was that they aren't low calorie as a snack at 100 calories per cookie, and I eat fairly decently anyway and don't feel the need to eat this type of thing to balance my life nutritionally.

The Calorie Mate web site emphasizes nutritional balance and even provides a chart of the number of calories, amount of protein, fat, vitamins, etc. that an adult needs to maintain weight and health. For the record, the calorie count that Japanese men require according to the site is 2,650 and women need 2,050. I believe that the bars are supposed to be considered possible meal replacements if you are trying to cut calories in addition to being used as supplements if you feel you need more nutrients.

Calorie Mate is often sold in convenience stores and drug stores in Japan for around 150 yen ($1.67). I got mine from a huge display of health food cookies and bars at Tomod's drug store. Most of the other items were variations on granola bars and whole grain cookies.


There are quite a few flavors of Calorie Mate available including fruit, cheese, chocolate, and this maple version. I chose maple because I wanted to buy a variety that my husband would be willing to try. Each cookie is 7 cm x 4.25 cm x 2 cm (2.8 in. x 1.7 in. x .8 in.) and there are 4 of them in the box. They smell strongly of maple and, well, general cookie smell. The cookies are very dry and crumbly and have a decent, though rather artificial, maple flavor. They're like a poor quality shortbread cookie. Occasionally, there are fragments of what appear to be nuts in the cookie which isn't surprising since almonds are one of the ingredients.

For what they are, these are pretty good. I wouldn't be doing cartwheels over them or selecting to have one rather than a real cookie or an authentic treat. That being said, if you want to have something cookie-like which is healthier or at least less unhealthy, these are enjoyable both in texture and in taste.

Note that there are a lot of Calorie Mate commercials on YouTube featuring Kiefer Sutherland. Since "24" is so popular in Japan, they love to show him in his headset being frantic about something or other and then having some Calorie Mate product. Here's one commercial: