Wagaya Yamitsuki Corn Snack (Hot and Spicy)

"Yamitsuki" means "addictive". That means that this $1 (82 yen) bag of corn snacks has a lot to live up to. I'm not expecting it to take its place next to cocaine or even alcohol, but it should at least edge up to the position held in the aching stomachs of former Twinkie junkies and Lay's potato chip consumers who eat themselves into carb comas. 

Frankly, I was mainly drawn to this because of the promise of "hot and spicy" contents. I found it for a reduced price (but not in the bargain shelves) at the Daiso. I don't know if it being a little cheaper than the standard $1.50 per item price at the Daiso meant anything other than the fact that not every food item has to be the same price, but I could have seen it as an ill omen. The reason I didn't is that food isn't normally something I see in any way as ominous... unless it's something with an expiration date that has passed and may have living creatures reproducing in it.

Getting back to this "corn snack", I always love how Japanese snack foods are so generically called "rice snack", "corn snack", etc. Someone could have called these "hot waffles" or "spicy weaves" (though that sounds like a hair augmentation that is supposed to make the ladies want to dance the tango with you or something), but, no, they are just "corn snack". Actually, even in America, sometimes you find this type of naming convention. Safeway's rip-off of Triscuits is rather pragmatically named "Woven Wheats". I guess that the Japanese market can't be blamed for not trying any harder than the America one, especially when they're writing the name in English.

When I opened the bag, I smelled a vaguely spicy scent which seemed a bit like paprika or tomato. The pieces themselves are actually pretty large. They're about the same length as a standard potato chip, but narrower. If these look suspiciously like an elongated piece of Chex cereal, you're on the right trail. That is very much what these taste like, though they seem slightly different in texture. They even have a fairly high level of sweetness for a salty snack. The fourth ingredient, after corn flour, hydrogenated palm oil, and tapioca starch, is sugar. Clearly, these are nutritionally rather bad news just from that information alone, but it is worse that Sucralose rounds out the list because you need both sweetness and artificial sweetness. 

I am not really daunted by the ingredients as I don't expect junk food to be nutritious. As long as you don't eat too much of it, your body should be able to process the toxins. Of course, I don't drink alcohol, so my liver isn't being taxed outside of the processed snacks I eat and your mileage may vary if you find yourself at frat parties getting drunk into a stupor and waking up full of a sense that you should regret something but are unsure exactly what that might be.

The main problem with these is that they have almost zero flavor depth. Despite listing miso powder, there is a distinct lack of savory flavors. I gave this a good chance to reveal more taste, but all I got was the slightly sweet corn cereal flavor and heat. The "hot" part works at about the level at which you feel it, but there isn't actual pain, but the "spicy" fell down on the job completely.

These are, for lack of a better word, "serviceable" in that they are salty, crunchy, and hot. They're also light. The whole bag (1.94 oz./55 grams) is 240 calories, which doesn't make them much lower on the calorie totem than chips, but they feel nice and light. You can eat more of them compared to chips because they're puffier and have holes in them. This does not a great snack make though, and it is miles and miles away from addicting anyone.

Yawataya Mini KitKat

When I was given wasabi KitKats, I remember having a discussion about chocolate with one of my students in which I mentioned that putting chili in chocolate was fairly common in America. She was shocked, and grossed out, at the idea of this combination. Of course, she thought that including wasabi was also pretty weird, but accepted it as something reasonable as a regional variation for novelty value. This is one of those rare cases when a combination is actually a bit stranger in Japan than in the West. I've been reading about American releases of chili paired with chocolate on other blogs for years.

If you look at the top of this box, you can see that there is an old-timey picture in sepia (because that's how we can tell it's "old-timey"). This is because this flavor is supposed to represent what was popular in the Shinshu area during the Edo period. The origin of the hot pepper that is used is thought to be the Amazon basin rather than Japan. It's a transplanted flavor that is commonly called "togarashi" in Japan. Apparently, we have Columbus to thank for spreading it all over the globe, first to Europe and then to Asia. I doubt that makes up for all of the stuff the Spanish did to indigenous peoples nor does it make up for the fact that he is seen as discovering something which was hard to miss and probably was located by many explorers before him, but, hey, credit where it is due. He spread some hot peppers for us all to enjoy, especially the folks in Nagano (formerly the Shinshu area).

I picked this box of 5 mini KitKats up at the airport on my way out of Japan. I don't remember what I paid, but the retail price according to Nestle Japan's web site is 350 yen ($4.38). As is so often the case with these types of KitKat, it represents significantly bad value for the quantity, but one does not buy these for the volume, but rather the novelty. Each KitKat is two mini fingers (about the size of one and a third regular KitKat fingers) and has 67 calories.

When I opened the packet on these, I smelled a very pleasant bittersweet chocolate smell. I deeply inhaled the scent of the bar to try and detect any spiciness or hint of the chili pepper, but there was really no hint. My first bite yielded a mild, slightly sweet bittersweet chocolate flavor with the usual crispy wafer freshness of a KitKat. Only after this did I get a bit of heat on the tongue. Each subsequent bite was the same. It was a one-two punch with each flavor hitting quite distinctly.

This is a pretty nice tasting KitKat, largely because it is a slightly dark, bittersweet flavor which is not too sweet and pairs well with the wafer's crunch. However, the spicy portion seems almost superfluous. It does not detract from the chocolate, but it seems to add nothing. It's like eating a candy bar and then a little hot pepper alternatively. 

I think this works best as what it is, a novelty. If you're in the area (or at the airport) and want to take something back for your friends to try which won't make them gag, but will surprise them, this ought to fit nicely. The heat isn't so intense that someone will have a burning mouth. You'd have to be extremely sensitive to hot pepper to suffer for sampling this. Though I'll finish this box (slowly), I don't think there would really be any reason to buy this again. 

Meiji Very Hot Curry "Karl"

In Japan, you don't have to settle for a "hot Carl". You can get a "red hot Carl".

One of these days, I need to have a contest in which I post a food item and ask readers to enter their ideas about the ingredients in that item based on the sometime esoteric inclusions I've mentioned in former posts. It's easy to guess that something like curry, chicken, and onion flavors are in a baked corn snack like this one, but what are the chances of guessing that it includes "pineapple powder"? Ah, Meiji, you tricky devils!

"Karl", or as we might say in English, "curl", is a popular brand of salted snack from Meiji. In various flavors, sizes,  and packages, these can be found in most convenience stores and markets. When I was working, I often saw them sold in foil lined paper cups like Calbee's Jaga Rico. They were first introduced in 1968 in a cheese flavor and a curry version first came out in 1969. There's an interesting scrolling photo history of all of the flavors, designs, and packages since the product's inception here.

There are instructions on the back of the bag telling you how to tear it down the seam if you're offering these at a party.

When I saw this bag of corn snacks perched outside of Okashi no Machioka in a box labeled "69 yen" (75 cents), I jumped at the chance to try it. Not only was it marked down in price, but it was also new to may area and it has flames all over the bag. Little encourages me more than the chance of something red hot. It doesn't hurt that the entire 48 gram (1.7 oz.) bag weighs in at 246 calories. That's a bit on the low side for a salted snack food of this sort in Japan considering their penchant for high fat counts. The size is such that I felt quite full after eating just half of it.

When I first opened the bag, I caught a whiff of what I could colorfully refer to as "corrupted curry". There are definitely curry elements, but there's more. The curls themselves are puffy and satisfyingly crispy. They have a nice depth of flavor from all of the seasonings that are layered onto them, which include various seafood powders, pork, and soy sauce in addition to the aforementioned ingredients.

Sometimes the heat that is advertised on Japanese snacks is sub par, but these are gratifyingly hot. They also have a cumulative fiery effect that makes your tongue get a better burn as you eat more of them. They may not satisfy the most ardent hot pepper lovers, but they pleased me.

I enjoyed these and would definitely buy them again if I wanted something hot and salty to snack on. I was really happy with the flavor depth as that is something that some corn-based snacks are lacking in my experience. If you want something hot and spicy to have with a soda or alcoholic beverage, I'd recommend giving these a go. You won't be disappointed, and they aren't as fattening as such foods can get.

If you'd like to download some items that have the mascot's theme (the frog and farmer), you can find some message cards, a coloring page for kids, and some tickets here.

Tyrant Habanero Wasabi Sticks

Sometimes I try something and I like it, but there are negative points to it such that I'm not likely to have it again despite actually enjoying it. That was my experience with these Tyrant Habanero Wasabi sticks. I liked them, but there were a few sticky points (not as in actually sticky) that make a revisit unlikely.

I bought these at the same time as the "Tyrant Habanero" garlic sticks at the same place, AM/PM convenience store. The size is the same, 35 grams (1.2 oz.), as are the calories at 175 for the whole bag. These are about 130 yen ($1.44) and have a similar list of ingredients to its brother product. The primary ingredient is potatoes and there are a ton of nice savory spices like garlic, onion, and meat-based flavorings. Of course, this one also includes wasabi.


Unsurprisingly, these smell like wasabi. The first bite is intensely strange and almost medicinal, but that blows off after you eat a few and then it's a nice wasabi flavor with consistent heat that starts to punch you in the back of the nose as you eat more. As is so often my experience with wasabi, it doesn't accumulate heat on your tongue, but punches you nasal passages. I strongly recommend a beverage to mitigate this effect to some extent. The texture is nice and crunchy, not too airy or dense, but there is a bit of a greasy sense underlying them. This greasiness was less present in the garlic version that I reviewed before.

I liked these, and I ate the whole bag at once, but the truth is that I wouldn't buy them again because of the weird medicinal starting flavor and the greasiness which coated my mouth for awhile after I finished. Those negative points overcame the positive ones of the nice taste, heat and texture.

Tohato Tyrant Habanero Garlic Sticks

I studied psychology with a fairly strong emphasis on biology and behavior. One of the things I learned about was how and what stimulates the brain in a particular manner. In particular, the brain responds to pain by releasing counterbalancing pleasure chemicals. This is one of the reasons people like to eat foods that are hot and spicy despite the sometimes painful burn associated with them. It is a way of tricking your brain into juicing you up a bit.

Whatever the reason may be, I love hot and spicy things and the "Tyrant Habanero" product line always catches my eye. You can identify them in Japan by the evil jack-o-lantern red pepper mascot that graces every bag. There are only two things that keep me from having a constant supply of these snacks on hand, the calories and the fact that they taste great going in but are far less pleasant on the way out.


I came across these stick-style garlic habanero snacks at AM/PM convenience store. Those who want them have to get them at "conbini" as they are not sold in other types of shops. I'm afraid that I don't remember exactly what I paid for this 35 gram (1.2 oz.) bag, but I think it was around 130 yen ($1.44). The entire bag is 175.5 calories, and that's not bad for the quantity of salted snack sticks.

When I poured a few of these out to take the picture, I was reminded of some sort of spicy or barbecue snack stick that I had on rare occasions as a child and really loved. I have a strong sense that the brand name was "Popeye" (and a company named "Allens" makes Popeye potato sticks, but their web site is mum about snack foods), but I couldn't find anything on the web that resembled what I recall. Part of the problem is that Popeye's fried chicken is talked about so much that anything with "Popeye" and "spicy" brings up a chicken-related result. If anyone remembers what I'm talking about, I'd love to hear about it.

These sticks are not very long, about 4 inches or 10 cm each. They have a really perfect potato-based snack texture which is airy enough to be light and crispy but not so much as to feel like nothing. The spice at first carries a heavy garlic flavor, unsurprisingly, but the cumulative effect of the heat soon squashes that out of existence if you keep eating. And, oh, I kept eating. I ate the whole bag and my mouth was on blissful fire by the end. These have a great mix of garlic, onion, paprika, and various meaty flavors so the taste has depth until your tongue is too inflamed to detect them.

I adored these. I'd buy them again in a heartbeat, but I'd try harder not to eat the whole bag at once next time. I've heard that some people find the Tyrant Habanero series too meek for their hot food needs, but I found it just about right.

Hot Cocktail Cheese in Kamaboko (chikama)

Kamaboko is various types of white fish processed and formed into loaves. It's sold in plastic tubes in convenience stores as a snack and the promise of something with three different peppers (jalepeno, chipotle, and green pepper) as well as cheese made me overlook the fact that I hate most fish. I decided to pick up this fish log and give this a try. Incidentally, when cheese is in this and it's sold as a snack, it's called chikama. Kamaboko is generally used in soups rather than eaten as a snack.

This is made by a company called Maruzen, which makes a lot of these sorts of tubular fish loaf products. They also sell a very scary product called "fish sausage". I'm not sure that the Western world is ready for such gustatory possibilities.


The tube is about 16 cm (about 6 in.) long and weighs 60 grams (about 2 oz.). One of the great benefits of fish loaf as a snack is that it's pretty low in calories. If you could choke back the contents of the entire tube, you'd only be ingesting 81 calories.

One might suspect that the little red piece of tape on the plastic would be a way of removing the tightly wrapped fish product from it's poly shell. I removed the tape and only the tape came off. I had to cut off the metal bit holding one end together to get at the fish loaf inside.


This stuff smells like very stinky old fish. The texture is slightly rubbery, but it's easy to bite into. It takes awhile to chew though. This is a bad thing because it means the flavor of old fish is in your mouth until you masticate enough to force it down your throat. The dominating flavor is definitely that of fish, with a hit of heat after you chew it a bit. I don't know how much of each type of pepper is in it, but I don't detect any particular pepper flavors except some jalapeno heat. There is actually very little cheese in it and even if you happen to find a piece with a tiny cube of orange processed stuff, you don't taste anything but the heavy fish flavor.

This was genuinely gross. My mouth rebelled. My stomach wanted to rebel violently. I don't think that there was anything wrong with the kamaboko, but rather that I am simply not a candidate for a rubbery snack that tastes and stinks like very old fish. I threw the rest of this away. The only way I kept my stomach from expelling this stuff in a fit of anarchy was to placate it with French meringue cookies.

Togarashi (Cayenne) Sembei

In order to fulfill the notion that I'm doing this blog to sample new things, I have to stop showering myself with new flavors of KitKat and try some things which are more than simply the same main character cast in a different, but very similar play. I'd also like to stop eating so many sweets so I picked up this package of sembei at the local 99 yen store. It won me over with its promise of cayenne pepper hotness even though I am not a fan of either sembei (rice crackers) or nori (seaweed paper).

This sembei is made by a company named Kameida Seika, which makes a wide variety of sembei-based snacks and is the biggest maker of rice crackers in Japan. The company was started in the 1940's, but has since been reorganized several times and no longer bears much a resemblance to the business that started it all which was co-owned by a farmer. Like many food manufacturers in Japan, they are looking to diversify and expand their product line in order to increase sales despite the falling birthrate, and they hope to offer sweets and health foods in the future rather than mainly focusing on rice-based snacks.

On the company's web site, they mention that these are especially good in winter, presumably because the cayenne chili flavor will heat you up. Since it is winter, I guess I picked a good time to try these.



The packaging for these crackers is a brilliant example of the convenient, but over-the-top packaging in Japan. The crackers are each individually wrapped, placed in a plastic tray and then wrapped in a plastic wrapper. This keeps each cracker in great shape and allows you to leave the main bag gaping open without any fear of allowing the remaining crackers to go stale, but I frankly feel guilty about all that plastic.

The crackers look great. They are shiny, slightly red tinted, and partially wrapped in a crisp square of nori. Once liberated from their individual plastic prisons, they smell slightly of soy sauce and cayenne, though the cayenne has a bit of a tomato scent to it. You can also smell the seaweed if you sniff the part with nori on it.

The texture of the crackers is very crunchy, with some flaky areas on the surface where they have bubbled up during baking. It's very satisfying from a texture point of view. When you bite into it, it cracks off easily, but the nori doesn't tear very well alone the line of your bite. The first thing you really get hit by taste-wise is the seaweed, soy sauce and a fishy taste. This is followed by some cayenne pepper heat. The second bite gives you more of the flavor of a classic rice cracker. This flavor is hard to describe if you've never had sembei, but if you have had it, you'll know exactly what I mean. All rice crackers carry this taste no matter what flavoring has been applied to them.

The ingredients include rice, soy sauce, sugar, seaweed, hot pepper paste, mirin (sweet Japanese rice wine used in cooking), and seafood extract powder. This explains pretty much the entire range of flavors in the cracker. Personally, I could do without the seafood extract powder as I don't like overtly fishy flavors. There are 11 crackers per bag and there are 215 calories for the entire bag (about 20 calories per cracker) so this wouldn't be a too fattening snack, particularly since one is unlikely to eat an entire bag at once.

I probably wouldn't buy these again because, while I don't hate these, I don't love them either. I think they are very well made and enjoyable, but I don't think they suit my tastes. I love the heat, but not the fish or seaweed flavors, which I can certainly tolerate without difficulty, but find distracting. If you're a fan of all those flavors, these are definitely worth sampling. I finished off the bag, but I also pulled off the nori wrappers on them to do so.

Karamucho Hot Chili Potato Chips

I like hot (as in spicy) food so these chips appeal to me more so than the average bland, plain chip. They're also the only regularly-available hot chip in Japan and one of the first types I tried so many years ago when I first arrived. That being said, I have only eaten them about 4 times in 19 years. I decided to revisit them and see what it was that kept me from going back more often. I wondered if a big part of it wasn't that they were bad, but rather that they were too different from American chili and barbecue chips.

These chips smell mostly like regular chips despite having a visible dusting of red powder. On first taste, you are hit by paprika, garlic and onion flavors. The quite mild heat of the chili hits a second wave. The blend of flavors seems designed to make sure the actual potato taste isn't buried in the spices. These aren't exceptionally salty chips and I think that's why they don't produce as strong a burn. That being said, there is a very slow heat build up and by the third chip, I was feeling an irritation in my throat and a few extremely vague and short-lived little burn spots on my lips from the spice.



The chips are mostly medium size and most of them do not have dark spots on them. There is a lot of air in the bag and almost no smashed chips at all. They are nicely crunchy, not overtly greasy, and of average thinness. Personally, I prefer chips that are cut in this way rather than those which are extra thin or thick cut.

I bought this small bag(28 grams or just under 1 oz.) in a 99 yen shop where a variety of salted snack foods in small packages were being sold at a price of 2 for 99 yen (94 cents so 47 cents for this one small bag). The entire bag will cost you 154 calories, 9.5 grams of fat, and 168 mg of sodium.

If you like things that are just a bit spicy but not painfully hot, these are really quite nice. Personally, I prefer quite a bit more of a burn factor from my spicy chips, but I believe these pack a much nicer flavor profile. Really hot chips are mainly giving you the neurotransmitter rush as your brain deals with the "pain" from the burning. These actually taste good and have a well-balanced mixture of chili and other spices.