Adachi Sangyo Chestnut Monaka

Sorry, I managed to lose my pictures, but the manufacturer's is much nicer anyway.

If you search my archives, you will see that I have only reviewed a "monaka" sweet twice. Both times, I was reviewing ice cream because that was the proper context into which I personally believed monaka belonged. For those who don't know, and there's no reason why you should, monaka is often called a "wafer" and is similar in texture and flavor to the cake cones that your mom buys as inadequate receptacles for a scoop of ice cream. That is to say, they taste like nothing and have a spongy texture. I swear that the vast majority of cake cones sold in America these days are not for holding ice cream, but rather for baking novelty cupcakes.

My ambivalence toward monaka was lifted recently when I saw a package of 3 chestnut monaka treats on sale at Nijiya market for $2.49. Most of the bean/chestnut paste sweets there are massively over-priced and I have been hankering for chestnut for quite some time so this lured me into the monaka world.

The truth is that not all monaka are created equal. While I've had some which are the texture (and taste) of Styrofoam, the case on these was rather different. Yes, it is still essentially flavorless, but it is super flaky and almost wispy. It flaked like super fine pastry instead of made my misaligned teeth attempt to tear it asunder. I can't say I loved it, but I can say that it didn't in any way detract from my enjoyment of the filling inside, and the filling is really what this is all about.

Inside of the flower-shaped wafer is a generous amount of bean paste with bits of chestnut mixed in. It is rather surprisingly sweet for a Japanese traditional treat. By the end of one cake (which is all I can eat at one sitting), it was just on the edge of cloying without going over. Honestly, it made my teeth hurt even with coffee to drink between bites. The texture was oddly chewy in spots, which I imagine was something about the rather roughness of the puree.

Despite how sweet this was, I really liked it. I could have used more chestnut and less red bean flavoring, but I really enjoyed the delicate texture of the monaka coupled with the jam. The flavor was good with the chestnut, if not shining through, cutting out the intense "beaniness" which you sometimes experience with anko.

Note that the nutrition information I was given was a bit of a cheat. There are 3 cakes in the package, but the calorie information is given for 4 servings of 84 calories. Each is actually 112 calories. Since the ingredients list is headed by "sugar", neither the sweetness nor calories are a shock. Beans, which by weight are surely a huge part of this, is 4th on the list. That's a lot of sugar!

The company that makes these is Adachi Sangyo, and I was frankly surprised that they have a web site as many of smallish makers of traditional sweets in boring packaging never put up a web site. They make a small range of snacks which are all very much "Japanese". The focus is on monaka, daifuku, dorayaki, and jelly (gelatin) treats. If I were in Japan still, I'd keep my eyes peeled for their chestnut daifuku because it looks pretty awesome. Unfortunately, even if I were still there, I'd be unlikely to locate them as this is one of those businesses that has limited distribution. One thing I definitely learned is that being in the thick of things in Japan is no guarantee of finding a particular Japanese release. Some things are easier to find here than they were there, quite frankly.

Though I really liked these, and I'd buy them again for the same $2.49 (214 yen), I'm not sure others with different tastes would share my enjoyment of them. Monaka is, in my opinion, a bit of an acquired taste texturally, even good monaka. Bean jam is even more so, and this is pretty sweet stuff. Nonetheless, I'd buy it again.

Glico 80-Calorie Monaka

I've often thought it would be interesting to create a blog devoted to low calorie, diet and health foods in Japan. Of course, I soon realized that such a blog could only update about once a week, if that, because there aren't many of such products. In America, people can create entire blogs devoted to low calorie, reduced fat, and healthy foods, but I'm hard-pressed to find anything in line with their review fodder except the odd zero calorie soft drink. I realize that eating "fake" foods in order to save calories isn't the best way to approach one's diet. However, I also think there is nothing wrong with the occasional indulgence that doesn't come with a hefty calorie price tag.

All of the ice cream in Japan is very rich and fatty. I rarely find a small cup of ice cream with less than 285 calories, and many are over 300. The only exception is Glico's line of 80-calorie ice milk treats. They sell small cups (110 ml.) of green tea, chocolate with chocolate pieces, rum raisin, and vanilla for 150 yen each ($1.69). These are difficult to find, but I can locate them at Natural Lawson's and one of the Family Mart convenience stores in range of my apartment. I have never seen them at local markets.

I was surprised to find that they also carry a low-calorie monaka ice milk sandwich. It is also about 150 yen, but has only 82 ml. of ice milk. According to their web site, they offer green tea and vanilla versions of these monaka, but I've never seen them. The vanilla version has red beans on it instead of the chocolate coating that this one has. All of these are part of what Glico calls their "calorie control" line.


One thing that one has to keep in mind when eating these types of foods is that the bar has to be lowered relative to other types of ice cream and ice milk. The question isn't how this stacks up to full-fat ice cream, but how good it is as a cold confection for 80 calories. Keep in mind that the first ingredient is polydextrose, a form of soluble fiber used to replace sugar. It also contains artificial sweeteners and tofu. Some of the ingredients aren't listed, however. The chocolate and monaka are simply listed as "chocolate coating" and "monaka".

When you give it a sniff, the first thing you smell is the monaka and that is like a cake cone. The monaka is rather soft and has absorbed a bit of moisture. I don't know if it might have been crisper if it hadn't sat in my freezer for a week, but my guess is that it wouldn't. Monaka aren't exceptionally crisp even when fresh.

The ice milk has a bit of a generic dairy flavor, reminiscent of powdered milk but not in a bad way. The chocolate coating is very sparse, but there is enough of it to add flavor. If you look at the picture above, you can see that the coating is fragmented rather than a solid sheet like I got in the Morinaga Jumbo Monaka bar. Mainly, it tastes cold and sweet with some bittersweet chocolate flavor. The flavors are not strong and I really wish there was a vanilla component to the ice milk.

This was fairly enjoyable. I can say that it was definitely worth 80 calories, but it won't do if you've got a hankering for some real ice cream. It will do if you have a craving for a cold treat. I would buy this again, but I can't say that it really "wowed" me so much as simply pleasantly satisfied me.

Morinaga Jumbo Monaka

When I was a child, my mother used to buy big boxes of what were called "cake cones". Among ice cream cones, the "cake cone" was the trailer trash of the lot. Sugar cones and waffle cones were flavor and textural delights to go along with your ice cream. They enhanced the experience. The cake cone was like edible foam packing. It was mainly there to hold your ice cream while you licked it, not to make the experience greatly tastier.

My guess is that my mother bought those cones because, as kids, we really weren't discriminating about what we ate. After all, we thought Kraft macaroni and cheese was the bee's knees of dinner cuisine. If there was ice cream, that was good enough for us. The cake cones were a way of being able to make sure not one drop was lost. I'm guessing she also liked the fact that they didn't tend to drip out the bottom like ice cream in a sugar cone. Cake cones probably saved her from having to fight shirt stains, at least on occasion.


The Japanese have taken the notion of a cake cone and turned it into a sort of ice cream sandwich. Instead of flanking the ice cream with a cookie or slab of waffle, they've imprisoned it in a thin layer of cake cone material. Ice cream sandwiches made in this manner are called "monaka". Since I was never a great fan of the cake cone to begin with, and this is adding more cone to the equation, I haven't really sampled many monaka since coming to Japan.

Incidentally, monaka originally and are still made as sweetened beans or other fillings sandwiched between two "wafers". The fillings are made of varied substances as are the shells. My guess is that the quality of traditional monaka shells is quite a bit higher than the modified cake cone substance used for ice cream sandwiches.


I saw this Morinaga Jumbo Monaka in a 99 yen shop. I found it the best of a poor lot of ice cream on offer and I was in the mood for something different. I keep saying "ice cream", but this is actually ice milk. Many ice cream monaka just have plain vanilla ice cream in them, but this one has a chocolate inner coating and a plain of crispy chocolate running through the center.

This bar was introduced by Morinaga in 1972, but they added the chocolate (as a sauce) to the middle in 1980 and named it a "Deluxe" bar. It didn't grow up to be a "Jumbo" until 1996 when they made the center chocolate a thin, crispy wafer-thin piece of candy. The entire bar is 315 calories, and though you could easily eat it at once, it's pretty big and I ate only one-third of it in one sitting.

I allowed this bar to sit out for about 5 minutes before eating it because I think ice cream isn't as good when it's really hard. You can't really sense the creaminess of it unless it's softened up a bit. For ice milk, this was quite nice. It felt rich and fatty and had good flavor and sweetness balance. The first bites off the ends aren't as good as interior bites because there's too much of the monaka wafer and very little chocolate flavor. Once you get past the edges, it's better as the center chocolate sheet has a deeper, slightly bitter sweet chocolate taste and you get more ice cream and less cake cone.

I liked this quite a lot, though I'm still not going to be filling the freezer with monaka bars any time soon. I'd definitely get this again if I were in the right mood. The ice milk and chocolate can't be beat, and the monaka wafer adds some softly crunchy textural elements. It's also a lot easier to eat it in stages because of the way in which the little squares allow you to visually divide the bar into portions.