Suprise Find: Ginger Frosted Sembei

As I mentioned in my "I'm back" post, I now live in a very remote area. What is more, I also live in a small town (less than 10,000 people). There are very few local markets and I can charitably say that local tastes match local political views; they are very conservative. That means that the restaurants around me focus mostly on burgers, bad steak, pizza, pasta with heavy sauces, Americanized Mexican, and sandwiches. The most exotic place is a Thai restaurant and there is one American Chinese place which offers very pedestrian options.

I'm not mentioning this to criticize the local food scene because I know that one's taste in food is one of those things that is shaped by experience. People like what they like because it is what they grew up with and it's not like the people who live in rural areas made a conscious decision to have limited food options. If anything, we can blame their parents and grandparents. I certainly can say my parents have terrible taste in food and any restaurant scene that their patronage cultivated would be populated by places with leathery, over-cooked meat, canned vegetables, noodles, and potatoes. It would be even more grim than the reality I currently live in.

The reason that I mention the limits here is that any Japanese food I find at local markets outside of Pocky and some more common cooking ingredients (soy sauce, rice vinegar, etc.) are a suprise find. When I locate one of these finds, I'm stunned because I can't imagine the locals buying them. That leads me to today's shocking find of frosted ginger sembei.

I found these at Grocery Outlet Bargain Market. I've been told it's the west coast equivalent of Aldi's, but I can't verify that as I've never been in an Aldi's. The thing they are supposed to have in common is food at low prices because it was over-produced, unpopular, or is getting on in years. I'm guessing this sembei showed up because it was unpopular, but it's hard to know for sure.

The first shocker was that it was in a local market at all. The second was that it was being sold for 50 cents a bag. In the Bay Area, I had to pay $4-$6 per bag for this same brand of sembei. In Japan, this would cost the equivalent of $1.50-$2.00 for a bag. It was insanely cheap by any estimate. I bought 25 bags. I am not exaggerating. My pantry has stacks and stacks of these.

The difficulty in marketing these to the American market is explained somewhat by the description panel on the lower right panel of the bag. In particular, the fact that the manufacturer feels it is necessary to say, "no topping needed" is revealing. Americans see rice crackers as a savory item that needs a topping like a Quaker rice cake. Buyers have no idea what these are until after they've purchased them. In fact, when I bought them, the cashier looked perplexed at what they were. I'm guessing just me, and possibly the Japanese members of the taiko club a great many miles South of me, are the only customers and potential customers who know what these are.

What these are is a very, very tasty snack with a surface that makes you think of the moon with luscious sugary craters. They'd better be great if I'm going to drown myself in stacks of crispiness. They are light and somewhat sweet with enough ginger to whisper kindly at your tongue, but not to overwhelm. They snap without being too brittle and actually do melt in your mouth if you leave them in there long enough. It's easy to eat far too many at one sitting, but given that each large cracker is only 25 calories, it's hard to get fat on them. I've actually be fairly responsible with these and limit myself to one packet (two crackers) per day. I will likely have my stash for months at that rate, but they come with an enormous oxygen absorber packet so I'm betting they won't go stale. If they start to, I'll just have to watch a good movie and start consuming them by the bag-full so as not to waste my luxurious investment of $12.50.

I should note that I had confidence in these and how good they'd be because the company that mades them, Kameda, is one that I recognized from my time in Japan. In fact, I have reviewed no small number of their sembei in the past including one sweet variety made of chocolate. They rarely let me down and I was pleasantly surprised to see something from that company at a local market. While this clearly is packaged for the American market (since everything is in English), the rice crackers (sembei) themselves are precisely the same as what you'd get if you shopped in Tokyo. And, yes, I'd absolutely buy them again, even at a higher price.

Information:

Where I bought it: Grocery Outlet Bargain Market
Price: 50 cents/bag

Lemon Lucky Thin Crackers

One of the things that I'm finding overwhelming about being in the U.S. is the enormous variety of products. There are dozens of flavors of some things, and several flavors of nearly everything. The selection is often so overwhelming that you spend most of the time trying to tune out what you don't want and zero in on what you do. While selection is great, research has shown that having more than three choices changes the experience from one that is interesting to one that is stressful. Do you hear that Nabisco? We don't need more than 30 Oreo products available at any given time!

Part of the problem with having so many choices, besides the fact that you can end up like Mr. Burns standing around trying to decide between "ketchup" and "catsup", is that you tend to be so overwhelmed by choice that you have to zero in on a small subset and ignore everything else. Sometimes, what is in "everything else" may be of interest either economically or in terms of flavor. That is where these crackers come in. The truth is that I would almost certainly never choose to buy these if I were perusing a store that carried them because there's so much other food and this would look like a weird or boring option. I'd likely eliminate the section they were in and zero in on the more glamorous-looking options.

Fortunately, I was given these as a hostess gift by a visiting friend. When we have her over, she always asks if she can bring anything. We always say she doesn't need to bring anything, but, if she insists, she can bring something for dessert. This has turned out to be a good deal because she's of Chinese descent and often brings us family favorites that we are unfamiliar with. Her previous treat was a roll cookie which I really enjoyed. This time, it was these lemon crackers.

These are distributed by a company called "President Global Corporation" and made in Indonesia. They make a variety of these types of crackers including honeydew melon, chocolate, coconut, and sesame flavors. In terms of snacks, they also sell rice crackers and various other cookies and wafers. Beverages, noodles, and other more mundane food offerings are also a part of their line-up. Though I do not know where my friend got these, after receiving them, I noted that they were available at 99 Ranch Market. What was even better is that they are only 99 cents (92 yen) a box, so they are an economical choice if you want to experiment.

The crackers smell pleasantly lemony and look like a thin version of a Ritz. The top is lightly sprinkled with sugar. The flavor is a very pleasant mixture of a basic cracker with light sweetness and real lemon flavor that is at just the right level to be present, but not strong enough to seem like you're eating something that furniture polish has been splashed onto. The texture is light and they are pleasantly crispy, though not as brittle as a saltine.

No one is more surprised than me that these are so good. They are quite addictive, in fact, and I think they'd pair well with a cup of tea as a light snack. Saying "light" is not to be confused with "low calorie" as the whole small box (100 grams/3.5 oz.) is 415 calories. They also are not "healthy" as the ingredients list starts with flour followed by sugar then vegetable oil (pal or coconut). The lion's share of what you are eating is a refined carb, sugar, and a hydrogenated fat. If you can exercise portion control, however, that should not be a problem.

I really liked these and will absolutely try another flavor in the near future. If you are a fan of more elaborate treats rather than something relatively simple and clean, these may not float your boat. These are nothing like the sugar, flavor-blasted stuff that tends to be more popular in the United States. They are subtle and delicate and not nearly as sweet as a cookie nor as salty as a cracker. However, I think they're well worth a sampling if you can pick up a box for cheap.