Asahi Balanceup Salty Vanilla アサヒ クリーム玄米ブラン 塩バニラ

Don't ask me why but Balanceup is a favourite snack of mine. I think it's because it is not only filling but it is made with real bran and always comes in interesting flavours. It is meant to be more of a convenience food, for example, to replace cereal in the morning or a snack at morning tea time if you're busy and don't have time to grab a proper meal.

The snack consists of two layers of bran crackers sandwiching a thick layer of flavoured cream, in this case salty vanilla cream is in the centre. The bran crackers are quite thick too (about 2mm) so they give a decent crunch when bitten into.

These crackers have a pleasant smell when the packet is opened and the outside of the bran has a sweetness to it, and lots of bits of bran inside the cracker make for a very crunchy experience.
The vanilla cream in the middle is sweet and has a slight hint of maple flavour followed by another hit of vanilla and finally some saltiness at the end so it seems like having sweet then savoury.
I'm not sure why the vanilla cream tastes like maple but I have noticed it before in other flavours so maybe it's coming from the crackers when it gets mixed with the cream.

The flavours are not strong but they are not weak either. This was quite enjoyable and I ate the whole bag in one sitting (4 crackers!). The bag is made up of 2 individually wrapped bags of 2 crackers each so it's great for portion control and also the crackers won't go stale if you don't eat them all at once.

Country Ma'am Vanilla & Fragrant Matcha カントリーマアム バニラ＆香り抹茶

Today I have a share pack of cookies by Fujiya called "Country Ma'am". In the past I have reviewed a black sugar version and a kinako version. Today I am reviewing a pack with 20 individually wrapped cookies inside. 10 are Vanilla flavour and the other 10 are fragrant Matcha (green tea) flavour.

I bought this bag of cookies from Ichimaru Supermarket in Tokachi for ¥258. It's quite a big bag and 20 cookies seems like a lot but actually each cookie is quite small - about 3.5cm in diameter.

The vanilla cookie is referred to as a "Chocochip Cookie Vanilla" on the wrap, but on the actual bag is only called vanilla. However, I think most people would think of this as a "choc chip" cookie as the most predominant smell is chocolate. The outside is crispy and the inside is soft and there is a slightly burnt and sweet caramel flavour. The milk chocolate chips give a hint of chocolate but only when you bite into them directly. Otherwise there is a vague caramel/vanilla flavour present. While it's still nice to eat, it's over rather quickly and it's not the strong vanilla flavour I was expecting.

The fragrant matcha cookie is green in colour and crispy on the outside. When biting into it I inhaled a strong scent of matcha. The flavour is very much green tea but there is a surprise inside : chocolate chips! Again the chocolate chips don't add much unless directly bitten on. This is a very strong flavoured cookie so if you like matcha then you would enjoy this cookie. There is a slight vanilla flavour right at the end that is not unpleasant but seems mismatched with matcha.

I'm not a big fan of the vanilla cookies, they are just "ok" but I really like the matcha flavour cookies. This bag of 20 cookies was great value because I shared them out with friends as part of a "Japanese snacks gift bag" when I got home. They are individually wrapped so they are the perfect kind of snack you can hand out to friends who like to try Japanese foods.

It's also a good pantry filler because you can keep a few in your bag or in my case nappy bag, and take them with you when you go out for a quick snack or when my toddler asks for a snack in the supermarket I can ply him with a cookie. :)

You can visit the Fujiya Website for more interesting Country Ma'am flavours.

Hinamatsuri Tirol Peach and Strawberry Vanilla チロルひな祭り ふんわり ピ ーチ と 苺バニラ

Obviously, I'm pretty late at reviewing this pack of Tirol released for Girls Day in Japan, but better late than never!

This pack has 8 individually wrapped Tirol chocolates, 3 of Peach and 5 of Strawberry Vanilla. Not sure why there is more of one flavour than the other, it's probably just random.

All 3 peach flavour chocolates have the red wrapper with the princess on the cover. The other 5 have samurai on them in green and purple.

Peach - is a soft pink flavoured white chocolate with a peach jelly and vanilla cream inside. The jelly and chocolate really capture the essence of a peach. The vanilla cream gives it depth. There is a tartness to the peach flavour at the very end, coming from the jelly.

Strawberry Vanilla - a 3 layered chocolate, neopolitan (strawberry, vanilla and chocolate). All 3 layers come together to form a nice sweet harmony but are also individually apparent. The strawberry is by far the strongest flavour with some sour notes but doesn't overwhelm.

I really liked this pack. I liked the peach flavour best, but the strawberry vanilla is also nice. The packaging is so pretty too, it's a shame to throw it out! Tirol have done this well :-)

Koala no March Highland Vanilla Icecream コアラのマーチ 高原のバニラアイス

I'm getting around to my backlog of Japanese snacks. This box has been sitting in the cupboard since before Christmas. Yasu has been eying it off every time he opens the cupboard...probably wondering when I'm going to crack it open. Well Yasu will be happy when he gets home from work today! :)

This flavour is called "kougen no vanilla ice" in other words Highland Vanilla Icecream flavour. Not sure why but they seem to have a theme going. The last box of Koala no March I reviewed was "mountain hut" flavour. I guess they like the mountain theme?

The biscuits look and smell the same as always, Koala shaped biscuits that are lightly toasted, with pictures of various Koala's on the front in brown ink. From the outside there is a sweet smell, and biting into it there is a creamy vanilla cream in the centre. These really taste like vanilla icecream, my only complaint is there is not enough cream in the middle, as always. I wish there was more filling.

The biscuits are really crunchy though and deliver a satisfying loud crunch when you bite into them followed by the sweet vanilla cream. I love these as a sweet snack, they're really pleasant and great for sharing too.

It was nice to try once, but I probably wouldn't buy it again because it's just not that special. But I'm sure kids would love these!

And as an aside, by buying this pack you are also making a donation to the Australian Koala Foundation - www.savethekoala.com

Brand: Lotte Calories per box: 259 Website: http://www.lotte.co.jp

Tirol Air-In Salty Vanilla チロル 塩バニラ

After coming to Japan I have been browing the aisles of supermarkets to find new and different Tirol flavours. I have not had much luck so far, only finding the regular coffee flavour.

At Jusco a few days ago, I finally found this flavour for ¥20. I originally grabbed two of them but lost one on the way home, only to find it in a friends car two days later, it had melted in the heat and lost its shape.

The image on the packet is of a sparkling blue ocean with a small island in the background and a soft serve cone in the foreground. I am not sure why the soft serve is in the image, but after googling "soft serve salty vanilla" I found a few links to icecream with a salty topping in Hakata, so maybe thats a kind of regional specialty.

This chocolate is air-in which basically means its like an Aero, it is aerated, very soft, and less dense.

From the outside, the chocolate smells of vanilla and a saltiness like the beach (cue blue water on image). The chocolate is quite soft to bite into and feels really grainy. Its really white chocolate, with a hint of vanilla, and after all the chocolate has melted, a few grains of salt.

The air-in makes the middle soft, and like mousse, and as I eat more, the salt flavour builds up, to a kind of sour vinegar like when you get a mouthful of water at the beach, that unpleasant taste in your mouth.

I never really got used to the grains in this chocolate, and I don't like the salt flavour because it's too strong. I have satisfied my curiousity and I definitely wont buy this again.

Takenoko no Sato Cheesecake - たけのこの里・チーズケーキ味

Takenoko no sato (or Bamboo Shoots in the village), is shaped like a bamboo shoot with a cookie base and a flavoured chocolate covering. They have a brother called Kinoko no Yama (mushrooms on the mountain), which is pretzel based, and looks like a mushroom.

As my husband is a big cheesecake fan I bought this Takenoko for us to try. Takenoko is his favourite, he prefers the cookie base, while I prefer the pretzel base of Kinoko.

While this box is large, it only weighs 23.4 grams and there are 7 large indivdually wrapped bamboo shoots. A major waste of packaging and space. These are 3cm x 3cm, double the size of the normal chocolate Takenoko.

There is no perceptible scent from the cookie. The cookie is covered in a creamy coloured chocolate with Vanilla Bean specs within. The first taste when biting in is a creamy vanilla chocolate, followed by a more milky taste that develops. The crispy biscuit underneath is good, crumbly in texture, sweet but not too much. There is some saltiness that develops at the end that rounds out the flavour.


I found this to be more vanilla flavour than cheesecake. There was no cheese flavour, or tangy yoghurt like flavour that is usually present with cheesecake flavoured snacks. It was disappointing for me as I expected a nice creamy cheesecake. My husband wasn't disappointed though because he loves the cookie crunch and really loved the vanilla flavour anyway.

I just wish that Meiji had labelled this better, or developed the flavour better, because it did not deliver it's promise of flavour. This is a really nice cookie-chocolate snack if you don't expect it to be cheesecake. If someone had blindfolded me and told me it was vanilla bean, I would be really happy.

I wouldn't go out of my way to get another box as a) the flavour is quite pedestrian, and b) the contents of the box in no way match the price.