After a light dinner of some fettucini alfredo, The Librarian and I began to roll Cardcaptor Sakura and opened the first box of Japanese nibblies.

We started with the box of "Pine Cream Pocky", nicely decorated in yellow and a pineapple. The pocky itself was a yellowish color that had a very nice whiff of pine. Not pineapple, pine. Which is swell, who doesn't like pine fragrance, but it's not encouraging when it's supposed to be pineapple. The flavor was... different. Almost, but not entirely unlike, pineapple. The box also suggests that there's bits of chocolate included, but in our humble opinions, the box lies! The fact that more than three quarters of the pockysticks remain in the box should tell you our opinion of Pine Cream Pocky.

After we hit the eyecatch of the episode entitled "Sakura, Tomoyo and a Mansion," we moved on to the "Wheat Milk Pocky." It's much like the regular chocolate pocky, but with a crunchier biscuit stick, milk chocolate, and an odd hint of Reese's Peanut Butter Cup. Tasty enough, but not particularly awe-inspiring or anything. The box is pretty, though, with a painting of a wheat farm on the front. The considered opinion of the two judges? Meh... not bad, but we'd rather have the original-style Chocolate Pocky.

Then the nightmare began. The Librarian had been entranced by the box of Cheese Pretz all night, with it's cover photo of small pieces of rye bread liberally covered with melted cheese. The sticks are shorter than Pocky, but look the same. The flavor, though... *shudder* All salt and something inexplicable... maybe anchovies, or something like that... The aftertaste has a similar flavor to some US snackfoods, like those little 'snackables' that have Ritz crackers and what I like to call "cheez", but it comes from the back of the throat in a very unpleasant manner. Our opinion? RUN SCREAMING.

Hoping for something, ANYTHING, to get the memory of the horror out of our minds, we tore into the Poare Choco Custard. Poare, as mentioned before, is a "reverse Pocky," where the stick is hollow, and filled with the stuff that's usally on the outside of a pockystick. The biscuit was a little sweeter than the usual, and the 'choco custard' filling was soft and creamy. The box was quickly emptied, and recieved the highest honor we could impart: "Is there any more?" Even the box is pretty, with three sticks of Poare on a white background. Plain, but effective.

With our enthusiasm for the project restored, we opened the box of Salad Pretz. Alas, prior research had revealed that it wouldn't taste like salad at all, but was designed to accompany salad. In this, we figure it would be a success. Again, very salty, but the taste isn't bad at all. Similar to Gardetto's-brand snackfood, to be honest. The amount of salt used on these things, though, would be enough to melt the polar icecaps. The packaging is nothing special, however, just a picture of the food on a green and white background, with the title in red. Functional. The opinion? Not bad, could be a nice alternative to chips or pretzels.

By this time, though, we were rapidly running out of time and available stomach space, but being the brave researchers that we are, dedicated to the improvement of the world's intellects, we soldiered on and opened up the box of Pocky G. This is completely different from any other Pocky, with a crunchier CHOCOLATE biscuit, and a stronger chocolate covering. As the very 'art deco' box (white, with a big black capital 'G' centered, transfixed by a single pockystick) proclaims, it's "hard & rich". If this had been opened earlier in the night, there's no doubt the box would have been emptied. As it was, however, we only managed to get through one of the two packs (the 2nd pack was consumed with this author's dinner tonight). Just a smidge behind the Poare in the night's rankings, but only because the Poare was something completely different. Good stuff, this G!

And more pocky reviews coming down the line, as there's still a ton of flavors sitting on the table to go through! Pictures to follow, as soon as I reduce them... and figure out how to upload 'em!

I think our costumes were pretty good, actually...

Posted by: Wonderduck at 07:20 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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