There is no single best Japanese matcha, because the powders sold under that name are built for different jobs. Recommending a tin of ceremonial-tier drinking matcha to someone…
A bag labelled “matcha powder” in Japan can be one of several quite different things. Some are sweetened mixes that turn into a milky latte the moment you…
Outside Japan, almost everything chewy and rice-based gets called mochi. In Japan these are separate things with separate names, and the differences are not academic: one is a…
Mochi is no longer an unfamiliar word outside Japan. Chewy rice-cake sweets now turn up in supermarket freezers and dessert shops across North America, Europe and Southeast Asia,…
Kirimochi arrives as a hard white brick. It is sealed in its own plastic wrapper, it sits on a shelf for two years without refrigeration, and it does…
MINTIA is the tablet candy you see in every Japanese convenience store, in a flat card-shaped case that slides into a shirt pocket. Asahi Group Foods lists 28…
Hi-Chew is not a Japan-only candy, and this guide doesn’t pretend otherwise. Morinaga lists it as being sold in more than 30 countries, and its own brand site…
If you buy Hi-Chew in the United States, you are buying a candy made in North Carolina. Morinaga has produced Hi-Chew at its plant in Mebane since 2015,…
Cororo is the Japanese gummy people peel on camera. The pieces are wrapped in a thin collagen skin that comes away like the skin of a real grape,…
Hangyodon finished 9th in the 2026 Sanrio Character Ranking, ahead of Little Twin Stars and Badtz-Maru. You would expect a top-10 character to have plenty of merchandise. Yet…