eating japanese snacks or what i did during the san diego blackout

San Diego had a major blackout last week. 12+ hours without electricity made me realize that A) I should probably keep my gas tank half full at all times, B) maybe I should have a real emergency kit in my car after all and C) we sure do have a lot of candles in our house.

I was at work when the power cut out, in the middle of coding a new website. Luckily everything had been saved otherwise I would have been quite unhappy. As it was, it was 20 minutes until quitting time and I gave up and went home after sitting in the dark for 10 minutes. Aside from dealing with people who have no idea how to get through a blacked out intersection (it’s a four way stop, people!) my evening was relatively quiet. I made a trip to the nearby liquor store for some bags of ice, my parents and I made dinner and then sat out on the patio in the cool air, listening to our hand-crank powered radio. I read by oil lamp and tried to fight off a raging headache from the extra heat of the afternoon.

But before the sun for the evening and gave way to a beautiful moonlit night, I ate some Japanese snacks.

I know very little about the origin of Japanese snacks. I do know that I love the packaging and one afternoon I bought a bunch of stuff to try for the blog. The blackout seemed like a good time to try a few things!

These are some “Corn Snacks”. My brief Google search told me that these are Riska Umai Wa. Riska being the name of the company and “Umai Wa” referring to the fact that these are ring shaped snacks.


The flavor is “Yasai Salad” which I took to mean “salad flavored snacks”. That’s really what intrigued me. Salad flavored. Hmmmm.

The corn snacks are a bit sweet, mild salt, and a hint of herbs and garlic in the mix. They’re light, crispy and crunchy like most snacks of a similar ilk. They kind of reminded me of Funyuns, excepted sweeter and much less salty (and a better flavor). I ate a handful of these and my dad ate the rest of the bag. He informed me that I needed to buy another bag because he wasn’t sure if he liked them. Uh huh.

The other snack I tried were a package of these Balance Power bars (in blueberry flavor). The English on the back informed me that these were basically “cookies”. They’re marketed as some kind of health food though since it’s got a bunch of vitamins and things in them. Does that make it healthy? I guess.

These remind of the bottom of a Twix candy bar when you eat off the top and only have the cookie part left. Doesn’t taste like it though. These bars were very crumbly once you started eating them and had an almost sand-like texture upon chewing. No crunch, no crispness, very soft. Hint of blueberry flavor in that artificial way. Maybe they would be better dipped in chocolate. Doesn’t chocolate have antioxidants in it? That’s still healthy, right?

All in all it was a quiet evening. It was weird to look out the window at night and see no lights on at all, save for the moonlight. It was kind of nice having the night off for electricity, if it weren’t for the heat and loss of groceries.

 


2 thoughts on “eating japanese snacks or what i did during the san diego blackout

  1. I think it’s good to know that, in case of an actual emergency, we know that it will be complete chaos among the general public and no one will be acting decently.

    Love japanese snacks! I just picked up some salad flavored Pocky, but haven’t tried it yet.

    1. Yes, another reason why you should be prepared… so you won’t have to face the general public! I grew up on chocolate Pocky! I would always bug my mom to buy me a box whenever we went to the Asian market. Salad Pocky sounds strange.

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