Cookies!!!
Unsurprisingly, hubby and I have found that of all the gifts we brought back from Japan, the snacks are some of most popular among our family and friends. And not just any snacks but iconic ones:
1. Kit Kats in multitude of flavors. Cliche? Yes. Fun? Yes! You can definitely find some of these at your local Japanese (or even Korean!) grocery store, but of course flavors are limited. I've consistently seen matcha and strawberry, both are ubiquitous and boring. The more interesting LE releases are Japan-only, like wasabi (sweet, with only a faint taste of wasabi) and toast-able "pudding" (by "pudding" they always mean
Spanish-style flan, I did toast them, and they did have a custard-like flavor).
***Stock photos from Amazon and
RocketNews24.
2.
Shiroi Koibito. Our family went nuts for these and for good reasons. They're delicious, enough said. You can get them via Rakuten Global or even Amazon, but you sure pay one way or another, via shipping from Rakuten or marked up prices from Amazon, take your pick. Which was why we loaded them up with our move home and even then, our 12 boxes were woefully inadequate and disappeared pretty much instantly.
Then came this past holiday season and one of my sister's friend in Japan sent her a giant tin of
Yoku Moku Cookies. Like Shiroi Koibito, Yoku Moku is a brand of premium cookies. The
founder Noriichi Fujinawa first tasted a variety of butter cookies when
he visited the town
Jokkmokk of Sweden. Upon coming home to Japan, he went straight to work recreating the goodies he had and couldn't forget.
