These famous Japanese candies by Morinaga are widely available in many flavours. Hi-Chew are popular not only in Japan, but also in a lot of other countries. They can easily be purchased online. Fruity flavours and chewiness are the main components of these candies, although there are also some more artificial flavours such as cola and soda available. Though their shapes and colours are different these are not unlike Fruittella in chewiness.
The bigger packages contain 12 pieces of candy and the smaller ones contain 7 pieces of candy. Both the smaller and bigger packages are around €2,- a piece. Each candy is individually wrapped. The wrappers have several kinds of cute prints on them.
‘Tsubu Tsubu’ Strawberry
As expected there was a strawberry flavour present in these candies, but it did miss the slight sour flavour of a strawberry. It was sweet, but not too sweet.
Strawberry Puree
This one had a more subtle flavour than the original and it was also a little less sweet. It didn’t match my expectations, for some reason I expected the puree version to have a more intense flavour to it.
Green Apple
A piece of candy with a strong green apple flavour to it. It was also slightly sour, just like green apples usually are.
Green Apple Puree
Just like with the Strawberry Puree flavour this one had a less strong flavour than the original version. It was also a little less sour.
Grape
Upon opening the package there is a strong grape smell. The candy itself has a slightly more subtle flavour to it, but it is a clear grape flavour. There is a very slight, very subtle, sour flavour to this candy.
Grape Puree
There is a clear grape smell present when you open the package, just like with the regular version. Just like the other Puree versions the flavour seems less intense than in the original.
Momotaro Green Grape
The expected flavour is clearly present in these candies, but these are slightly sweeter than I’d expected them to be.
Ougon Peach
These were different than what I’m used to from peach flavoured candies, they had a slightly subtler flavour than I expected, but it did clearly have a peach flavour to it. There was a very slight sour taste to it as well.
Sour Lemon “Suppai-Chew”
The colour of this version of Hi-Chew seems almost like a neon yellow. What set this one apart from the other kinds was the hard candy pieces in the middle. They added an interesting texture and some sour lemon flavour as well. The lemon flavour was clearly present, as was the sour aspect of lemons, but it wasn’t too sour.
Hokkaido Yubari Melon
This candy had a clear melon flavour to it, it had a very slight sour taste to it as well. The colour of the outer layer was pretty similar to the colour of the inside of the melon.
Okinawa Mango
Even with the wrapper still on the smell of mango was clearly present. This one tasted as you’d expect; like mango. It wasn’t a very strong flavour, but it was clearly present.
Orange
As expected this candy had a very vibrant orange colour to it. When it comes to flavour it had a clear orange flavour to it as well.
White Soda
Unlike most of the other flavours, this one lacks a white centre and different colour outer layer. The flavour definitely reminded me of soda.
Cola
Just like the soda flavour this one doesn’t have a white inner layer. It seemed slightly chewier than the flavours with a white centre, which made it a bit harder to chew on. This version has a refreshing cola flavour to it.
Mini’s
These reminded me of Mentos, a very different texture from the normal Hi-Chew’s and a bit chewier. The intended flavours were clearly present. The pack contains cola, soda, orange and grape flavoured mini candies. All of the flavours were slightly sour. Even combined the flavours worked well together.
All of these flavours were interesting to try out. There were some unusual ones and some more common flavours as well. The chewiness of these candies doesn’t really differ per flavour, each gets a little softer as you chew them. All of them had a sweetness to them, but none of them were overwhelmingly sweet.
