Calbee – Jaga Pokkuru

Calbee has been doing fry adjacent snacks for quite some time. In fact, I’ve heard stories that at their main factory in Japan you can get freshly made Jagabee snacks. The concept is interesting and confounding to me, because it’s like getting fresh french fries, except their dehydrated and turned into a potato snack. It feels like extra steps in my brain for some reason.

While not the first Jagabee or similar fry product from Calbee, this is unique in that it comes in a box that is reminiscent of those packages common in Asia where it’s sole purpose is to be gifted. These are fancier than the usual, already somewhat posh packaging and branding that they have compared to the boring potato chip. These in particular are made from simple ingredients, the key one being potatoes from a farm in Hokkaido. Hokkaido is a region in Japan known for many things, like it’s milk, it’s fruits like melons and many other agricultural products. A lot of that is owing to the land over there, and overtime has developed a reputation for delivering top quality goods. It’s certainly garnered enough attention that whenever you heard Hokkaido something, you assume it’s going to cost more or be more premium tiered.

This box has 10 packs, and each of the packs is about the same size as the typical Jagabee pouches you get. Good for portion control for normal people, but it just means more wasted packaging for me since I would need at least 2 pouches in one sitting.

The texture identical to other Jagabee flavours where it’s like taking a french fry and freeze drying it. It has the crispiness on the outside while preserving the somewhat starchy and soft insides within the fry. While I don’t think the texture differs much from the normal, non-gift box version, I can only assume there are some variations with the base potato used. Speaking frankly, I can’t really tell the difference so maybe my palate is just not advanced enough.

Flavour is quite simple here, it’s just potatoes, some salt and some other flavours that remind me somewhat of soy sauce. While I’m not enough of an aficionado to know what’s different about these potatoes, I will admit that they taste quite flavourful and are quite addictive. They taste saltier than an actual french fry as well, so keep in mind these are in essence saltier than a regular potato chip.

For me, the deciding factor in whether I would get this again or not comes down to price. By that I mean, I would compare it to the price of a regular Jagabee release and do a price by weight comparison. The two are close enough in my mind that I wouldn’t mind getting either, and it will just come down to price. That being said, I would get this again, or at least Jagabee in general.