Fujiya – Dole Gummy Candy Double Grape

Fujiya is a brand I associate mostly with chocolate – from their Milky products with the ever creepy Peko Chan mascot, or the Country Ma’am cookie line, they seem to do well with the dairy based snacks. They’ve branched out into other things using Peko Chan as the mascot, from things like lollipops and hard candies and even gummies, but it wasn’t until recently I found out they did a crossover with Dole. Dole was a big deal when I was a kid, though I’m not sure how the brand is doing these days. Dole was best known for their fruit cups, in particular the ones containing pineapples. Also they had the best pineapple juice when I was a kid. It’s actually really hard for me to picture Dole without also imagining a sliced pineapple, so seeing grapes is a bit of a mental stretch for me.

This is a mix of the red grape and the Muscat grape, both of which I am intimately familiar with at this point.Each piece is clearly sectioned off to show which side is the red grape, and which is the Muscat. Often times a lot of snacks have a clear delineation between the colours visually, but they are all technically the same flavour. I imagine this will have a clear cut though, as it looks as though they poured the two flavours into a mold and had it separated somehow.

These smell absolutely heavenly. If they taste half as good as they smell, we are going to be in for a good time. The green side is what the very sweet, rounded grape flavour you expect from Muscat. The red, while also sweet is more like a concord grape, in that there’s a bit of tartness and complexity to the flavour. Overall though, the flavour isn’t as strong or vibrant as I’m used to. Maybe Hi-Chews have spoiled me, but it doesn’t come through strong enough for my liking. They smelled very promising, but I’m learning now that smell can be very deceptive.

The texture is fairly soft, and easy to chew through. I personally prefer firmer gummies, so this is not my preferred texture. I would probably liken this more to a fruit jelly more than a gummy. once you get past that initial bite, which isn’t particularly bouncy or anything, the subsequent chews are not great.

I want to like this on principle, because I love Dole fruit cups and the grape flavour is passable, thought somewhat faint and weak. But the texture just really holds it back from greatness. Perhaps some might like this very soft gummy texture, but to me it’s kind of like chewing on mildly flavoured gelatin, while lacking the texture to make it interesting. It’s hard for me to recommend this to anyone, as you’re calories and wallet would be better spent on other gummy or grape flavoured products. Or better yet, go try a Dole fruit cup. Those things are awesome.