Puccho – Fruit Soda (Minion Edition)
In the realm of chewy candy, it’s pretty evident that Hi Chew is the reigning king. You may think I am biased on this, and you would be very astute in thinking so. However, I am not alone in my thinking and many others feel the same as I. That being said, I like to keep an open mind and I still give other brands a relatively fair shake, even if Hi Chew is still the champ.
I did a prior review for another Puccho product previously. However, today’s product is much more in line with what I have tried previously from UHA. The Puccho line is their version of a soft chewy candy, and while some may consider them to be an inferior version of Hi Chew, I think a strong case can be made that they are different enough that I wouldn’t consider them substitutes to each other. For one, Puccho chews tend to come in smaller packages, but they also tend to take a more flat, wider shape. A defining feature of Puccho is that they like to stick little gummy pieces or small candy pieces into their chew, so you get a “surprise” so to speak. In my past experiences, I also found the chews to be more “milky” and yogurt like. By this I mean that you can clearly taste the presence of some sort of lactic agent at work. This can be either good or bad depending on your stance on yogurt chews. I’m fine with it, but the aftertaste can be a bit off putting to some people.
Why did I buy this specific flavour? To be perfectly honest with you, I wasn’t really paying attention to what flavour it was. It’s fruit soda by the way, whatever that means. I really only bought it because the minions intrigued me. Apparently this stick comes with two minion blocks, and there’s a total of 10 so as is the case with anything else of this nature, I am now doomed to purchase packs until I have all 10. They got me.
On a more serious note, what is the deal with minions? I didn’t even watch any of the movies in the franchise beyond the first movie, and I don’t even like minions. Yet I have multiple minion shirts from Uniqlo, and now this? What is wrong with me?! Ahem. Moving on.
As you can see, the package ends up looking about as big as standard stick of Hi Chew. However, you’ll notice that about 1/4 of the package is taken up by the minion top. Let’s open that up first and see what’s in store.
So the package contains two minion blocks, which feel and smell like erasers. Like those fun erasers we used to get as kids when pencils and papers were still a thing, and you gained social equity by having a spiffy pencil case. When pencils and erasers were about how cool they looked, not how practical (or impractical) they were. Oh, how I’ve dated myself. Anyways, each pack comes with two blocks, and as you can see they are stack-able. I’m not sure how the blocks work, but I’m assuming it’s not entirely random and each facial expression is matched to a torso print.
On one side is the face, and on the back of that side is the torso, giving you at least 2 minion combinations in each stick. Unless you somehow end up with the exact same block I guess?
Now that playtime is over, it’s time to get to the real business. As I mentioned before, these pieces are flat, and wide. Something that they do have in common with Hi Chew is the silver foil packaging, with the cute little doodles on it . The pieces don’t really have a distinct smell. The best way to describe them is being similar to a generic soda candy. Think of any ramune candy ever, and remove the citrus. Really not much going on in terms of smell.
In terms of how it actually taste, flavour wise I’d say it is very similar to the description – fruit soda. It has a someone generic, vague fruity flavour with that underlying soda-ishness. Think of your average, nondescript fruity soda but flat. Texture wise is where things get a little weird. Remember how I mentioned earlier that their pieces have strange candy bits inside? This one has a small, spherical gummy that didn’t have too much flavour, but was very firm and hard. It’s kind of offset by how soft and quickly the rest of the chew melts away. Whereas Hi Chew has longer lasting chew before it disintegrates, this one is a bit softer and doesn’t last as long. I guess the gummy is meant to offset it a bit, but the overall experience is kind of jarring sometimes.
Would I buy this again? Most probably, or at least until I get a satisfactory amount of minion blocks. I have to say they alone are worth getting more sticks. As a standalone flavour though? No probably not. It just doesn’t have enough to stand on it’s own. That being said, if I’m ever feeling something that won’t leave too much of an aftertaste in my mouth and need a quick pick me up, these aren’t a bad way to go. At least the slightly inconsistent mouth feel will jolt me awake.
