Snack Review: Mochi Ice Cream
The typical Japanese sweet mochi treat is a chewy, sticky little ball with red bean paste in the center. While I love Japanese food passionately, I have never been able to develop a taste for red bean paste. I don’t like beans in my dinner and I like them even less in my dessert. The taste isn’t bad, actually, but the texture… eeeeuw. Maybe there really are some things you just have to grow up with.
But ice cream – who can argue with that? What’s more, the mochi coating on these isn’t as sticky or chewy as traditional mochi, so it’s probably more acceptable to an American audience.
Or so I would have thought. Personally, I am crazy about these. But when a friend served them to her family, she says that they all basically ate the ice cream out of the inside, and said that the mochi was a nice coating to keep the ice cream off your hands. And these were Californians, who in general have plenty of chances to be exposed to Asian cuisine.
But, Trader Joe’s has faith, apparently – they’ve started carrying the Mikawaya brand. So I was planning to tell you to run right out and get these wonderful things, right at your Trader Joe’s, even if you aren’t near an Asian market.
Um. Slight change of plan.
Really, you should definitely try these. But not the Mikawaya green tea flavor. It has no green tea in it. It’s entirely artificially flavored and wow, green tea “flavoring,” as opposed to real green tea, is seriously nasty. I can’t even explain what it tastes like, it’s like something else green… soap, maybe. Really, really bad.
In contrast, although the Maeda-en brand has “flavoring” in its list of ingredients, it’s got real matcha green tea powder up near the top. This is the one to get if you know what green tea sweets are supposed to taste like (and if you like that flavor, or course).
But, I don’t want to discourage anyone from trying other flavors of the Mikawaya. They are probably much better. They have mango, chocolate, vanilla, coffee, strawberry, and even the dreaded red bean. I’ll bet the coffee is good. Really, this is a good company, they’ve been making Japanese sweets in Los Angeles’ Little Tokyo for almost a hundred years, they know what they are doing. I’m sure this one flavor is an aberration. And, really, Maeda-en has such an unfair advantage when it comes to this flavor, because, as you will see if you look at their website, they are actually a tea company.
To sum up: try these, whichever brand you can find. You’ve never had anything quite like it. You might think they are a really cool, interesting, different product – and at worst, the mochi coating keeps the ice cream off your hands.
And if you like them, please pretty please buy more, because I want this product to take the US by storm. I dream of being able to get it in regular supermarkets and someday even in convenience stores. I long for the day when I can complain about how it’s being made in horrible multi-ingredient American flavors. Rocky-road peanut-butter dulce-de-leche-swirl mochi ice cream, your day will come!
12 Comments
ButterflyKyss on October 14th, 2008
Okay wait- so these are REAL frozen ice cream? I thought at first
they were ice cream flavored candy, so I was a bit confused!
Either way, these sound yummy! I love green tea candies, so I will hunt
for the harder to find Maeda-en variety. Or maybe I’ll just swing into
trader joe’s and see if they don’t have some of those coffee ones!
Linda on October 14th, 2008
Mochi is a very old traditional Japanese food - mochi with ice cream
filling is the thing that’s recent. And yes, this is really ice cream -
look in the freezer section!
Spike247 on October 14th, 2008
I have tried the Mikawaya green tea variety. I love green tea ice cream, but didn’t really care for this product … maybe because it was not what I expected it to be. I’ll try other flavors next.
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Jimmy on October 18th, 2008
Funny. I tried the Maeda-en brand for the first time today as
they were on sale at the local asian supermarket (2 for 5). Got the
strawberry and the green tea. The strawberry was definitely on par
with Mikawaya, and you are correct, the green tea is much better.
Rex Dandycorn on October 21st, 2008
I wouldn’t bother with Mikawaya’s strawberry. The ice cream itself is fine, but somewhere in the strawberrification process, the mochi turned leathery and mealy like a piece of vegan fruit leather made entirely from Red Delicious apples.
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Japanese Ice Cream on October 14th, 2008
Hi,
I have read that Mochi isn’t actually a really old Japanese food and that originally it
was marshmellow that was used. Was something like first made in the 1980’s!
I don’t mind the taste of the Mikawaya ones but didn’t realise they were completely
artificial - not good. The mango one isn’t nice, thats for sure. And like you I am not into Red Bean but it is surely better than Natto