SoraNews24 —Japan News—

Bringing you yesterday's news from Japan and Asia, today.

TOP

» Japan
» Brand-new premium sake Kit Kats are out in Japan, and they’re amazing【Taste test】

Featured

Weird
Studio Ghibli
Jobs

Brand-new premium sake Kit Kats are out in Japan, and they’re amazing【Taste test】

Casey Baseel Sep 20, 2017
Tweet

But how well do they pair with their liquid inspiration? SoraNews24’s Meg finds out.

It’s almost hard to believe now, but for many years the only Kit Kats sold in Japan were the same basic, original chocolate ones that the rest of the world has. Then someone hit upon the idea of making a matcha green tea flavor, and the phenomenal success led to the cornucopia of Japan-inspired flavors we know and love.

Last year, Nestle decided to try it’s hand at basing a Kit Kat flavor off of Japan’s other representative beverage: sake. Once again, the confectioners knocked it out of the park, with locals and international visitors alike singing the praises of the elegantly mature dessert.

For a follow-up, Nestle recently announced that it would be releasing a second flavor of sake Kit Kats. But whereas the previous ones were a generic sake flavor, these new treats proudly trumpet that they’re made with Masuizumi, a variety of sake from Toyama Prefecture whose brewer has been in business for over a century.

The new Masuizumi Kit Kats are now on sale, and we tasked our Japanese-language reporter Meg with trying them out. After procuring a box, she swaggered into SoraNews24 headquarters with a box of the hotly anticipated sweets in her left hand…

…and a bottle of lightly chilled Masuizumi sake in her right.

Now even in an office where work protocol is as lax as ours, our bosses usually frown on us drinking on the job. Meg had a solid excuse, though, in that she wanted to try a cup of Masuizumi first in order to establish a baseline for the sake, so that she could better judge how well the Kit Kats replicated the flavor profile.

Masuizumi is crisp and slightly fruity, with a clean, dry finish. It has a light mouthfeel, but just as you swallow it, there’s a comfortable sensation of alcohol splashing against the back of your throat, followed by a rice-taste finish that’s as soft yet thrilling as the final falling sparks of fireworks in the night sky.

Meg’s bottle of Masuizumi cost just 1,200 yen (US$11), but its quality was far beyond what we’d expected. Now it was time to see if the Masuizumi Kit Kats, which cost 700 yen for a pack of nine, also punched above their weight in class/price point.

As soon as Meg tore open the wrapper, she knew this was going to go well. The aroma that wafted out of the package was an exact match for the Masuizumi sake.

The flavor, meanwhile, is almost an exact match. That’s to be expected, though, since the Kit Kats are covered in white chocolate, something that’s not present in these desserts’ liquid inspiration. Still, they deliver 95 percent of the deliciousness of a cup of Masuizumi, but with a milder finish, since while the Kit Kats do contain 0.4 percent alcohol, that’s not nearly as much as you’ll find in sake itself.

After finishing off a pair of wafers, Meg could say with confidence that a Masuizumi aperitif transitions seamlessly into munching on the new sake Kit Kats. But what if she followed that up with another drink?

It turns out that following sake Kit Kats with sake is just as tasty as the reverse order. As a matter of fact, Meg cautions that they go so well together that if you’re not careful, you’ll fall into an endless loop, eventually ending up with a stomach ache and a hangover.

But if you remember to indulge in moderation, the Masuizumi Kit Kats and their drinkable counterpart are a blissful combination.