Ninja Fuwamaru Corn Snacks

Brand: Tohato

Price: 78 yen

Found At: AEON

I love the campiness of these chips. The bag features the image of a woodblock-style ninja and the legend: “Floating, weightless and then suddenly vanishing into your mouth.” It’s the kind of hype that I love in a snack – go big, or go home.

Despite, or perhaps because of, these flowery words , I did not have very high expectations of these snacks, assuming that they would be a fairly standard salty treat. I bought them more for the cheap price and the goofy packaging. But they turned out to be absolutely delicious!

These corn and salt flavored snacks (with some added seaweed to enhance the flavor) are very similar to Pirate’s Booty in the States. They are crunchy and spongy, with about the same consistency as a cheese puff, and likely manufactured in the same way. But the really unusual thing about these snacks is the shape. Instead of being the tube or ball that I usually associate with puffed corn snacks, these are snacks come in wild, branching shapes, like a jet of water or a young corn plant. They are twisted and fractal and resemble the waves and clouds in woodblock prints. There is something unsettlingly alive about the shapes, but maybe that’s the point. Maybe they are meant to represent the shadowy shapes of the ninja that cheerfully adorn the front and back of these chips.

Or maybe it was just a manufacturing error that they rolled with. Either way, I’m game.