Sometimes Foodie: When Did I Buy This?

Puccho Shiranui Citrus

While doing more of my ~~obsessive~~ New Year's cleaning, I found these! And I have no idea when I bought them. Whoops, first world food blogging/hoarding problems, am I right?

We all know I am not above eating ancient candy, my Spice Girls Lollipop review is all the proof you need, so let's give this a try!

Judging by the visuals, I thought this would be a lemon-like citrus fruit, but as it turns out, it's Shiranui. What's that? Well, I had to google it.

'Shiranui' is a Japanize hybrid (1972) between a Ponkan Tangerine and a Kiyomi. 'Shiranui' is a seedless, sweet variety of mandarin orange. 'Shironui' is distinguished by its super sweet taste, large fruit and the large protruding bump on the top of the fruit. Also known as "ugly fruit" or "sumo citrus."

So while all the packaging is yellow and green, and even the fruit itself on the packaging appears lemon-yellow, this is actually a variation of orange! Let's see how it tastes.

The chew itself is a pale green-ish yellow, with little gummy add-ins. It smells sweet, but tangy, almost like an orange creamsicle, but with tart grapefruit-like citrus notes.

It has the classic gum-like consistency of Puccho, with some added texture from the gummy inclusions, and the overall flavor is impressively complex. I get a creaminess from the typical yogurt-like base of Puccho, along with a sweet and juicy citrus that lands somewhere between lemons, grapefruit, and oranges.

At first the yogurt and orange-like flavoring takes center stage as you chew, giving me breakfast-vibes, but as it begins to break down there is a tangy, almost tart, citrus flavoring that is a little on the dry side, similar to a lot of grape fruit candies. It's not bitter or tart in an unripe or unappealing way, it's actually refreshingly authentic for a candy. I find myself enjoying it a lot and as soon an one piece dissolves into nothing but little gummy bits, I find myself reaching for another.

Despite being old (I don't even remember when I bought these), these are still really enjoyable and flavorful. I believe they were a limited run, so I am not sure when this flavor in particular might pop up again, but when it comes to Puccho, I haven't had a bad flavor yet. If you see this brand around, and you like chewy candies, I highly recommend it.