Amaou Strawberry Melon Pan / あまおういちごメロンパン

Amaou Strawberry Melon Pan
あまおういちごメロンパン

(Japanese follows. / 日本語は以下へ続く。)

My husband came back from Japan today and brought me back A LOT of snacks.
The first one is this "Amaou Strawberry Melon Pan" produced by Shikishima Baking Company, a.k.a. Pasco.

It's launched on December 1, 2014 and will only be available for 2 months, till the end of January 2015.
And also this is available in Kanto, Chubu, Kinki, Chugoku and Shikoku areas only.
* Amaou is a type of strawberry known as sweetness and richness.

It's a product of their famous series called "いちご三昧 (Ichigo Zammai / Strawberry Indulgence" made with Amaou strawberries, and the biscuit on the top, whipped cream and jelly fillings are all using Amaou strawberries.
* Ichigo means strawberry in Japanese.

There's a note that 97% of the strawberries used in the whipped cream is Amaou strawberry.
And for rare occasion, there might be strawberry seeds in the biscuit and the whipped cream.

The biscuit was pale pink and sprinkled with some white sugar.
It's not crispy but slightly wet and soft, but it's pretty normal to those breads stored in a plastic bag, besides it travelled across the ocean.

From the side, I could see the bottom side had some biscuit, too, as it's pale pink.

After a big bite, I could reach the smooth strawberry whipped cream, but it took me 3 bites to see the strawberry jelly.
The biscuit, whipped cream and jelly were all sweet and not much sourness, like actual Amaou strawberry, and it wasn't bad yet a little bit dull as it's only sweet.
The dough was plain and dry, and I wish they used strawberry in the dough to make it also pink and more flavorful so that it's a true strawberry indulgence.

<Nutrition> --- per 1 package

Calories: 420kcal

Protein: 7.1g

Fat: 14.0g

Carbohydrate: 66.4g

Natrium: 187mg

(Sodium Chloride Equivalent: 0.5g)

Other Melon Pan I've reviewed.

Peko-chan's Melon Pan
Hokkaido Melon Pan
Kiwami No Melon Pan

Only The Top Of The Melon Pan.

旦那が日本から帰ってきて、沢山お菓子を買ってきてくれた。最初に食べたのはパスコとして知られる敷島製パンの「あまおういちごメロンパン」で、
これは2014年12月1日に発売され、2015年1月末までの2ヶ月間限定商品。
また、関東、中国、近畿、中国、四国地方のみでの販売となる。

強い甘さと濃厚な味で知られるあまおうを使った「いちご三昧」という人気 シリーズの
1品で、ビスケット生地、ジャム、ホイップクリームの全てにあまおうが使用されている。

表の右下には、ホイップクリームに使用されているイチゴのうち97％があまおうである
ことと、ビスケット生地とホイップクリームの中にイチゴの種が入っている可能性が
あると書かれていた。

メロンパンのビスケット生地は淡いピンク色で白砂糖がかかっていた。
ビスケット生地にサクサク感はなく少し湿っていて柔らかかったけれど、 プラスチックの
袋に入って売られているメロンパンにはよくある食感なので仕方がない。
さらに海を越えて来たので、もしかしたらその影響もあるのかも？

横から見ると下の部分も淡いピンク色だったので、上部と同じビスケット生地が使われて
いることが分かった。

大きな1口目でイチゴ味の滑らかな生クリームに到達したけれど、ジャムは3口食べた所で
やっと出て来た。
ビスケット生地、生クリーム、ジャムは全て本物のあまおうのように甘くて酸味が少なく
美味しかったけれど、甘いだけで少し退屈な味だった。
パンの生地はプレーンでパサついていて、この生地にもイチゴが使われていたら全体が
ピンクで本当の意味で「いちご三昧」だったと思う。

その他メロンパンの記事。
ペコちゃんのメロンパン
北海道メロンパン
極みのメロンパン
メロンパンの皮焼いちゃいました。

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Tofu Cream Bread / おとうふクリームパン

A Sweet Bread Made With Tofu

生地にもクリームにも国産大豆が使われた「おとうふクリームパン」

At a supermarket, I found an interesting sweet bread.

The name is "Otofu Cream Pan" from Pasco and this contains tofu in the bread and also in the cream.

*Pan means "bread" in Japanese.

These days, it's not that rare to see confectioneries or bread using soy milk or whole wheat, but this sweet bread with tofu was new to me.

And usually the product name is written horizontally, but it's vertical writing.

It might be because the main ingredient is tofu, bean curd.

On the left side, the fact that the dough and cream are made with tofu is mentioned.

国産大豆のとうふクリームを練りこんだ生地で

国産大豆のとうふクリームを包み焼き上げました。

"Kneading domestic soybean cream into dough, 

and the dough wraps the tofu cream made with domestic soybean and baked."

On the right top, there's a red circle indicating the soybeans used in this product were grown in Japan.

This is the bread in the package.

It was a little square and risen bread with golden top.

The bread was airy and light, but the tofu cream was much richer and creamer than I thought.

The cream was smooth and velvety.

Before I tried this, I was thinking that this wouldn't have much tofu or soybean flavor in it, however, the filling was sweet first and later, the familiar scent of soybeans came out and remained.

The bread itself had some sweetness but didn't have tofu taste at all.

I liked this filling as it's similar to regular milk filling but seemed slightly healthier and I liked the tofu flavor.

<Nutrition>

Calories: 315kcal

Protein: 6.8g

Fat: 14.9g

Carbohydrate: 38.4g

Natrium: 234mg (equivalent sodium chloride: 0.6g)

On the ingredients list, tofu flower paste was the first thing to be mentioned, so as it tasted, this uses plenty amount of tofu or soybean related ingredients.

Manufacturer: Pasco

98 JPY

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Nyanko Sensei No Funwari Miruku Mushipan / にゃんこ先生のふんわりミルク蒸しぱん

Nyanko Sensei No Funwari Miruku Mushipan /
にゃんこ先生のふんわりミルク蒸しぱん

I've never heard Nyanko Sensei ("nyanko" means cat but it's a casual way to say, and "sensei" means teacher in Japanese), but apparently it's a cartoon character from Natsume Yujin Cho/夏目友人帳.
http://www.nasinc.co.jp/jp/natsume-anime/about.html

According to the official site above, Nyanko Sensei is a specter, ghost, or monster, but a self-confessed bodyguard/enforcer.
The final episode was shown in March, 2012 around 2:30AM so I definitely didn't know or see this anime.
My fiance didn't know what this character is but he thought this package was really cute and bought one for me.

This anime and Family Mart collaborated and launched Mushipan, which is a steamed bread, which Naynko Sensei's hair color: white, orange, and grey.
(Bread maker is Shikishima Pan/Pasco.)

As the package says, it was really soft and it was about 5cm (2inch) tall.

Price: 130 JPY

Nutrition

Calories: 400kcal

Protein: 7.3g

Fat: 12.5g

Carbohydrate: 64.5g

Natrium: 294mg 

(Sodium chloride equivalent: 0.7g)

It was quite big so it makes sense that this steamed bread has high calories plus it was really sweet.
I didn't notice any milk flavor but it was sweet and tasty.

As it was big and tall, I had to have some rest to finish this bread.
If I had been really hungry, I would have been able to finish it once.

It was sold in January, so I'm not sure if it's still available at Family Mart but they announced they'd sell bean-paste bun (あんまん) on February 19, 2013.

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Hawaiian Host ToffeeMacs / ハワイアンホースト トフィーチョコレートデニッシュ

Pasco's Hawaiian Host ToffeeMacs / 
ハワイアンホースト トフィーチョコレートデニッシュ (パスコ)

I bought this when I find Hawaiian Host Chocolate Bread the other day.
Despite of not having tried ToffeeMacs, I was interested in trying this.

Behind the package, there's a short description of this product.

Same as the Classic Tiki, this is supervised by Hawaiian Host Japan KK and Pasco produced this sweet danish with toffee-ish filling.

The filling of the real product, ToffeeMacs, contains toffee as the name says.
Also on the package, there's a line what toffee is.

"Toffee is made from sugar and butter which are heated together."

"We used caramel cream which tastes close to the toffee."

I see, they don't use real toffee... I wonder why, too costly???

The danish is square and fully covered with chocolate topped with crushed macadamia nuts.

The chocolate cream on the top was slightly bitter but not like dark chocolate.

As you can see, the bread was soft and airy like a pie.

Caramel cream was less sweet than toffee I know, but the bread dough was sweet so I think it was well-balanced.

I'd love to buy this if this was a bite-size; fully covered with chocolate and fragile = needed a plate and wet tissue by me.

No wonder I didn't see this in summer.

Nutrition:

Calories: 470kcal

Protein: 6.5g

Fat: 28.0g

Carbohydrate: 47.9g

Natrium: 354mg

(Sodium chloride equivalent: 0.9g)

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Hawaiian Host Chocolate Bread / ハワイアンホースト チョコレートパン

Pasco's Hawaiian Host Chocolate Bread / 
ハワイアンホースト チョコレートパン (パスコ)

When I dropped by a supermarket near my house, I got excited.
I found Hawaiian Host chocolate bread there!!

This is produced by Pasco, a brand of Shikishima Baking Co., Ltd. founded in 1919 and HQ is in Nagoya city, Aichi pref.
The brand's name Pasco is from Pan Shikishima Company, and pan means bread in Japanese.

This chocolate bread is supervised by Hawaiian Host Japan and the image of the flavor is the most popular and beloved "Hawaiian Host Classic Tiki" which may be known as "Macadamia Chocolate TIKI" in Japanese.

Once I opened the package, nothing really looked like the actual chocolate.
This bread is made of 2 united table rolls with milk chocolate coating...

However, if you think of the chocolate set in the box, they kind of look like 2 balls are connected and have curvy shape, right?
Pasco (or even Hawaiian Host Japan) wanted to let us have an image of the famous chocolate.

I tore the bread into half.

NOTHING THERE.

I only see white and fine bread.

Now I see some chocolate cream 

It was a rich tasted chocolate cream but not like the thick and super sweet chocolate of the real Hawaiian Host chocolate.

Second bite, I could feel some ingredients on my teeth and it was crushed macadamia nuts.

With the nuts, I would say they copied Hawaiian Host, but without it, it's hard to say they did good job.

Probably my expectation was too high since I'm big fan of Hawaiian Host chocolate.

If somebody who don't know that brand or the product, it's satisfying but with such a notable name, personally this didn't make me that happy.

Calories: 366kcal

Protein: 7.1g

Fat: 13.6g

Carbohydrate: 53.7g

Natrium: 179mg

(Sodium chloride equivalent: 05g)

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