Suntory Surfers Soda Review!

What a great concept for a drink! It's essentially marketed as the perfect drink to kick back with after a long hot day at the beach catching some serious waves on your surfboard. As you lie back and observe the awesome surfers and gorgeous babes around, you can sip on your Surf Mode Soda for the ultimate refreshment under the beating sun.

To reinforce the message of summer sun, sand and waves, the drink comes in these beautifully designed bottles you can see below which are the colour of crystal blue waters on a perfect day.

And here you can see a close up of the beautiful beach babe motif that adorns the Surf Mode Soda surfboard and no doubt indicates the type of people you are expected to associate with whilst enjoying your Surf Mode Soda.

We also had a lot of fun shooting this review as we got dressed up in our best surf gear and donned our sunnies for a real beach style review. Heck we even featured Keanu Reeve's classic line from Bill & Ted's Most Excellent Adventure which consists of exactly one word "Woah...".

And of course since it is produced by Suntory we featured a little Bill Murray too "for relaxing times make it Suntory time".

Overall this review was a lot of fun to produce, although I did struggle a little with my geography in the middle of it. As Arne was careful to point out (and later to subtitle in the video) after I made the rather ludicrous statement of "I can taste the Miami Sun, Hawaii here I come" , Miami and Hawaii are in fact nowhere near each other. Then he reminded me of my equally embarrassing mishap with our Pepsi Baobab review where I mistook the giraffes on the bottle for camels...

Sadly as we drank more and more of the soda it actually became rather less refreshing and started becoming a bit too dry, losing sweetness and with a slightly odd aftertaste. I presume this is probably a result of the use of artificial sweeteners since it's supposedly a zero calorie drink. I never drinks with artificial sweeteners by choice and I rarely if ever am able to enjoy them for long. Still it was a fun review over all and the drink certainly has potential. If you are a zero calorie drink person then you'll probably love this one, as it's one of the best I've had in that group. 

Check out all our reviews of bizarre Asian snacks, foods and drinks here: Crazy from Kong!

And you can check out my blog here: Spencer Douglass

Hakodate Wine Caramels はこだてわいんキャラメル and Nanae Sweet Apple Wine Caramels 七重スイートリンゴワイン キャラメル

Hakodate is a city in the South of Hokkaido that is apparently famous for making wine and Nanae is a small town nearby that is apparently famous for it's sweet apple wine. 

I saw these wine flavoured caramels in my local 7 Eleven and thought they might make quite an interesting snack for young +Joe Fiorello and myself. To make things even more interesting after looking at the packet I found out that they actually contained a certain amount of real alcohol from the addition of actual Hakodate Wine to the sweet mixture. All of this had me quite excited! 

Unfortunately my dream of getting drunk with Joe in the middle of the afternoon by consuming delicious wine caramels was not to be... Turns out that the caramels did not taste of wine at all, just mild grape and to make matters worth there was nowhere near enough alcohol in them to have even a mild effect. 

The only consolation was that the Nanae Sweet Apple Wine Caramels which you can see below, where deliciously sweet and fall of apple scent and flavour. 

Sadly this disappointing review went on to become our least popular of all time, despite the fact that Joe references it in a whole bunch of our future reviews. Perhaps you could watch the video below and help his dream of it becoming our most popular review come true! 

Check out all our reviews of bizarre Asian snacks, foods and drinks here: Crazy from Kong!
And you can check out my blog here: Spencer Douglass

Kanikko Crab Snack - Eating Baby Crabs...

Well these were really a weird snack! This snack was bought for us by Emma Moosa and was essentially a bunch of tiny little deep fried crabs inside of some giant crab packaing. You can see what they looked like here: 

As you can see from the picture above, the crabs were presented in their entirety with their tiny legs, claws, shells and even eyes intact (presumably their tiny little brains too...). On top of that, these were not a variation of the ever popular "soft shell crabs" that are served in Japanese and some other Asian restaurants all year round, but rather appear to be regular hard shelled crabs just in small sized and fried to crispy. As a result they were still pretty tough and brittle, as Arne described "it was like eating teeth". The flavour was intensely fishy and they were pretty stinky to boot.

Overall this was very far from being a tasty snack and I think was a pretty gruesome experience for all involved. Check out our video review to see our full reactions and meet our special guest star Emma:  

Check out all our reviews of bizarre Asian snacks, foods and drinks here: Crazy from Kong!
And you can check out my blog here: Spencer Douglass Blog

Brain Juice - Drink This and Get Really Smart!!!

Lots of people dream of being just a little bit smarter, or having a better memory, or being able to ace their tests without studying and finally there dreams can come true! Just by purchasing an inexpensive drink they can become really smart!

Kirin Brain Juice is filled with DHA (the primary structural component of the brain) and lots of other exciting herbs with unpronounceable names that are guaranteed to make you at least an Einstein level genius after a few cans.

The attractively designed metal bottle shows a professor with a lightbulb for a brain, presumably indicating that he's just had a Eureka moment leading to the creation of this wonderful potion:

The rest of the bottle is covered in complicated mathematical equations, equipment from a chemistry lab (including a conical flask) and other difficult and complicated things that most sensible people know nothing about. 

So how was the experience? Well the drink itself was quite delicious and satisfying, with a sort of light root beer flavour, complimented by the herbally taste of the various intelligence creating essences that have been added. 

Did it work? Of course! I've been a genius ever since I drunk it! 

Don't believe me? Send me a difficult question and I'll answer it. 

To watch me getting instantly smarter as I drink it check out the video review below: 

Check out all our reviews of bizarre Asian snacks, foods and drinks here: Crazy from Kong! 
And you can check out my blog here: Spencer Douglass Blog

Fanta Shake Shake - This Remarkable Drink Combines Fanta With Liquid Jelly and Comes in Grape & Orange Flavours!!!

Now this has to be one of the most awesome products ever and is definitely one of my all time favourite drink products that we have reviewed! Essentially a cross between a regular Fanta soda and a Fanta flavoured jelly, this is one of those bizarre marriages that shocks you by what a great success it is. Coming in two delicious flavours: the traditional Fanta Orange (below) and my personal favourite Fanta Grape (above), the idea is to take the can which is filled with a soda and jelly combination and shake it up aggressively till both ingredients are perfectly mixed. Then gulp down the soft, fizzy, squishy and sweet result in a moment of pure self-indulgent pleasure! 

Now don't get me wrong, I'm sure these tiny little cans are bursting over with teeth rotting sugars and probably filled with more colouring agents and funny chemicals than science laboratory, but heck you're not buying the product for it's health value, you're buying it coz it's ridiculously delicious and a childhood-like guilty pleasure! 

Check out our review of this wonderful product below: 

Check out all our reviews of bizarre Asian snacks, foods and drinks here: Crazy from Kong!

And you can check out my blog here: Spencer Douglass Blog