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In Japan, the culture of gift giving is very important, and nowhere is that as commonly seen as when people take trips. It is very important to come back with a souvenir (“omiyage”) from where your trip took you. Different food and other goods from overseas trips for the folks back home are important, but so are different regional foods from different regions in Japan.
Usually this means small specialty items only available in different regions of Japan. But big companies are getting into it.
Famously, Nestlé is producing varieties of its KitKat bars that are only available in certain regions of Japan – they feature famous flavors from the different regions. They are also producing certain specialty and seasonal versions of KitKats.
Below are these special KitKats.
Otona no Amasa Series (Sweetness for Adult Series) 1 – Dark Chocolate 2 – White Chocolate
Seasonal Series 3 – Maccha (Green tea) 4 – KitKat with Messages (Messages for to cheer on students written on each bar)
Tohoku region 5 – Zunda (Creamy edamame paste)
Tochigi area 6 – Tochiotome (A variety of strawberry grown in the area)
Tokyo area 7 – Eitaro Kuromitsu (Brown sugar syrup made by an old, traditional Japanese sweets shop) 8 – Rum raisin
Yokohama area 9 – Strawberry cheese cake
Tokai area 10 – Wasabi 11 – Azuki sandwich (Red bean sandwich)
Koshinetsu area 12 – Le lectier (A variety of pear grown in the area) 13 – Blueberry cheese cake 14 – Apple 15 – Ichimi (Japanese red pepper spice)
Kyoto area 16 – Maccha (Green tea made by Kyoto’s tea makers) 17 – Hoji-cha (Roasted green tea made by Kyoto’s tea makers) 18 – Yatsuhashi (Japanese style cinnamon-flavored cookie)
Shikoku area 19 – Iyokan (A variety of citrus fruit grown profusely in the area)
Okinawa, Kyushu area 20 – Amao ( A variety of strawberry grown profusely in the area) 21 – Beni-imo (Purple colored sweet potato)
These regional KitKats have become very popular omiyage for people to bring back with them on their travels around Japan.
© Akihabara News
5 Comments
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Russ Schaeffler
These are one the biggest things I miss about living in Japan, especially the wasabi kit kats.... I now live in Toronto and have visited the Nestle factory and they only make the milk and dark chocolate ones.
UsagitoSaru
I love these special kit kats my favorite so far are the hojicha, rum raisin, kuromitsu and strawberry cheese cake! whenever my husband takes business trips to Yokohama he always brings back tokyo and yokohama flavors. I want to try the yatsuhashi ones those weren't available when I was in kyoto in October.
FightingViking
What ? No "20 seki" pears from Tottori ?
Maria
@AustPaul: The wasabi taste isn't that strong,it's entirely edible, go for it!
I really like the yatsuhashi ones. Love the sound of the rum raisin!
A few years ago, they had these really nice mango ones out - lovely. All in all, a very clever idea.
AustPaul
Currently here on holiday and mulling over whether to buy the wasabi kitkat for a pressie for the folks back home...ifonly they had tasters at the shops for these...