Grill-A-Corn — munchies review

by Kris   ⋅   January 28, 2006   ⋅   Comment now   ⋅    RSS

Grill-A-Corn is Japan’s answer to crunchy Cheetos except it’s not cheesy. Well, maybe the name is a bit cheesy. Even though they won’t leave a greasy residue on your fingers, they are actually more lard-o than the popular American cheese puffs, due to that wonderful ingredient: palm kernel oil. And although they don’t seem to be seasoned much, they are infused with some sort of invisible but intense flavoring with fullblast MSG boosters. So they hardly leave a trace behind.. as opposed to the telltale orange rings and fingertips from a messy cheese puff binge.

They seem to have bypassed the trusty original or just-corn flavor; comes in hot-and-spicy, barbeque, bacon-cheese. Lucky people get to try the garlic-toast flavor, but I haven’t seen them anywhere around here. Waah. We get the hot-and-spicy, which is more like barbeque. I think the barbeque flavor was more like oil and shoyu, but they weren’t memorable enough for us to buy again. Since Calbee dubbed them “Aromatic Grilled Corn Sticks”, maybe they were going more for smell than taste(?) What I like is that the taste of corn comes through and it isn’t too salty.

They are all Martha Stewart-esque uniformly shaped pieces, which means that unfortunately you’ll never marvel at the size range from rice-grain to Captain Caveman’s club like you do with Cheetos. Best of all is the trippy paragraph on the back of the bag: “Grill-A-Corn is made by grinding the best corn from America and Europe and then baked. Although Grill-A-Corn is not fried, it is crispy and tasty because Calbee has the expertise, technological know how and the strictest quality control. BBQ Grill-A-Corn — a unique sense of corn barbecuing!!”

About the Author:

Kris Kobayashi-Nelson has zero cavities and has had dentists place bets against her. Although she’s a candy addict, she is no chocoholic; she thinks milk- and white- chocolate are disgusting. Kris does enjoy Cucu Azuki and Cream and assorted types of yummy gum.

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