Rice Rice Baby (Mitoku Macrobiotic Sweet Rice Candy Ginger)

Member Name: historywitch

Product:	Mitoku Macrobiotic Sweet Rice Candy Ginger
Date:	14/04/09 (154 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Healthy, Tasty, Handy

Disadvantages: Overpackaged

During the first trimester of this pregnancy I felt so nauseous that I bought everything that I thought might make it better. Teas, lollipops, crystallized ginger, homeopathic remedies - anything spotted, recommended or marketed was grabbed and tried. On one of my forays I was sold these sweets by the local health food shop who assured me they were very popular amongst their customers, especially those suffering from morning sickness. The sweets didn't really work on my sickness (of course!) but they are something I like to keep in my handbag now for a 'healthy' sweet treat.

These little Japanese sweets have only two ingredients:

Traditional Rice Malt (made of whole brown rice, sprouted barley and spring water)
Ginger Powder

and according to the website are made with a traditional Japanese recipe. I have to admit at scoffing scornfully when I clocked the ingredients and the word 'Macrobiotic' - I usually run in the opposite direction from these sort of products but in my pregnancy madness I stocked up!

Each packet contains 15 individually wrapped brown sweets around the size of a cough sweet. They have a pleasant rice and ginger smell to them, although it took a bit of persuasion before I put one in my mouth as it is hard to reconcile brown rice (or sprouted barley) with a tasty experience. I was expecting something healthy and bland, almost medicinal and certainly not something I would ordinarily choose. But to my surprise they tasted just like malt-loaf, sweet and satisfying with a light undertone of ginger. The texture is quite tacky, they aren't a chewable sweet but they don't have that smooth gloss of other suckable sweets - tending instead to stick slightly to the teeth if bitten down upon. They are very comforting to suck as they release their flavour slowly and once finished they leave my breath smelling very lightly of ginger but without unpleasant buildup on my teeth.

These sweets come in four other flavours:

Peppermint
Lotus (vegan)
Sour Plum
Vanilla

but I have become completely addicted to the ginger flavour and there are always one or two in my bag. They are something I am happy to give to my daughter as well as a sweet treat without too many e-numbers or artificial additives.

The cost for a bag ranges between £1.10 (www.goodnessdirect.co.uk) and £1.30 which is what I pay from my local health food shop.

For more information on the sweets and the malt syrup they are made from you can check out the importer's website:
http://www.clearspring.co.uk/european/spreadsswee ts/ricecandies

[Arggggh since writing the headline to this review I cannot get the Vanilla Ice song out of my head)

Summary: Very nice rice