Kotas Reviews Frito-Lay I Have No Idea (Takoyaki-Tei)

Today we return to the Mystery Box for additional snack treats! There is a glorious habit of anthropomorphic food icons to sell us various treats. From the talking M&Ms to the crazy zaniness of McDonaldLand, walking, talking food has been trying to sell itself to us for consumption for ages and ages. Occasionally a product takes it to a whole new level. Today we look at...I have no freakin' idea.

Soy Fritter Ball Things? Adipose gone horribly wrong? I wish I could read Japanese.

Whatever the heck these things are, they are ADORABLE. Look at 'em, with their big smiles and stumpy limbs only good for the suggestion of motility! Clearly they are supposed to be living incarnations of the fried sauce covered things to the right of the packaging, and the potentially female one has a BOW in what passes for hair. And big eyelashes for some reason. Anyway, I love this packaging. It makes me want a plushie version of these things. SO CUTE! I wonder what is on the back?

Aw, they have a lovely family. Wait, are they eating their own kind? THE TERROR OF IT ALL!

The back of the package is no help determining what these things are, but it shows a preciously snuggly family settling down to eat a meal of themselves, like the horrible cannibals that they apparently are. So much for cute and cuddly, eh? It's always the cute ones you have to watch out for. Let's open it up and see what we have.

Heh heh. BALLS.

Well, they smell like onion and soy sauce, and they are basically corn puff balls with flavor dust on them, much like I expected. By Akira's Ghost these things are darn tasty though! It's like someone took an unflavored corn puff, dipped it in soy sauce, coated it lightly in onion powder, and let it dry. Savory, tangy, and excellently munchable, I ate almost the whole bag of these. My daughter however rejected them outright with "Yuck!", but she's a three year old and thus her opinion on the matter doesn't count. I now understand what drives these cheerful mascots to greedily devour their own kind. They are delicious! So, what the heck are these supposed to be? Well, according to the Internet, they are a snack food distillation of a takoyaki: fried octopus ball with sauce. I can honestly say that is not what I was expecting.

On the FACE Rating System, these get an easy 2 Smiley Faces. They are om nom nom good, but I wouldn't want them every day. Damn tasty though, and if you can get your hands on them, you should pop them in your food hole. Unless you hate soy sauce, probably. And you know what? I don't care if they are cannibalistic, I still want a plush version of their mascot.