うまい棒

Everyday it seems that one company or another is producing a new type of building material that will revolutionize our lives and our homes. But it looks like they can all stop now. The ultimate in structural integrity and edible wall paneling has been discovered!

Not many would have thought to do this, but it takes a rare mind to spark a revolution of this magnitude. If you’re looking for the newest hot real estate tip, look no further–all you need to do is invest in the almighty umaibo!

Umaibo are basically giant sticks of puffed corn that retail for about 10 yen (roughly US$0.10) and come in a variety of flavors. Much like Hello Kitty’s localized figures, the snack has special flavors that are available only in specific locations.

But all of that will soon be irrelevant once everyone realize that umaibo isn’t just food–it’s the greatest building material known to humankind.

Behold! The umaibo home!

umaibohouse

Made of 2,000 sticks of umaibo, the miniature house pictured above has gotten a lot of attention on Twitter, with nearly 8,000 retweets. Perhaps out of fondness for the treat, people are falling in love with this semi-edible house, though it has left some of us scratching our heads. Just how the heck did they find 2,000 sticks of umaibo?? We suppose they could probably be bought at a local convenience store one stick at a time, but that would end up costing 20,000 yen (about $205)! Looking on Amazon Japan, it seems that buying in bulk with help with the cost a little bit: packs of 18 flavors with 30 sticks per flavor (a total of 540 sticks) are available for 4,520 yen (about $46). Considering the incredibly slim profit margin at which umaibo are sold, it seems unlikely that you’d be able to find them for much less, meaning this adorable little house probably cost at least twice as much as building it out of wood!

On the other hand, some things money can’t buy–like the joy of sleeping in an umaibo house.

Japanese commenters mostly loved the house:

This is so cooooool!

Oh, this was much cooler than I had expected it to be.

Playing with your food. LOL

Hey, give me a stick!

My dog would literally eat the whole house.

This is amazing. But what is most amazing is that they found a place to buy 2,000 stick of umaibo.

Hey! This isn’t a house made out of umaibo! They just glued a bunch of sticks of it onto a cardboard house!

Bah! There’s always someone there to spoil the fun, isn’t there? So, what do you guys think? Is umaibo the building material of the future? We sure hope so! It’d be great…until we ate ourselves out of house and home.

Source: Jin115, Twitter
Images: JJ Club, Jin115