Think Cheetos ice cream with caramel and you’re halfway on the track to what this tastes like.

Tohato’s Caramel Corn is an iconic Japanese snack that’s been on the market since 1971. While the name might lead foreign visitors to mistake the snack for caramelised popcorn, there’s no popcorn to be found here — instead, it’s a corn-based snack, similar in look and flavour to Cheetos.

▼ Caramel Corn snack (left), new ice cream (right)

The snack is loved by all ages in Japan, so when news started spreading that it would be available in ice cream form from today, fans ran out to buy it, and we were lucky enough to pick one up at our nearest convenience store.

The ice cream is served up in a choice of three different package designs, all featuring the familiar face used on the snacks, and the one we chose was giving us a cheeky wink.

It looked a lot more slender than we’d anticipated, but inside the slim packaging was a very decent-sized ice cream bar.

▼ It was yellow in hue, just like the corn puffs themselves.

The packaging boasted that the ice cream “contains roasted peanuts”, so we cut the ice cream in half to see if we could find any.

▼ Yep — there they are!

The peanuts were generously scattered throughout the ice cream, creating a satisfying crunch with every bite. As for the taste, it was high on caramel, with the rich bittersweet flavour singing out on the palate and pushing the puffed corn out of the way, building up to a crescendo that almost had us exclaiming “too much caramel!” At that point, however, a slight saltiness stepped in to take the spotlight off the sweetness, rounding itself out with a delicious finish.

The Caramel Corn snack turned out to be a great partner for a creamy ice cream like this one, and we’ll definitely be requesting an encore while it’s still on sale. It’s currently available at convenience stores, and will be released at other stores nationwide from 9 January.

Photos © SoraNews24
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