And it took me a while to figure out what it was, too.
Here’s the packaging:
And here’s what one of the little buggers looks like up close:
A little blurry, but it’s basically a brown nugget wrapped in a darker brown skin.
Putting one in my mouth resulted in a very salty and crunchy experience. Considering this is the experience associated with most snack foods, though, this is a huge step up from moldy and pitted. It took me a while to figure out that these are some sort of bean that has been left in its shell and baked (?). During the baking process the halves of the bean curl outward a little, which pops the ends of the shell off but leaves a band around the center. I imagine these would be fantastic to munch while drinking a beer. However, I realized with the saltiness that one of the dangers of doing this snack food experience is not just that I may be eating things meant to be cooked or served inside a dish, but also that I have no indication of serving size or healthiness of these foods. So while I may be popping these things in my mouth like peanuts, they may have a serving size of 2 beans.
Whatever. I’m still alive, and this is way less risky than many of the other things I’ve eaten so far here.
1 comment
Josh Brandt
March 27, 2012 at 6:56 pm (UTC 0) Link to this comment
OH YEAH! Those are fried broad beans! They’re FANTASTIC. I get them in California all the time, but I have to drive a ways to the Chinese market to find them.
At the Japanese supermarket (yeah, I know, they’re actually Chinese, but I find them at Mitsuwa too) they’re hung up next to the other bar snacks, and they’re definitely good for beer munching.
Now I totally crave some, but I’m out. Time to plan another trip to 99 Ranch…