It seems that every week, there’s a new drink which quietly sneaks up on you by simply showing up, unannounced, in your local vending machine. Japan is a culture of vending machine drinks. Apparently there’s one vending machine for every four people. So, keeping these machines profitable – means lots and lots of drinks – new drinks, comeback drinks, bootleg drinks, drinks with jelly, hot drinks, soup, the classics, “calorie off” drinks…
Anyway, this post is about a particular new drink – it probably came out a month or two ago – Itoen’s Jasmine Tea. In addition to the label being quite appealing – a spring-like floral pattern, the tea inside is equally appealing. The fragrant light brown colored liquid is also, like it’s exterior, floral. But good, floral – just a hint of spring floral tang – not like Elizabeth Taylor perfume floral. So for you folks living in Japan – indulge… before it gets replaced by a watered down 5% fruit juice drink that tastes like thinned-out, canned-fruit syrup.