Candy Comparison : Morinaga Hi-Chew Premium vs Standard Hi-Chew

“Hi-Chew (ハイチュウ)” is a taffy candy produced and sold by “Morinaga Seika (森永製菓)”, a leading Japanese confectionery company well-known for its caramel candy “Morinaga Milk Caramel” and sugar candy “Morinaga Ramune Soda Candy“.

Together with Morinaga Milk Caramel (Amazon.com) and Ramune Soda Candy (Amazon.com), Hi Chew is one of the Morinaga’s top-sellers and widely enjoyed around the world.

Morinaga Hi Chew is a long-selling series of taffies introduced into the Japan’s market in 1975. Actually, in recent years, Morinaga released another Hi Chew series in Japan. That is Hi-Chew Premium put on the market in 2013.

I have seen some online shopping sites handling the newly released Hi-Chew taffies, so you might already know those.

Hi Chew Premium Grape vs Regular Hi Chew Grape Taffy Candy

Actually today, I purchased both Morinaga Hi-Chew Premium Grape and regular Hi-Chew Grape (Amazon.com) for this blog article, for I want to compare them this time for those who are curious about new Hi-Chews. Now, let’s get started.

Features

Hi-Chew Premium’s taffy candies have a round, spherical shape and are in a plastic package with zipper without wrap, while the taffy in standard Hi-Chew Grape is square in shape and individually wrapped with paper.

Hi-Chew Grape

Standard Hi-Chew Grape’s taffy candy has a two-layer structure and its outer candy contains grape puree. This taffy is firm, chewy, and somewhat sticky. As for the taste, it is flavorful, rich in flavor of grape, and has a moderate sweetness.

Hi-Chew Premium Grape

The taffy candy of Hi-Chew Premium Grape has an aromatic coating that is thin compared to the outer layer of standard Hi-Chew taffies. The inner part is full of flavor of Cabernet Sauvignon, a representative grape cultivar for red wine. This premium candy is soft, not so chewy and not so sticky compared to the former.

Overall, I think that, thanks to the grape Cabernet Sauvignon, this one has a flavor closer to actual grape. Both the regular Hi-Chew and the Premium Hi-Chew are delicious, but if I had to choose, I’d say I liked this one better.

Ingredients 

Speaking of the ingredient, the taffy candy of regular Hi-Chew Grape mainly contains starch syrup, sugar, vegetable fat and oil, gelatin, concentrated grape juice, mixed jam (including apple), and grape puree.

On the other hand, the main ingredients of Hi-Chew Premium Grape candy are starch syrup, sugar, glucose, vegetable fat and oil, concentrated grape juice (99% of Cabernet Sauvignon), and gelatin.

Price and Where to buy

Standard Hi-Chew Grape’s suggested retail price is 100 yen, while that of Hi-Chew Premium Grape is 120 yen. Both the Hi-Chews are available at many supermarkets in Japan, and the regular one can be bought on many online shopping sites outside of Japan.