Umaibo (Puffcorn): What is the Yasai Salad Flavor?

Dagashi (駄菓子) can’t be told without Umaibo (うまい棒).

For the unfamiliar, Dagashi is the collective term for cheap, unique, and relatively small Japanese snacks and candies whose price ranges from 10 yen (about 0.1 USD) to about 100 yen.

And Umaibo is one of the most famous Dagashi treats, sometimes called The King of Dagashi.

Umai-Bo, literally meaning Delicious Stick in Japanese, is a corn puff stick available in various unique flavors, including Natto, Takoyaki, Teriyaki Burger, and Mentai.

Since its original flavor, Tonkatsu Sauce, debuted in 1979, the price of 10 yen has never changed until today. (It changed to 12 yen from April 2022).

According to the official website of Umaibo, currently, there are 15 regular flavors in the series, and many probably can’t be seen in other countries.

I suppose you couldn’t imagine how the Mentai and Yasai Salad flavors are. But I explained the former before, so today, let me detail the Yasai Salad flavor.

Umaibo Yasai Salad Flavor 

Umaibo Yasai Salad was released in 1980 when its flavor name was just Yasai (やさい, 野菜), meaning vegetable in Japanese.

As you can guess, Yasai Salad (やさいサラダ) is literally vegetable salad in English.

Taste

But this Umaibo delicious stick is far from vegetable salad, and it might be hard to imagine its taste without eating the puffcorn.

Nonetheless, if I express the taste in words, it is savory, packed with umami, and is similar to consomme soup rather than a vegetable salad.

It is, needless to say, yummy, and this has been one of my favorite Umaibo flavors for quite a long time.

Ingredients/Nutrition Facts

Lastly, let’s see the ingredients list and nutrition facts label on the backside of the package.

According to that, the puffed corn snack Umaibo Yasai Salad consists of Non-Gmo potato, vegetable oil, dextrose, sugar, garlic seasoning, spices, breadcrumb, powdered cabbage extract, dried potato, salt, protein hydrolysate, amino acid seasoning, acidifier, paprika pigment, caramel pigment, and flavoring. (This snack partially contains wheat, dairy products, soybeans, chicken, pork, and gelatin.)

The calories per piece (6 grams) are 43 kcal, and this Japanese treat contains 0.1 g salt equivalents.