Morinaga Ramune Non-Carbonated Soft Drink
Made basically with sugar (dextrose), starch (potato, corn), and acidifier (citric acid) and shaped like a tablet, “Ramune (ラムネ)” is a classic Japanese sugar candy with a nice, chalky, melt in the mouth texture.
Ramune is said to have been created imitating the taste of Ramune soda, a Japanese carbonated beverage with a lemonade flavor, but the details are unknown, also the definition is unclear.
When it comes to the product, with a long history, “Morinaga Ramune (森永ラムネ)“, produced and sold by Morinaga Seika (Confectionery), is the best, which, in fact, has been loved by people of all generations for decades.
Morinaga Ramune Drink
Since Morinaga Ramune is a very famous, well-established brand name here in Japan and has a very familiar taste to us Japanese, recently, on June 8, Morinaga Nyugyo (Milk), a family company of Morinaga Seika, released its beverage version.
Unlike classic Ramune Soda, this Morinaga Ramune Drink is a non-carbonated soft drink, which beautifully recreates the taste of Morinaga Ramune Soda Candy. It is priced at 150 yen (about 1.4 USD) and can be bought at convenience stores.
Taste
The liquid of this Morinaga Ramune Drink is clear like water and indeed tastes like Morinaga Ramune Candy. Also, I think this beverage has a taste quite similar to Ramune Soda, though it’s not a fizzy drink.
Ingredients
But how does the non-carbonated Ramune drink differ in ingredients from classic fizzy Ramune Soda? I was wondering, so lastly did some online research about that.
First, based on the list pictured above, the ingredients of the Morinaga Ramune Drink are sugar, high fructose corn syrup, dextrose, daily product, acidifier, flavoring, and sweeteners (acesulfame potassium, sucralose).
On the other hand, according to the article “ラムネ (清涼飲料)” on Japanese Wikipedia, Ramune Soda is carbonated water sweetened with sugar/high fructose corn syrup, flavored with lemon or lime flavoring, and typically acidified with citric acid.
