Showa retro drinks and "cream soda"

As part of the "Showa retro" trend, there's been a renewed interest in drinks such as ice cream floats and sodas or ミックスジュース mikkusu jūsu ("mixed" juice)—original house blends of fruit juice and milk—served in the once-prevalent neighborhood 純喫茶 jun kissa coffee shops and still found in some restaurants and coffee chains.

We've recently seen products inspired by cola floats and covered the renewed interest in "mixed juice," but if there's one drink that symbolizes old-fashioned cafe fare from the Showa era, it would have to be the classic クリームソーダ kurīmu sōda made with green melon-flavored syrup, a scoop of vanilla ice cream and invariably topped with a maraschino cherry:

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Cream soda gummies

Since we've had cream sodas on our mind, we noticed a familiar image in an eye-catching package when we visited our local convenience store the other day. On closer inspection, we realized these were cream soda-flavored gummy candies!

These gummies in a cute and Showa retro design package, called 昭和の味：純喫茶グミ クリームソーダ (shōwa no aji: jun kissa gumi kurīmu sōda | the taste of the Showa Era: jun kissa gummies - cream soda flavor) are sold by the アイデアパッケージ株式会社 Idea Package Corporation, a food package design company based in Osaka. They first released a "mixed juice" version but this second version, inspired by cream sodas, has been the most popular so far. They were initially released in October 2021 and are now back by popular demand.

Since we hadn't ordered a cream soda in a very long time and the taste had faded from our memory, we made our own, following the most conventional recipe of 1 part melon syrup to 4 parts soda:

After refreshing our memories (and our palates), it was time to open up the package and take out the gummies.

We were surprised at how soft they were. Cube-shaped, dusted with coarse sugar with a two layer structure representing the twin flavors of melon and vanilla ice cream, they were unlike any gummies we'd ever seen. The melon part was a bit sticky and syrupy so we recommend holding them from the white part.

They were delicious!

The melon part tasted just like our melon soda and the soft, mashmallowy vanilla part just like vanilla ice cream. Together, they re-create the unmistakable flavor of a cream soda in your mouth. The combination of textures is fun too!

Now we really want to try the other flavors like mixed juice and lemon squash. Each flavor in the series costs 145 JPY (incl. tax). The package weighs 40 g (1.4 oz) and contains 125 kilocalories.

Look for these cute Showa retro gummies at 7-Eleven convenience stores and other locations throughout Japan or you can buy them online at Idea Package's online store here.