The last Kit Kat I reviewed was the Limited Kyoto Itokyuemon Uji-Maccha (宇治抹茶) and knowing that I had another maccha Kit Kat in store, I wanted to do them back to back to compare and contrast. The Kyoto variety is easily one of my favorite Kit Kat, with it’s smooth, earthy, honest green tea style. So, this set of fingers really had a lot to live up to.

First, packaging. This flavour came out at about the same time as the White Coffee flavour (namely spring) and if you remember, I took issue with the sakura packaging of the white coffee Kit Kat. It just didn’t make sense there. Here of course, it does. I quite like the packaging here. A Traditional sized box, with the the common Nestle Kit Kat brand is present, of course, but the box itself is a vibrant green that plays beautifully against the pink place setting and sakura blossoms. Of course, on the southeast corener, there is a similarly green cup of maccha. This is successful because not only does it appropriately sell the flavour, but the colors are lively and eye catching. I admit that when searching through the Nestle website, this packaging was one of my favorites. The bittersweet colour palette was interesting and engaging and paired with the flavour itself, wonderfully exciting.

The interior wrapper is understated, but carries through with the brand. A green gradient to white and a pink gradient to white are at both ends. Besides looking appealing, it makes note of a soft blending of the two flavours. Let’s hope that’s what we get!

Opening the package, again, there was no strong green tea aroma like the last Kit Kat, unless I really went searching for it. They smelled of a sweetened green tea dessert, like Haagen Daz green tea ice cream with no real hint of sakura. In fact, there was a pretty strong chocolate scent before there was anything sakura. Colour-wise, the fingers were almost identical to those from Kyoto (which isn’t surprising they’d use the same dye numbers).

桜抹茶「Sakura Maccha」Kit Kat

On the first bite, if I’m honest, I found nearly no green tea. Instead, it was mostly the sweet of the white chocolate and a very spicy version of sakura (like cinnamon, perhaps). I hadn’t really known what to expect from the sakura in these. I had really hoped for a strong, bitter taste of sakura pickled in ume as that would be quite exciting. If I had to say what the taste was like, I’d say it was a milder version of the Tokyo-style sakuramochi I’d had before as it was a slightly sweet, bland sakura flavour (as if introduced to azuki). Also, perhaps like sakura ice cream which is usually more delicate in flavour.

Through the first finger, I didn’t really get the green tea at all. On the second one, I could taste it initially before becoming consumed by the azuki-like sakura flavour. Sampling just a bit of the chocolate I found that it was meant to convey the green tea flavour, but it was mild inside the sweet white chocolate. I like a real earthy maccha, not sweet. This definitely was of the latter. It has also become quite apparent that the filling of the wafer in Japanese Kit Kat will be the most dominant flavour. In the Kyoto snacks, there was definitely maccha filling and thus had a strong maccha flavour; these it’s inverted.

The filling in these also seemed, for whatever reason, creamier than other bars. On a presentation note, however, the filling is quite disappointing. The wafer are regularly colored with simple white filling. It would have been nice to see a bright pink or fuchsia filling. The fingers would have looked really interesting.

Overall, the flavour of these are really, really tough to judge. As a sakura-maccha snack, they fail pretty horribly. I can almost never get a sense of the maccha. However, the “spicy” sakura/azuki flavour is really quite delicious. I could eat these all day and actually, now that I’ve finished this box, I dare say I’d like some more. A great taste, horribly misrepresented.

Flavor: 7.5/10 (would have been a solid 8 had these not mentioned maccha at all)

Presentation: 4/10

Packaging: 9/10

The packaging was really solid here: colourful, engaging and interesting; a selling point on its own. The presentation of the snacks themselves left a bit to be desired. I like the “maccha” colour of the chocolate (quite possibly the same as the Kyoto snacks) but the filling and wafers are boring, uninspired. The flavour was fantastic, a mild spiciness reminiscent of sakura-azuki desserts that wasn’t too sweet either.

How do they compare to the Kyoto Uji-Maccha Kit Kat? They don’t. There’s hardly any maccha flavor here whereas the Kyoto fingers are packed full of them. If you’re after maccha flavour, try those. If you’re after a unique maccha flavour, don’t look here. Try these only for the sakura in them.