Orihiro Low Calorie Konjac Jelly Pouches — Kyoho Grape, Muscat & Mango (432g Bag)

Twenty-four twist-open pouches of konjac jelly, in Kyoho grape, muscat and mango. It's much firmer than the jelly you know: konjac sets harder than gelatine, so you squeeze it out of the pouch and chew it rather than let it dissolve. This is Orihiro's erythritol-sweetened recipe rather than its fruit-syrup one, which is where the low calories come from.

It's Orihiro's everyday supermarket range rather than anything premium, and within their low-calorie line this is the big bag, the rest of that line is a 12-pouch version or single standing pouches.

ぷるんと蒟蒻ゼリー, "purun to konnyaku jelly", is the name on the bag, if you're matching it to something you tried in Japan.

If you're choosing between our two Orihiro bags: this is the low-calorie one, built on erythritol, in grape, muscat and mango, with 18g pouches. The other is the 480g white peach, mango and grape bag, built on fruit syrup, with slightly bigger 20g pouches. Same maker, same twist pouch, genuinely different eating.

What you're getting

• Taste: Kyoho grape (Japan's dark table grape, with a bit of skin astringency to it), muscat (the mildest of the three) and mango. Japanese reviewers pick mango as the favourite by a clear margin, and it's also the one people either love or leave. Sweetened with erythritol: a sweetener made by fermenting plant sugar, a little less sweet than sugar itself, and what this bag uses in place of the sugar syrup in Orihiro's others, plus acesulfame K, aspartame and sucralose. Most people don't pick the difference; a few find it cloying.
• Texture: The "purun" in the name: springy, bouncy, with real bite. Closer to a soft gummy than to a wobbly jelly cup, and meant to be chewed.
• Count: packed by weight rather than counted, so the number in a bag varies — usually 24. Each pouch is 18g, about two bites.
• Gelatine-free: set with konjac, which comes from a plant, not from gelatine.
• Allergens: Orihiro declares none of Japan's 28 listed allergens in this one. Read the pack's own label before you rely on ours.
• Allergens, one more: It does contain aspartame, which is a source of phenylalanine. That matters to anyone managing phenylketonuria (PKU); for everyone else it changes nothing.

Hold the pouch in both hands, cut slowly along the dotted line, push the jelly out a little at a time, and chew it well: don't suck it straight from the pouch, and don't put the cut edge in your mouth. Konjac jelly is firmer than it looks: young kids and older folks should have theirs pushed out in small pieces, with someone keeping an eye on them. Don't freeze them either: the maker warns the pouch can tear and fire the jelly out as one hard lump.

One honest note before you get a bagful. Orihiro's own packet says eating a lot in one go can leave your stomach unsettled. That's the sugar alcohol, and it's true of this whole category rather than this bag in particular. One bag to try the texture; more if the household approves.