Japan department store fun?

[TinaLala]

Does anyone else love the Japan department store Mitsukoshi? We give my kids $5-10 and tell them to buy something they've never had before and gen we all share our new treasures. We saw it on a Lou Mongello show and have been doing it ever since.

We've had marshmallows with jelly inside, chocolate ramen, ginger candy, soda, wasabi flavored chips. One year we just did mints.

Has anyone else done this and what have you tried?

 

[kimj88]

We LOVE that store! Whole family is looking forward to spending a long time in there next visit....almost like it is a ride or something

 

[kbmartin]

We haven't tried any of the food in the store (although we have been to Tokyo Dining, which was awesome!), but I pick up a new Zen garden at Mitsukoshi every year for my classroom. Believe it or not, my ninth and tenth graders absolutely adore the Zen garden and gather around it all of the time. Sometimes they will even hide items (like coins) inside it for other students to find as a surprise. Students ask me where I found it constantly. (It's also been a great "fidget" item for students with special needs.) That has been a great purchase!

 

[kimj88]

I love the little owls that have different meanings for each color

 

[lullwater]

Our family loves the store as well. Every so often the inventory changes. Wish they had more variety of pocky and koala snacks; such as the almond, cream, coconut, matcha, banana, mango flavors. The cream collons are tasty. Some of the Japanese flavors of Kit Kat are the best and not too sweet. Can’t remember if they have all the different flavors of Ramune soda in the bottle sealed with a marble. Don’t really like the soda, but the creativity of the bottle is fun for kids. I run away from the shrimp flavored chips, but my son loves them. The Calbee potato sticks in a variety of flavors make for a good snack.

 

[monorailsilver]

We always bought pocky and rice candy. My DH had never had rice candy before that. I had it growing up because we used to go to NYC growing up and hunt down rice candy in China town.

Then we discovered pocky! Yum!

But we can get both at 5 below now.

Sounds like fun though.

 

[Minnesota!]

I adore this store! There is SO much to look at and try..

 

[loves to dive]

In the minority here, I try to avoid the main part of the store and just go in the back entrance. It seems to be always crowded and loud and just a little overwhelming for me and I don't even mind crowds. I do go into the Morimoto pearls section if I am in the main store though. My son was never a big fan either, even when he was little.

 

[DisneyRegulars]

Thank you for this idea! We had a blast picking out snacks and trying them. Well we haven't tried the spicy dried squid yet, but the two candies we tried were a huge hit and my son can't wait to go back and pick out something else. This will definitely be a new tradition for us.

Our choices:

 

[littlbugmom]

My DD and I always spend SO MUCH time in that store! She loves it. We always take a bag full of "unknown" stuff back to the condo with us!

 

[cariann77]

This store makes me want to pay for park hoppers! We're doing a quick visit before our cruise and only hitting MK. My kids love it!

 

[TinaLala]

DisneyRegulars - can't wait to hear how the squid is! How was the long train of candy? We've seen that a few times but never grabbed it.

Check out their ginger candies, those are my favorite. I've been making a list off the department stores website so I can look for goodies when we go next.