Dainobu

I recently stumbled upon Dainobu while I was walking home from work.  This Japanese grocery store and deli is packed with the kinds of products you usually need to go to Canal Street to find.  I finally made the time to go in but made the mistake of going on a Sunday evening when the prepared foods are not at there best.  From what was left in the deli case, I could tell there were once a lot of delicacies including stuffed squid, udon salad, mochi, and unidentified syrupy sweets.

I figured I would go back when I wasn't dealing with such picked-over goods, but still walked away with the chocolate filled cookies and aloe drink pictured below.  The drink was good but a little sweet for my taste, which means it would go over very well in America and makes me wonder why it's not a thing here.  I picked the cookies based solely on the picture on the box and hoped for the best.  I was wowed to see they were actually mini chocolate filled pastries.  The pastry was far flakier than you would expect from a pre-packaged snack.  If I didn't know better, I would have thought this was a French goodie instead of Japanese one.  I love my Oreos and Vitamin Water, but this was a nice way to mix up my snackies this week.