Tivoli Akai Bohshi, a brand headquartered in the Japanese hot spring town of Yugawara, Kanagawa, has been dedicated to crafting assorted cookie gift boxes for more than half a century. The name ‘akai bōshi’ translates to ‘red hat’ in Japanese, and the brand’s logo proudly depicts a red bowler-style hat. This is the Tivoli Akai Boshi Kukkia Assorted.
Kukkia feature whipped chocolate sandwiched with a cookie and gaufrette. This box contained an assortment of fourt flavours: milk chocolate, strawberry chocolate, dark chocolate and matcha chocolate.
Each cookie sandwich measures approximately 6 cm in diameter. The top features a crispy gaufre wafer with the Akai Bohshi hat embossed on it, while the bottom is a light sugar cookie.
Upon tasting, the contrast in textures between the top and bottom cookies offered a memorable mouthfeel. The bottom cookie provided a gentle sweetness that first graced the palate, followed by the more flavourful whipped cream. As the bite progressed, the unsweetened gaufre and the sugar cookie melded into a smooth, melt-in-the-mouth sensation, complementing the cream’s lightness.
Milk Chocolate. The whipped cream here had a smooth and rounded milk chocolate flavour that complemented the cookie and gaufre, providing depth of flavour and textural variation while allowing the base flavours of those two components to come through.
Strawberry. This variety featured a strawberry chocolate whipped cream adorned with pieces of strawberry rock sugar. It offered a fresh strawberry flavour with a subtle sweetness, although the rock sugar didn’t contribute noticeable texture or enhance the burst of flavour.
Dark Chocolate. When compared to the milk chocolate variety, the dark chocolate had a noticeable cacao acidity. The more robust flavour profile slightly overshadowed the wafer and gaufre, offering a bolder experience in contrast to the more balanced milk chocolate variety.
Matcha. This particular variety featured green tea chocolate sprinkled with gyokuro tea leaves. The green tea flavour was prominent, offering a subtle sweetness and a delicate umami that harmoniously balanced the mild vegetal notes of the green tea without any trace of bitterness. Among the four flavours, this one and the milk chocolate stood out as the most enjoyable and memorable.
This Tivoli Akai Boshi Kukkia Assorted Cookies contained 12 pieces (3 x milk chocolate, 3 x strawberry chocolate, 3 x dark chocolate, 3 x matcha chocolate). It was produced in Japan and purchased in Sydney, Australia in 2023.