Fake eggs are being used in Japanese convenience store bentos

18:04 cherishe 0 Comments

Customer’s investigation leads to a discovery that’s shocked people around Japan.

Japanese convenience stores, or “konbini” as they’re colloquially known, have built up a reputation locally and abroad for their tasty food offerings, covering everything from seasonal desserts through to chicken nuggets, onigiri rice balls and bento lunch boxes.

The pre-made, heat-and-eat bentos are particularly popular with busy customers looking for something quick and substantial to eat, and while many believe they’re a healthier option compared to some of the fattier, oilier foods on sale, that theory is now being blown out of the water due to the discovery that they contain FAKE EGGS.

The shocking discovery has people reeling in Japan, and media outlets are now spreading the news after the revelation came to light with this tweet from Twitter user @coco_tsw., which reads:

“Those of you who fill your mouths with convenience store bentos without a second thought should look at this. 
That egg you think you’re eating is not an egg. Eggs normally harden when heated, but the ones in konbini bentos melt when heated.
Why the heck would you want to put something like that in your mouth when you don’t know how it’s made?”

The tweet contains several images, including a photo of a 7-Eleven bento, which in this case contains a serving of pasta carbonara. While the word “bento” is conventionally used to describe a traditional Japanese boxed meal, it’s also colloquially used by people in Japan as a blanket term that covers Western-style pre-made meals in containers like this one as well.

Sitting in the middle of this bento is what looks like a raw egg, but as subsequent images show, when heated in a pan next to a real egg, the convenience store egg on the left turns into a bubbly, runny mess.

People were shocked at the discovery, leaving a range of comments like:

“Whaaaaat? I had no idea about this!”
“Omg I am shocked. This is frightening.”
“I’ve been eating them all this time and I thought they were real!”
“I’m going to read ingredient labels much more carefully now.”
“Actually, this makes sense as eggs can explode when heated up in the microwave.”
“I would be more scared if this was a real raw egg as that would be a salmonella risk.”

It’s true that a raw egg in a meal like this could cause customers to become ill, and that’s exactly why the fake egg is used, according to its creator, who is none other than Kewpie, the Japanese company behind the world-famous Kewpie mayonnaise.

▼ The “eggs”, which can be found on the official Kewpie site, are called “Snowman Kimipuchi” (“Snowman Petite Egg Yolks“)

Kewpie says their faux egg took over ten years to create, and was designed for commercial clients who wanted to add raw eggs to their products but were unable to due to health safety concerns. According to the description of the “Petite Egg Yolks” on the official site, these “eggs” turn into an “egg yolk-like sauce” when heated, which resembles the runny egg yolk favoured in dishes like oyakodon.

According to this online sleuth, who caught wind of the pseudo eggs last year, the “egg” can be sliced neatly when cold as well.

Unlike a real egg, however, which would have just the word “egg” on its ingredients list, these manufactured yolks have a long list of ingredients which include locally manufactured “liquid eggs”, along with dextrin, glucose syrup, vegetable oil, gelatine, salt, agar, egg white protein, trehalose, polysaccharides, seasoning (amino acid), PH adjusting agents, and carotenoid colouring.

That’s a whole lot of additives and colourings you wouldn’t find in an ordinary egg, and it’s now prompting a lot of people in Japan to rethink their dinner options when browsing the store shelves at their local konbini. Still, there are others who say they don’t care what the eggs are made from, as long as they taste good, which these reportedly do. And that’s not surprising, given they’re made by a mayonnaise manufacturer who celebrated their 100th anniversary by opening a mayonnaise cafe that served mayonnaise pudding.

Source: Jin
Featured image Twitter/@jiromal
 Insert image: Kewpie
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