Tokyo Banana Pie

Japan's Twinkie-like cult treat

If you’ve ever had the good fortune to travel through Tokyo’s Narita Airport, you wouldn’t have missed the stacks of Tokyo Banana Pies in the shops, sitting among all the tasty treats for friends back home. These small vanilla sponge cakes filled with banana custard are Japan’s more upscale version of the Hostess Twinkie, so we decided to taste them to see if they were …

Secret Squirrel Cold Brew

Creating the ultimate all-American cold brew coffee with Hawaiian beans and LA illustrators

Trevor and Rebecca Smith began their love affair with cold brew coffee by experimenting at home. Their adventures with beans, roasting profiles, brew times, filters and recipes led them to launch Secret Squirrel Cold Brew. The duo transforms organic fair-trade coffee into a cold-brewed concentrate, double filtering each batch for 18 to 24 hours. The 16 oz. bottles yield about seven servings (of eight oz. …

A Single Hop by the Committee on Opprobriations

The DC-based designers are educating beer drinkers about hops with abstract prints

Craft beer’s surge in popularity coincides with a movement toward locavorism and a greater general interest in the ingredients in the products we consume. Most people now know that beer contains four major ingredients: water, grain, yeast and hops. Hops, the flower of the climbing plant humulus lupus, play a central role in determining a beer’s character. But some people aren’t aware that there are …