Hawaiian Warrior Beef Jerky - Teriyaki

Hawaiian Warrior Beef Jerky is a brand owned by Palama Holdings, LLC of Kapolei, HI. The jerky has been around since 1969.

The Hawaiian Warrior brand had actually been owned by Palama Meat Company, a company that started out as local butcher in the 1950s. The company soon became the largest meat processor in the state after gaining contracts with local school districts to supply meat. It later launched a line of foods under the Mays Hawaii brand.

In 1997, the company's owner, Donald Lau, retired by selling Palama Meat Company to H&W Foods. In the years following, H&W Foods ran into financial diffiulty and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. In 2004, a California-based investment company bought H&W Foods, and relaunched it as Palama Holdings, LLC.

Since it first launched, Hawaiian Warrior Beef Jerky has grown to become a local favorite in Hawaii, but it never really gained a following beyond the State. It also earned a stigma from tourists as being a bad-tasting jerky. The company recently redesigned the package into what you see now, and reformulated the recipes. The product is now being exported into the mainland and into asian food markets.

Ingredients

Beef, water, sugar, sodium citrate blend, monosodium glutamate, hydrolyzed soy protein, garlic powder, maltodextrin, citric acid, caramel color, spices, onion powder, tomato powder, soy sauce, pineapple juice solids, natural flavor, extractives of tamarind, dextrose, modified food starch, natural smoke flavor, vinegar solids, not more than 2% tricalcium phosphate, added to prevent caking.

Taste

There's something of a sweet taste that I detect immediately upon putting a piece into my mouth. With some chewing, that sweetness comes out more. I can also sense a touch of soy sauce.

Aside from that, I don't taste much else.

I can't really detect any of the natural meat flavors in this. After thinking hard about what I'm tasting, I do pick a very faint signal of meat, but it's more of that "old meat" taste, where it's somewhat stale, or starting to turn. But still, it's very faint, and only detectable if you really look hard for it. Otherwise, there's nary a meat taste in this at all.

As for that sweetness, it's not heavily sweet by any means. But considering there's little other taste to this, even that would be welcomed.

Considering this jerky is advertised as a "Hawaiian Teriyaki" variety, there's is very little teriyaki to be tasted here. Perhaps Hawaiian Teriyaki is a light variety of standard teriyaki, but if that's the case, it's extremely light on taste.

Overall, it doesn't taste bad. It just doesn't taste much at all. All I'm getting is the bit of sweetness, and very light touch of soy sauce. No natural meat flavors, not even very salty either.

Meat Consistency

This appears to be cuts of whole meat, sliced into medium thickness, and in small to medium sized pieces.

This is somewhat dry, but you might also think of it as somewhat moist also. They are very flexible and don't break at all. In fact, it has the rubbery consistency, like "gummy jerky".

It's easy to tear a piece apart, and easy to chew.

I do see a fair amount of fat on these pieces, but I didn't find much in tendon or gristle. I did find some pieces with small bits of membrane that made for some additional chewing.

Overall, it's a decent meat consistency in that there's nothing major that got in my way, and is easy to eat. The rubbery consistency is something you often see in large national brands, with their attempt to make jerky more soft and tender. I don't particulary care much for it.




Product Value

I paid $6.29 for this 4oz package at a Marukai Market in San Diego, CA. That works out to $1.57 per ounce, putting this in the average price range.

For general purpose jerky snacking, it provides a "so-so" value, because there's not much to taste in this. This might be good just to curb your hunger, or give you a protein boost while resting on a hike.

As a teriyaki variety, it has very little value at all. I don't taste much teriyaki in this. If anything, I taste a sweetness, but not something that manifests itself as teriyaki.

Rating

I'm giving this a fair rating.

This teriyaki variety from Hawaiian Warrior offers an easy-to-eat meat consistency, though with a rubbery-like consistency. It just doesn't provide much teriyaki taste at all, and in fact not much taste period. Even the natural meat flavors are not well discernable.

I wouldn't quite rate this as "dog treats" because it still doesn't taste bad. As a meat snack, it doesn't really offer much snackability.

The irony of this is that the package is marked, "New and Improved Flavor". I can't imagine what this stuff was like before.

Rating: Fair

Buy this online:

• http://www.cybersnacks.net/