The Nostalgia Effect: Why We're All Craving Asian Childhood Snacks Again
Every week growing up, my mom would drive me to Chinese school right after regular school. And every single week, without fail, she'd bring coated biscuit sticks for the ride.
I don't know if she knew how much that mattered to me. Probably she just wanted me to stop complaining about having to sit through two schools in one day. But those biscuit sticks, the cream coating, the snap when you bite in, the way the box smelled when you opened it, those are one of my clearest food memories.
That's the thing about snacks from your childhood. They're never just snacks.
When nostalgia hits hard
Taste is the most powerful memory trigger we have. A smell or flavor can pull you back to a specific moment, a specific kitchen, a specific afternoon, in a way that a photo or a song just can't.
For people who grew up in Asian or Asian American households, this is especially true. The snacks weren't generic. They were specific. They came in particular packaging, from specific stores. You traded them at recess. You knew which flavors your friends had and which ones you wanted. They felt like they belonged to a specific corner of your childhood that not everyone had access to.
Matcha Kit Kats from Japan. Shrimp chips from the Asian grocery. Biscuit sticks in that long, slim box. These aren't just foods. They're markers of a very specific experience.
And right now, a lot of us are craving that experience again.
Originals don't quite hit the same
Here's the hard part about going back to the snacks we loved: most of them haven't changed. Which was great when we were kids, but now that we're adults who care, at least a little, about what we're putting in our bodies, the ingredient list hits differently.
Not much protein. Not much fiber. A lot of refined sugar.
None of that is a moral failing of the snack. They were designed to taste good, and they absolutely do. But somewhere around our mid-twenties, "tastes amazing" and "fits how I actually eat" stopped being the same sentence.
The nostalgic Asian snack market has been slow to catch up. There are plenty of "matcha-flavored" things now, but real matcha? Harder to find. There are high protein snacks, but ones that actually taste like food and not a supplement? Even harder.
There's a version of "healthy snack" that's become kind of a running joke: the plain rice cake, the unseasoned almonds, the protein bar that tastes like chalk and tries to convince you it's dessert.
For a long time, that was the deal. You either eat the things you love, or you eat the things that are good for you.
Pon Pon exists because that trade is unnecessary.
I spent 200+ kitchen iterations rebuilding the biscuit stick from scratch, the format that's been a staple across East and Southeast Asia for decades. 10g of protein per serving. Real matcha. Real strawberry. Fiber. Just 2g of sugar. The cream coating is smooth, not chalky. The biscuit snaps exactly the way it should. The matcha latte flavor tastes like an actual matcha latte. The strawberry milk flavor tastes like actual strawberry milk.
your childhood snack, all grown up. ✩
The two flavors we start with:
We launched with two because we wanted to do them right before doing them many.
Matcha Latte: earthy, smooth, just the right amount of sweetness. The kind of matcha flavor that actually tastes like matcha, not just green. Real culinary-grade matcha in the cream coating.
Strawberry Milk: sweet, creamy, nostalgic in the best way. The one you'll reach for first and immediately want seconds of. Made with real strawberry, not strawberry flavoring.
Both have 10g of protein. Both are made without artificial anything. And both have that snap.
Preorders are open!
Batch 01 ships mid-June 2026. Every preorder comes with 2 free bonus boxes and free shipping, because if you're trusting us before you've even tasted it, that deserves something extra.
Whether you've been following since day one or you just found us today: thank you. 🤍