Okay, so I’m a little late on this one, but you’ve still got tomorrow to make this happen! The banner pretty much says it all, but I figured I’d let y’all know what flavors you can choose from:
Peppermint Mocha: “Espresso, steamed milk, bitter-sweet chocolate and peppermint flavor mingle beneath a blanket of classic whipped cream and decadent chocolate curls.
Caramel Brulee Latte: “Combination of espresso, steamed milk and rich caramel sauce tropped with whipped cream and shimmery pieces of caramel.”
Gingerbread Latte: “The flavor of freshly baked gingerbread combined with fresh ground espresso and steamed milk…with classic whipped cream and a dash of ground nutmeg.”
These appear to be the only official holiday drinks, but at my local Starbucks they were also offering Eggnog Latte, Peppermint White Hot Chocolate and a few other drinks I can’t remember because I have no memory. All these were covered under the BOGO offer. Hit up your Starbucks tomorrow to take advantage of this deal, because tomorrow’s the last day!
Jones Soda went totally weaksauce with their holiday offerings this year. No Halloween soda, only Tofurky & Gravy for Thanksgiving, and this “Bacon Holiday Pack”. I have no idea what any of the items included in this pack (more of which you’ll be seeing later) have to do with any holiday whatsoever, but I have a sneaking suspicion that thousands of people wrote angry letters about this lack of holiday participation. I imagine they went something like this:
Dear Jones Soda,
I am absolutely outraged to see that you are not offering your usual amount of holiday-related soda flavors this year. Now what soda am I going to drink that will make me gag with its unholy flavor? I have been so delighted to vomit into my sink such wonderful offerings as Candy Corn, Mashed Potatoes & Butter and Green Bean Casserole. The idea that you are not offering me a new carbonated beverage that tastes like meat or vegetables is unacceptable. Have you run out of ideas? Because I have a few:
Crab Cake
Potatoes Au Gratin (extra cheese flavor, please!)
Roasted Garlic Hummus
Chicken Tikka Masala
Lobster Roll
Expired Milk
Leftovers of Indeterminate Origin
Rotting Flesh
Feel free to take any and all of these ideas and transform them into wonderful, pure cane sugar-sweetened soda, so that I can gross out my friends and voluntarily traumatize my own palate. If I don’t see some new flavors that make bile rise up into my throat at just the mere mention of the name, I am going to boycott Jones Soda forever, tell all of my friends to do the same, and start an Internet petition.
Sincerely yours,
Disappointed in Denver
I imagine Jones Soda R&D and Marketing Departments were in a tizzy. What were they to do? Frazzled, there was an emergency brainstorming meeting called. Amongst the chaos, someone in the room called out, “What about BACON?! Bacon is so in right now! It’s all over the Internet!” Perhaps another bright up-and-comer chimed in, “Hey, maybe we could team up with J&D’s!” Nobody knew what the fuck this guy was talking about, so he added, “They’re the ones that make Bacon Salt! The nerds love it!”
It was an instant success, of course, and the soda was developed and packaged immediately. In a strange attempt to make it holiday-relevant, they added some completely unrelated bacon-flavored shit to make it a “pack” and put it out there for all the Internet to see. The buzz was immediate, because when you combine bacon and Jones Soda, there’s gonna be press.
Of course, I’m a sucker, so I had to buy it. I paid a completely unreasonable amount of money for some soda. The shipping was actually more than the product itself. But it was all worth it when the UPS man showed up on my doorstep with the box that clearly showed that I was ordering soda off the Internet. At least it didn’t show the flavor on the box.
Wait a second…
WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT?! I signed up for bacon-flavored soda. I did not sign up for creepy-ass pig-nose girl. And she is on both bottles. Why couldn’t I get overly excited guy in a bacon suit, like on their website? Happy bacon suit guy makes me feel a little better about this soda. Creepy pig-nose girl is like an ominous foreshadowing of horrible things to come.
The front of the label is not the end of things, however. Jones tries to justify itself on the back: “Bacon flavored soda? Okay, pigs may not be able to fly, but that’s not stopping us from bottling a batch of this stuff for you anyway. Drawing inspiration from everyone’s favorite cured meat, we partnered with J&D’s Foods, the makes of Bacon Salt, and produced this refreshingly meaty creation. So, crack open a bottle and ‘ink-dray up-way’…because everything tastes better with bacon.”
Puns make everything better. Here we have a pigs flying reference, and, my favorite, the use of pig latin, which actually took me a second to get the joke. Kudos to Jones for correctly utilizing the rule for words in pig latin that begin with a vowel. I had to think back to third grade to confirm that was the correct way to do it.
I may have been a sucker for buying this soda, but I’m not enough of a sucker to think that Jones didn’t say “refreshingly meaty” without tongue firmly planted in cheek. They know there’s nothing refreshing about this soda. They know it’s gross and wrong. And, sadly, even though they just stated that “everything tastes better with bacon”, their own product is probably about to prove that statement wrong for the first time. Jesus wept.
Somehow, I doubt that.
The color of the soda is ominous. It looks dark brown in the bottle, like a piece of bacon that’s just a little bit burnt, which I enjoy. In bacon, not in soda. On the other hand, it also looks like maple syrup. Oh god, what if they went with maple-flavored bacon instead of just straight-up bacon? Things just got worse. I need to just do this before I prematurely vomit just from psyching myself out.
First of all, upon opening the bottle, foam exploded out of the top of the bottle, despite zero jostling on my part.
Bacon soda went everywhere, and apparently instantly stains everything. That is my countertop after having spilled soda on it for five seconds before being wiped up.
That is my special review towel, which already had some stains on it, but now appears to be ruined forever. (Update – washed the towel immediately with OxyClean Stain Gel and all the soda came out. Yay!)
This is the soda in my kitchen sink, about three minutes after the bacon soda explosion. The foam refuses to go down. Also, what appeared to be dark brown soda is pink. What.
None of this means anything, however, because bacon soda is the worst thing in the world and I will now attempt to use mere mortal words to describe it.
First of all, I smelled it. It smells awful. It smells, literally, like poop. Shit. Feces. Excrement. An obese man’s bathroom after a night at Pancho’s all-you-can-eat Mexican buffet.
I stood with the bottle in my hand, leaning against the sink, for a good two minutes. I didn’t want to drink it, but I knew I had to. I finally took a swig out of the bottle. I couldn’t tell if it was remarkably tasteless and the feces smell was just drifting into my sinuses, or what, but I really was smelling more than I was tasting, and the smell continued to be awful.
I poured it in a glass and took a drink from that, wondering if perhaps the flavor would blossom in there, which I really didn’t want it to do, but had to know. I took my second drink.
I would say the taste is indescribable, but that is not true. It is very describable.
Anyone who has ever watched Mythbusters has probably seen the episode in which they place pig carcasses in a car, seal it airtight, and leave it for two months. When the car was opened, Adam Savage described the smell (I’m paraphrasing off of memory here) as one of the worst odors he’s ever experienced. I believe he also stated that the smell clung to him, refusing to leave. This is a man who has probably experienced more bad smells than 99% of the world’s population (along with Mike Rowe), so I take his claims seriously.
I have never been anywhere near a rotting, decomposed, maggot-filled pig carcass, but I can imagine exactly what it smells like. And that is exactly like what Jones Bacon Flavored Soda tastes like. After my second swallow, I reeled around the kitchen, holding my forearm to my nose and mouth like a rookie cop who just entered his first overripe crime scene. I’m sure it looked over-dramatic, but the reaction was completely real. Rotting pig corpse filled my mouth and my nostrils, clinging to me, refusing to dissipate.
Surprisingly, I didn’t throw up or even gag. I have to believe that the smell and taste was so bad that it overwhelmed my senses too much to even think about gagging. I dumped the glass down the sink and ran the hot water. I sealed the remaining soda in the bottle as tightly as I could and threw it in the trash. The smell lingered in my kitchen.
I had to go to the store shortly afterward. I felt like the stink covered me like a cloud. For the first time in my life, I bought a bottle of Listerine. When I brought it home, I didn’t take my shoes off or even walk all the way to the bathroom; I busted it out of the bag and swished my heart out at the kitchen sink. I have to say, Listerine is very refreshing! It also made me feel free of the dead pig cloud. 5 burgers to you, Listerine.
I don’t really feel like this review needs a wrap-up paragraph, but it’s a tradition, so. Jones Bacon Flavored Soda tastes absolutely nothing like bacon. Its only connection to that delicious food is “pig”. Instead of tasting like bacon, this soda tastes like they took the decomposing remains of a pig and combined it with carbonated water. The pure cane sugar wasn’t even necessary, as the sickly sweet smell of rotting meat was already taken care of. I wrote that little fake letter to Jones before I tasted the soda; I guess now I can cross “rotting flesh” off the list. Congratulations, Banquet, you no longer hold the gold medal for worst “edible” thing I’ve ever ingested. Jones Bacon Flavored Soda is the worst ever.
I’ve had a craving to get a fast food hot dog for a while now. Don’t ask me why; I get pregnant woman-esque cravings for random foods all the time. Since my local KFC/A&W hybrid went all Colonel all the time and there’s not a Wienerschnitzel close enough for my satisfaction, my only option is Sonic Drive-In.
What got me from “Gee, I should get a hot dog” to “Oh damn, I need that hot dog NOW” was Sonic’s Tex Mex Footlong Quarter Pound Coney. I think Sonic’s website describes it best: “Coney lovers won’t want to miss this footlong quarter pound hot dog topped with warm chili, crunchy FRITOS® chips, shredded cheddar cheese, diced onions, sliced jalapeños and zesty Southwest chipotle sauce all inside a soft, warm bakery bun.”
That’s a holy hell of a lot of toppings on a hot dog! Of course, my eyeballs immediately zoned in on the “Fritos” part. Sonic has had a Fritos Chili Cheese Wrap on the menu for a long time now, and I’ve always wanted to try it, just because it sounded ridiculous. It wasn’t until I watched some random episode of King of the Hill quite a few years ago that I realized Frito pie is a real thing, that real people actually eat. I blame Texas. You can blame Peggy Hill for me blaming Texas.
Armed with minimal knowledge of Frito pie, the Frito Wrap seemed mildly less ridiculous, but only in the way lutefisk seems less ridiculous just because it is real and exists outside the realm of unicorns and leprechauns. Lutefisk is still fish soaked in lye, and Frito pie is still a pie made with motherfucking Fritos. Humans are silly.
Reinforcing my judgmental glare towards Texas, I’m assuming the “Tex” part of Sonic’s Coney dog is the Fritos, chili and cheese, while the “Mex” is covered by the jalapeños and Southwest chipotle sauce. The onions straddle the middle, keeping Tex from pointing a shotgun at Mex and telling it to go back to where it came from and quit taking Americans’ jobs. Ouch. Topical.
Hot-button political issues aside, I had to try this hot dog. So I drove to my nearest Sonic, which weirds me out every time I go there. First of all, they have those car stalls where you park and place your order and somebody comes out on rollerblades and gives you a tray with all your Frito pie wraps and shit. If you’re going to commit to pretending it’s still 1956, why not have them wear roller skates? And didn’t rollerblades become passe in the 1990s? Sonic, you’re all over the place.
Second of all, if you want to be a self-respecting person and get your food at the drive-thru so you can take it home and engorge yourself in privacy, you still have to deal with the carhops. Instead of handing you your bag of grease through a window, you shout your order into the metal box and then drive up two car lengths, park, and wait for your food to be delivered to you via said carhop, who has to skate over three feet of concrete and then awkwardly step into the decorative bed of shrubs and rocks at the curb, struggling not to faceplant as she hands you your food and gives you your change via an attractive coinholder apron.
I felt bad for my carhop. I had to wait 15 minutes to get my food, and when she apologized for the wait, I told her it was okay, because I’m generally a nice person and she seemed pretty frazzled. Also, she was cute. She then thanked me for being so nice, and launched into a story about the car in front of me, who complained that their food was cold, made her get new food, then told her they were going to call someone to complain about their wait and demanded an unknown quantity of free food upon their next visit. She also said her feet were very tired. I felt bad for her, and wished her a better rest of the day. In hindsight, I probably should have tipped her. You’re probably supposed to tip carhops, and I was probably getting a sob story for a better tip. Sorry, cute girl, I suck at carhop etiquette.
Three paragraphs of curmudgeonly complaining about Sonic’s food delivery method aside, let’s get to the actual hot dog, shall we?
Okay, so first off, I did not take the moniker of “footlong” seriously until I slid this bad boy out of its foil pouch when I got home. Please see my wooden ruler that I probably stole from school in third grade for proof. This Coney is serious business. I was immediately hit with the strong smell of onions and jalapeños, which elicited a Pavlovian saliva response in my mouth.
I have never seen such a large hot dog. And so loaded with toppings! They certainly didn’t skimp on anything. I wasn’t even sure how to tackle the beast. After a few moments of contemplation, I just went for it. I had to actually use one hand to hold the end and the other to support the middle, or else the whole thing would have flopped over, spilling all the toppings and making me the saddest person holding a malfunctioned footlong hot dog.
I have to say, I love the Tex Mex Footlong Quarter Pound Coney. It feels so wrong, but it tastes so right. Amazingly, with all those toppings, almost all of the flavors have their own time to shine. You taste the spicy jalapeño first, along with the onion, which delivers a great crunch. As you chew more, the cheese and the chili come through. The chili is that thinner kind of chili that I just love on a hot dog. After you get through the chili, you hit the hot dog. I had my doubts about the quality of the hot dog, but it was actually really tasty. I wanna say it tasted like a dirty water dog, but I’m not a hot dog expert (yet), so don’t hold me to that.
The two ingredients that didn’t shine were the Fritos and the Southwest chipotle sauce. By the time I got my Tex Mex Coney home, the Fritos were already mostly soggy. They did contribute a corn flavor that I liked, which surprised me, but I would have appreciated some crunch from the chips. Luckily, the onions were bright and fresh, and made up for the crunch that the chips didn’t deliver. I managed to get a little of the chipotle sauce on my hand (well, actually, I got pretty much everything on my hands), and it was tasty, although a little too subtle on the chipotle. For this reason, the sauce absolutely disappeared when eating the hot dog itself. I think it faded into the flavor of the chili, which was disappointing. I wish I could just take some of that sauce home and put it on a plain hot dog to see how it would taste on its own.
Despite these two minor failings, I am crazy about Sonic’s Tex Mex Footlong Quarter Pound Coney. There was no way I could finish it in one serving, but I tried my best. Afterward, my stomach was…unsettled. Not nauseous, not “get ready for your bowels to punish you for eating such a monstrosity”, just sort of churning. I felt like my stomach was confused. It wasn’t sure what to do with so much craziness. Even despite this, I went back to the fridge two more times to take just a few more bites. Even a little cold, I still loved it. I was a slave to the Tex Mex Coney.
Texas has two stupid sayings: “Everything’s bigger in Texas” and “Don’t mess with Texas”. While I want to punch anyone who ever says these things in the face, they apply to the Tex Mex Footlong Quarter Pound Coney. It’s a giant hot dog with tons of toppings, and if you are not ready to get messy and ridiculous, this Coney is not for you. But if you’re like me, a person willing to eat a hot dog with corn chips on it that’s the size of my forearm, I urge you to try it. Just don’t make any plans for the rest of the day, because you will be rendered incapable of moving and also chugging down gallons of water due to the insane sodium content.
Also note that this is a limited time offer, so you better get moving (if you want to be rendered incapable of moving)!
Score: 4.5 out of 5 carhop faceplants
Price: $3.69
Size: 1 giant fuckoff footlong quarter pound Coney hot dog
Purchased at: Sonic #3517
Nutritional Quirks: Contains 80.1 grams of fat, which is 15.1 grams more than you’re supposed to have IN ONE DAY. Also contains 2,551 milligrams of sodium, which is almost twice that of the Double Down and also exceeds the daily recommended intake for one full day. YEE-HAW!
Did you know that Popeyes 2nd Annual Crawfish Festival is going on right now?! I did. Obviously. Since I am writing this. But I was even more keenly aware of it because I missed writing about the first Annual Crawfish Festival, and I always regretted it, just a little bit, in the back of my mind. I mean, really, what was I doing around that time? Well, I had just reviewed what is probably the worst thing I’ve ever eaten. You’d think after that, I’d be up for anything.
But the fact of the matter is, I was intimidated by Popeyes Crawfish Festival. Despite having grown up 20 minutes away from the Pacific Ocean, my experience with seafood of any kind up until a few years ago consisted primarily of fried shrimp drenched in cocktail sauce and putting my trust in the Gorton’s Fisherman. It’s shameful, I know. I blame my parents and Taco Bell.
I’ve made baby steps since that time. I had tilapia and enjoyed it. A variety of sushis have tickled my palate. But ever since that fateful day that I met my husband’s grandmother for the first time and she served us a beautiful dish of freshly boiled lobster straight from Maine (that I had made friends with the night before), I’ve been largely hesitant about most crustaceans. The moment I cracked the lobster and a murky liquid gushed out, I was done. No more. So strong was my distaste that I refused to eat one bite, snubbing my future grandmother-in-law in the worst way. Did I mention she’s Italian? Yeah. The worst way.
Fortunately she took it with good humor, and I didn’t burn any familial bridges on our very first meeting. The damage had been done for me, however. So when I saw Popeyes Crawfish Festival last year, I pussied out. Not only are crawfish crustaceans, they are popular mainly in the South, especially Louisiana, where I hear they still practice voodoo. I’ve never been to the South, and am extremely unfamiliar with the majority of their popular dishes. Double trepidation. Voodoo crawfish.
But it’s been a year, and I’d like to think that my culinary misadventures have strengthened both my exo and endoskeleton enough that I can man up and participate in the Crawfish Festival. If not, it doesn’t matter, because I’ve already got the food. There’s no turning back now!
Popeyes offers several different dishes containing the crawfish. I chose the Tackle Box, which is “piled high with regular side, biscuit and Popeyes very own Creamy Horseradish Sauce.” There’s also a Po’Boy, “traditional favorite served on a warm baguette with lettuce, pickles and Creamy Horseradish Sauce”, the Traveler, which is basically just the crawfish and sauce, and the Etouffee, “traditional Louisiana “one pot” dish features seasoned rice smothered with a rich sauce of crawfish, veggies and spices.” The Etouffee sounds interesting, but I wanted to taste the crawfish in its pure form.
Unfortunately, round one of my Popeyes Crawfish Festival experience was a little too pure. I got my crawfish, I got my biscuit, and I got my side, but I got no horseradish sauce. I was outraged. There’s nothing I hate more than going someplace specifically to pick up a food to review, only to find that I got the wrong product or something is missing. I wasn’t about to leave my house again to go all the way back, I mean, I’d already taken off my shoes, but I was determined to have the full crawfish/horseradish experience. Tomorrow I will have my revenge.
In the meantime, I can tell you about the crawfish. I ate crawfish! I am inappropriately proud of myself. Of course, it helps that I have no idea what crawfish is, and that it was heavily breaded and fried, making it look like little bitty fried shrimp. The batter was very tasty; it had a nice crunch and was satisfyingly deep-fried without being overly greasy. It’s obvious from the coloration that the batter was meant to have a little kick, and it delivered on the back end, leaving a little spice that was really tasty and didn’t overwhelm the palate.
As for the crawfish itself, I found the texture to be a little bit chewy, and the taste to be very mildly fishy. It tasted and felt to be a cross between a fish and a shrimp. Having never had one before, I have no idea if this is what a crawfish is actually supposed to taste like. I’m just reporting the facts, ma’am. I surprised myself with the ease in which I consumed the crustaceans. I thought I would find the firm but chewy texture off-putting, but it reminded me of fried shrimp. I also thought I might not like the fishy taste, but it was mild enough, and played so well with the cajun spices, that I found myself actually enjoying my own personal Crawfish Festival.
But I still wanted the sauce.
So I went back. I ordered the Tackle Box again, for the sake of consistency, but this time I actually asked for extra horseradish sauce, just to drive the point home that I wanted that goddamn sauce.
Victory! I immediately dipped the shit out of some crawfish. The new crawfish I got were a little more tender and less chewy, making them even better. The sauce is pretty good; it’s tangy and a little spicy, with a horseradish kick at the end that is tasty but doesn’t blow out your sinuses like horseradish paste can. I like that feeling sometimes, but I think they toned it down just enough to appeal to those who don’t. It also includes ingredients like paprika and powdered garlic, and has enough vinegar to pucker your lips.
After finally tasting the sauce, I could go either way on it. It’s a pretty tasty sauce, but it overwhelms the spice in the batter mixture, which was also pretty delicious. Despite my frustration at having to go back, I’m kind of glad I did, because I got to concentrate on the flavor of the crawfish the first time and examine what the horseradish sauce brought to the party the second time. I would recommend going halvsies if you get your own Tackle Box, just to experience both flavors.
Well, I ate crawfish, and I survived. Not only did I survive, I rather enjoyed my Crawfish Festival. The batter and the spice are just right, the flavor of the crustacean was mild but enjoyable, and while some of the pieces were more tender than others, I still liked them all. I’m glad I decided to stop being a sissy and partake in the Crawfish Festival. Another seafood I’ve never tried that I can check off my list. Now, I have no idea if Popeyes is fully representing the flavor of real, fresh crawfish, but if I ever get invited to an authentic crawdad boil, I won’t be afraid to try it out. As long as I don’t get to meet the little guys alive first and someone else shells them for me.
Popeyes Crawdad Festival only lasts until November 28th this year, so if you want to partake, you’d better get moving!
Score: 4 out of 5 unfortunate first impressions
Price: $4.99
Size: 1…Tackle Box with…about 20 crawfish?
Purchased at: Popeyes #5636
Nutritional Quirks: No nutritional information available on Popeyes’s website, so the crawdads could really be…anything.
Happy Halloween! I chose Boo Berry to represent on this day because, while he’s an old standby, I’ve also never tried Boo Berry Cereal. I also refrained from using its true title, “Boo Berry Artificial Berry Flavored Frosted Cereal with Spooky-Fun Marshmallows”. I figured y’all had gotten the picture by this point. I do like the bold statement of “spooky-fun”, however. I’m holding you to that, Boo Berry.
A little history lesson, largely provided by Wikipedia, which is my primary healthcare physician, attorney, and monster-themed cereal expert: Boo Berry was introduced in 1973 and was supposedly the first blueberry-flavored cereal. Ambitious! Resting on its laurels, these days Boo Berry claims to be only berry-flavored, but I’m still okay with that. After 37 years, a ghost can sit back and take a break. From the look of it on the front of the cereal box, a ghost can also make creepy, eyebrow-raised facial expressions and grabby postures that look less like he’s going to steal your soul and more like he’s going to do something to your children that would cause Elliot Stabler to punch him in the face.
The back of the box delivers more innocent fun. I tried to capture images of the whole thing, but the text would have been too small to read, so I’ll spell it out for you: Count Chocula and Frankenberry are playing a racing game that looks like it was made in 1986. “One more lap and I choc up another Monster Truck Racer WIN!” Says Count Chocula, who is presumably hanging upside-down, which would make his win even more impressive until you realize Frankenberry is probably just mashing the buttons with his nerveless, pieced-together thumbs. “Not so fast, Count! I’m a turbo boost away from TASTING SWEET VICTORY.” Apparently they are playing a very shitty video game based on the 2008 television remake of Knight Rider.
Boo Berry then shows up out of nowhere and says, “Argue all you want, fiends, but when we’re talking cereal, my BOO BERRY ALWAYS WINS!” They were not talking cereal, and you are being an asshole for interrupting them with your cereal talk, Boo Berry.
Apparently they don’t mind, however, because they immediately stop playing to have a Monster Cereal SHOWDOWN! This involves a “scare-off”, wherein the scariest face wins. Frankenberry’s all like “MMMRRRRR!” with a face that looks more developmentally disabled than scary, Count Chocula goes “Blah-Ha-Ha-Ha!” looking more like he just ate something gross (I’m guessing Kroger Jelly Belly Pudding) than anything resembling scary.
Finally, Boo Berry says the traditional “BOO!” which is not in and of itself scary, but…HE’S WEARING A MASK THAT LOOKS LIKE WHAT MONSTERS APPARENTLY THINK HUMAN CHILDREN LOOK LIKE!!!!! Frankenberry jumps into Count Chocula’s arms and they both shit themselves out of sheer terror. Boo takes his mask off, flashing his classic pedo smile in victory, which is actually more scary than the mask of a child’s face with the expression of someone who just snorted about six lines of meth. Boo wins this round, but I’m sure the other guys get their own moments to shine on the back of their own cereal boxes. I wish I’d looked at the store.
Here’s the cereal! Yes, there’s actual food inside the box! Here’s your players:
From top to bottom:
A Pac-Man ghost in eatable form Boo Berry himself, presumably, more purple than blue, but an impressive purple nonetheless. I don’t believe I’ve ever eaten something this color. I approve of both the shape and the color.
Purple bat guys. Or gals, whichever. Suitable for the season and the cereal.
Blue blobs. I think they’re supposed to be skulls? Poor execution, but skulls are cool. When’s the last time you ate a skull? That’s right. Don’t be so judgmental.
Pink Cthulhu and baby pink Cthulhu. I honestly don’t actually know what those are really supposed to be, but Cthulhu was the first thing that came to mind, and I’m going with it. Eldritch gods are spooky fun.
Apostrophe marks White ghosts. Two ghosts in one box! These are just generic ghosts, though. I assume they are Boo’s minions. I like eating minions.
The cereal itself has a subtle berry flavor that doesn’t really taste like any specific berry. It’s sweet, but not cloyingly so. It also has a definite “whole grain” aftertaste that I don’t remember from eating sugary cereals in my childhood. It’s been forever since I’ve had any kind of cereal, let alone corn-grain-and-marshmallow cereal, but I seem to remember them being way sweeter and less whole-grainy. I’m assuming the whole child obesity epidemic has pressured cereals into making them less sugary and more healthy than they were in 1989. Boo Berry cereal is chock full of vitamins and minerals, and has only 12 grams of sugar per 1 cup of cereal. I have no idea if that is any different than Boo Berry circa 1989, but I’m sure someone does. Feel free to comment.
The marshmallow pieces taste just like I remember them from olden times, which is basically like sugar and more sugar. They’re still firm yet tacky, and melt in your mouth in a delightful way. Marshmallows make any cereal better.
Boo Berry Cereal gets the honor of showing up on Halloween because it’s a classic. I don’t know how I never had any of the monster cereals before now, but I definitely remember loving their presence in commercials around Halloween when I was a kid. I’ve heard from friends that Boo Berry was always the hardest to find (excluding the short-lived Fruit Brute and his later equally short-lived and stupidly named incarnation, Fruity Yummy Mummy), so that makes him extra special. The cereal itself is your typical whole-grain with marshmallows fare, but the shapes are wonderfully Halloweeny and the box offers lots of fun for kids and adults like me who act like kids, even more so around this time of year. Boo Berry gets two thumbs up, even though he looks like a creepy pedo.
Score: 4 out of 5 spooky-fun pink marshmallow Cthulhus
Price: $2.50
Size: 9.6 oz. box
Purchased at: Target
Nutritional Quirks: Contains 8 vitamins and minerals that have 25% of your daily value in one cup of cereal. I now consider Boo Berry Cereal health food.
Pop-Tarts didn’t just put out Pumpkin Pie as a seasonal offering – they also created Choc-o-Lantern Frosted Chocolate Fudge! Okay, so it’s not a new flavor – Pop-Tarts already has a chocolate fudge toaster pastry – but this one has orange frosting and bat and ghost sprinkles! Other companies should take note – all you have to do to get love and adoration from Halloween fans is turn your product orange and black (or a vague approximation of black) and toss on some sprinkles and you’ve got it.
“Choc-o-Lantern” is a little weak, especially considering there’s nothing pumpkin-shaped on the actual Pop-Tarts, but they threw a picture of a chocolate pumpkin on the box to make it more acceptable. As with many re-purposed holiday foodstuffs, it’s the appearance that makes the product. Pop-Tarts delivers on the box, with spoooooky trees, bats, and little cartoon eyes that look suitably frightened by the toaster pastries. There’s also a splattering of slime in the corner, telling you the quantity of toaster pastries because, hey. Slime. Halloween!
The fun continues on the back of the box. Pop-Tarts urges you to “dig” into their “graveyard”! Halloween is the one holiday that I accept, even welcome, cheesy puns. The graveyard consists mainly of an unhealthy amount of chocolate pudding, some candy corn, and some Pop-Tarts, but I like the setup. I especially like the ghost lollipop in the background, frowning very emphatically and making an “I dunno, whaddaya gonna do?” gesture with his ghost arms. I assume he is unhappy with the pudding graveyard and also making the hands-up shrugging gesture to show that he takes no responsibility for its creation. I don’t blame you, ghost lollipop. I blame the obviously shitfaced Jack-o-Lantern candy bowl behind you.
I love Ghost Lollipop and Shitfaced Jack-o-Lantern Candy Bowl, but my heart really belongs to Seriously Bored and Somewhat Indignant Vampire Toaster. He resides on Pop-Tart’s website, and his facial expression seriously contradicts the assertion that the fact he is delivering to you is “super fun”. While I find the fact useless, since I will never plant a pumpkin, I think Vampire Toaster is being a little melodramatic. You have a job to do, Vampire Toaster, and you’re doing it. Try to muster up a little enthusiasm. After all, you are a toaster AND a vampire, and while that makes you the coolest toaster ever, you’re still not above dispensing pumpkin-growing facts.
My Choc-o-Lantern Pop-Tarts didn’t exactly have the plentiful and uniformly-arranged bat and ghost sprinkles like the ones on the box, but we all know that marketing doesn’t equal reality. I was just happy that some of them slightly resembled bats and ghosts and weren’t just black and white blobs. The orange frosting was sufficiently bright and seasonal. As for the taste, I was surprised to find I rather enjoyed them. I’m not a big chocolate fan, but the fudge filling was quite acceptably fudgy and rich, especially decadent when warm. It made me wish I had a glass of eggnog and it was about 30 degrees cooler outside.
I also found the chocolate pastry to be softer than other Pop-Tarts I’ve had. Usually, the edges are hard, and I would just nibble them to the edges of the filling and throw the rest away. These were soft all the way through, and tasted very similar to chocolate graham crackers. The icing and the sprinkles added a little extra crunch and sweetness.
Once again, Pop-Tarts Limited Edition Choc-o-Lantern Frosted Chocolate Fudge is just an already-existing flavor with a bit of Halloween flair, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t rock. The warm fudge is like comfort food, the soft pastry reminds me of chocolate graham crackers from my childhood, and the bright orange frosting and admittedly haphazard sprinkles complete the Halloween package. After eating just one, I feel like I’ve gotten my chocolate fix for the next three months, but I think chocolate and Halloween lovers alike will enjoy these Pop-Tarts.
Score: 4 out of 5 bored vampire toasters
Price: $2.69
Size: 22 oz. box containing 12 toaster pastries
Purchased at: Target
Nutritional Quirks: One pastry contains 10% of seven different vitamins and minerals. I now consider Pop-Tarts health food.
It’s been quite a long time since I’ve been in a drugstore. I’m not sure why; I guess since I shop like I’m British and all the grocery stores I frequent have pharmacies, I never really have the need to visit them. However, after a recent trip to the bank went wrong (after almost three decades of life you’d think I’d have learned that banks are closed on national holidays), I noticed that the new Walgreen’s across the street had opened. I also remembered that drugstores often have the best Halloween sections.
As you can see, I was NOT disappointed. There were so many gems that I wanted to bring home with me, but my cupboards are already so full of Halloween crap that if I brought home another armful, I’d have to put the Cheez-Its out on the streets, and that would have been immoral. Everybody knows Cheez-Its got no street smarts. They wouldn’t last a day out there. They’d be eaten alive. MUAHAHAHA BAD PUN HALLOWEEN TIE-IN.
I stood in that aisle for a good five minutes, taking everything in and trying to decide what I would pick. The store was almost empty and strangely silent. I felt exposed and conspicuous. No grown woman should spend that much time looking at novelty Halloween items. Which is not to say I picked Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce out of panic or embarrassment. (Not that that hasn’t happened before.) No, I think the picture and the name say it all. I mean, c’mon. Miniature Chinese take-out box? Fake noodles with eyeballs and sauce? Tiny plastic chopsticks?! I think the chopsticks were what ultimately won me over.
One of the hazards that a food reviewer has to navigate through is the Embarrassing Cashier Moment. Much like how a grown woman shouldn’t spend five minutes looking at novelties, a grown woman also shouldn’t walk up to the cashier with nothing but a fake take-out box containing gummy noodles. I considered buying a few other items, like maybe a box of suppositories and a can of nuts, in an attempt to look like I hadn’t just come in for bizarre candy. In the end I decided to man up and walked to the counter with my silly, lonely purchase. Lucky for me, the teenager who rang me up had dead zombie eyes and couldn’t have cared less what I was buying. It was so anticlimactic that I felt mildly disappointed.
While arranging my Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce for its Glamour Shot, I became unreasonably grossed out. Maybe it was the plastic smell of the gummies. Maybe it was the squishy, elastic texture. Maybe it was the fact that I knew I was going to have to eat it. Whatever it was, dread filled my stomach, and I came to realize that this was a good thing. I was being grossed out by a gross-out Halloween candy! My body became confused with revulsion and joy. ‘Tis the reason for the season. I fell even more in love with my take-out candy.
Turns out, my fears were largely unfounded. I bit into an eyeball, squinting my eyes closed, and…it was a gummy eyeball. It was squishy and tasted like high-fructose corn syrup. That was it. I had that feeling you get when you exit a Halloween maze – you’ve just been tormented by normal people playing crazy psychos and werewolves, you screamed like a little baby, but now that it’s over, you just laugh at yourself. That wasn’t so bad! I tried a noodle and it tasted exactly like the eyeball. Also, kudos to the noodles for looking like earthworms. It’s the kid-friendly version of Fear Factor. That show ended four years ago. My pop culture references are always so timely and relevant.
More props to Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce for putting some extra care into the Candy Sauce packet. That is one evil-looking green apple, right there. The sauce itself is more like a super-thick syrup; I had to coax it out of the packet and somehow managed to get it all over my hands. I hate sticky hands. The syrup calls itself “sweet”, but never believe an evil green apple. It will lie to you. The syrup was actually sour green apple. Very sour. Delightfully so. I took a bite of earthworm noodle coated in it, and my lips were puckered for thirty minutes afterward. I approve.
Really though, who gives a shit about how Take-Out Gummy Fried Noodle & Eyeball with Candy Sauce tastes. It’s all about appearance, and this candy delivers in spades. From the box to the chopsticks with convenient eyeball holder to the earthworm noodles to the evil apple sauce packet, this novelty Halloween candy is the best. One box of TOGFN&ECS could make the centerpiece of your whole Halloween party. Evil Green Apple for President 2012.
Score: 4 out of 5 earthworm gummy fried noodles
Price: $1.99
Size: 5.19 oz. fake take-out Chinese food box
Purchased at: Walgreens
Nutritional Quirks: Eyeballs do not actually taste like eyeballs. Halloween!
Dots has three different Halloween-themed gumdrops: Bat Dots, which are blood orange-flavored, Ghost Dots, which look like they glow in the dark and come in assorted flavors so you never know what you’re going to get, and Candy Corn Dots, which is what I was stuck with since that’s all they had at my Target. I feel cheated.
Crushing disappointment aside, Candy Corn Dots are full of Halloween fun. Well, at least on the outside. Fall leaves, candy corn, and all the colors of the season.
And then there’s this guy up at the top here who is super happy to be on a box of Dots. Look at him, struggling valiantly to keep his floppy, hay-filled glove aloft so as to say hi and tell you that he’s really happy to see you. Scarecrow don’t get enough play on Halloween. It’s always about, well, bats and ghosts.
I believe that my box of Candy Corn Dots is cursed. I had to retake the pictures because the first time, everything came out impossibly dark. The second time, I took about 30 pictures of the box and had to play the “pick where you want your glare spot to be” game. I chose to sacrifice the Dot down at the bottom, because he was obviously trying to hog the spotlight and I wanted to make sure Scarecrow didn’t get blotted out, thus ruining one of his rare moments to shine.
The Dots themselves also proved difficult, but at this point whatever spirit was haunting my camera and/or Dots had exhausted me, so I just gave up and went with it. You win, Dots spirit. And you deserve to – you are the reason for the season!
On the left you see an example of a normal Candy Corn Dot, dome-shaped with orange being the dominating color and a yellow making up the base. I have to ask, where’s the white tip? Candy corns are pretty simple in their construction, and the white tip is pretty key. You’d think they could have just dropped a blob on the top or something.
On the right, you see the Candy Corn Dots equivalent of Quasimodo – deformed, mutated, and awesome. I commend him for managing to slip by whatever Quality Control protocols they have at the Tootsie factory. I ate him second, out of respect.
Candy corns have had their share of controversy, at least amongst the people with which I associate. You either like them or you hate them. We all know how Lewis Black feels about them. I personally find nothing distasteful about candy corn. It’s mostly just a colored triangle of sugar that crumbles in your mouth and rots your teeth. That said, when I would dump out my pillowcase after a long night of trick-or-treating, candy corn was never in the top tier pile. They weren’t vanquished to the pile of tiny boxes of raisins and Mary Jane Peanut Butter Kisses, but they wouldn’t be hanging out with bite size Snickers any time soon.
Despite the relative simplicity of candy corn, Dots manages to miss the spot. I haven’t had a Dot since…well, probably since I was young enough to trick-or-treat without anyone raising an eyebrow at my age, so I don’t have a Dot control subject. I stuck my nose in the box for a first whiff, and it smelled like plastic and chemicals, with a generic sweet undertone. I thought this was an anomaly, possibly coming from the box itself, but no, the candy itself tasted about the same way. Candy corn doesn’t have that strong of a flavor beyond sugar, and yet you could blindfold almost anyone and give them a piece and they would know that flavor. I had to really look, and possibly wish, for that flavor. It was mostly generically sweet with some plastic and candy corn undertones.
I was pretty disappointed by Candy Corn Dots. Perhaps I set the bar too high. After all, it’s just candy corn. But still, I feel that the missing white tip and the underwhelming replication of that distinct flavor were critical missteps. However, kudos to Dots for putting out a trio of very Halloweeny candy instead of just resting on their tiny-sized regular boxes that are a staple in any trick-or-treater’s bag. Also, Mr. Scarecrow looks so happy on that box. It would break my heart to see him frown.
Okay, maybe I’m not completely stupid. But I am overzealous. When I read this in Frito-Lay’s Snack Chat blog, I got to “a limited-time snack with a special Halloween twist” and my brain went YAY! So much yay, in fact, that I didn’t put it together that CRAZY cheddar and WICKED picante actually meant sharp cheddar and salsa picante, a flavor of Mighty Zingers that I already reviewed here. It even explicitly states this in the next sentence, but I paid no attention. You put the words “limited edition” and “Halloween” together, and I lose all sense of control or logic.
So I picked these up at the store and soon realized my folly. You’d think I would have just given up there, but NO! This is Halloween, dammit, and if Frito-Lay is going to repackage an already-existing flavor for the holiday and trick me into buying it, then I’m going to review it, even if it means I have to photograph yet another incredibly shiny foil bag that turns every shot into an all-out glare-fest. Seriously, Cheetos, stop it. I only know how to do three things in GIMP, and removing glare is not one of them.
There are three things of note about this product, however. First of all, I bought a “Hungry Grab”, which is a bag size I’ve never seen before. It’s about the same width as a “Big Grab” bag that you usually find in a convenience store, but longer. I believe you would have to be rather hungry to finish off one of these bags in one sitting. It contains quite a few grabs.
Second, while re-purposing a flavor for Halloween is kind of weak, at least they tried to give a little backstory on the back of the bag: “Chester’s lab experiment went haywire causing Cheetos Mighty Zingers snacks to make a transformation”. I’ve seen Chester’s lab, and the idea of one of his experiments going haywire is very plausible. This brings me to my third point:
GREEN CHIPS! Or “snacks”, to be more precise. This is not the first time Cheetos has gone green. It may not even be the second or third, I gave up looking after a two-second Google search. Doesn’t matter. Green Cheetos are awesome.
If you want to know more about the actual flavor of these Cheetos, I refuse to repeat myself, so go read the article linked above. I will say, however, that it’s delightfully disconcerting to eat Flamin’ Hot Cheetos leftover bits that are green instead of fire-truck red. One might even call it…MADNESS! MUAHAHAHAHA!
On a final note, I now demand Christmas Flamin’ Hot Cheetos with red and green in the same bag. I will throw a candy cane-induced temper tantrum if this does not happen.
I haven’t had a Ring Pop in forever, so when I found these Halloween Screaming Berry pops, I thought they looked appropriately festive and picked them up. Nice font use on the package, cute little bat thrown in there. And the Ring Pops themselves, if advertised correctly, are black and orange! I have no idea what berry flavoring has to do with anything, but at least they made the berries scream while they were being transformed into Ring Pops. That’s pretty hardcore Halloween.
The pops themselves totally deliver on the Halloweenosity, alternating between jet black and spooooooky orange. I thought they seemed smaller than the last Ring Pop I’d been in a room with, but my husband explained to me that no, I had just grown bigger. Fortunately, my fingers are dainty, so I was still able to wear the Ring Pop as it was properly intended.
Even though berry isn’t the scariest flavor in the world, it is one of my favorites. Although wearing a black and orange costume, I know it’s blue raspberry underneath, and blue raspberry rocks. The only thing better than sucking on a blue ring is sucking on a black-and-orange ring that tastes blue. My Screaming Berry Ring Pop lasted a satisfyingly long time, too.
I know this is a short review, but really, there’s not a whole lot to say. It’s a Halloween Ring Pop. It’s awesome! And it comes in packs of two, so after my lips un-shrivel from the sourness of the blue raspberry, I can have another one! Halloween is awesome because I can wear candy rings and get away with it.
Score: 4.5 out of 5 berries screaming in terror
Price: $0.99
Size: 2 0.5 oz. pops
Purchased at: Target
Nutritional Quirks: No real quirks, but I like the idea of Blue Raspberry wearing a costume. Trick or treat!
Junk food and fast food reviews from a leftist perspective. We eat it so you don't have to!
Okay, so I’m a little late on this one, but you’ve still got tomorrow to make this happen! The banner pretty much says it all, but I figured I’d let y’all know what flavors you can choose from:
