Reviews – Page 557 – The Impulsive Buy

REVIEW: Dunkin’ Donuts Peeps Donut

Margaret / April 23, 2014 / Reviews / 3 Comments

7:30 in the morning and fresh from the dusty, diesel-packed streets of the Bowery, I swung into the Dunkin’ Donuts, dodging the heating lamps of hash browns and the baskets of 99 cent danishes. I sought neither the jelly-puffed munchkin nor the swirls in the Butter Pecan Latte. Nay, I came for one thing and one thing alone: a torus-shaped chunk of fried dough topped with an artificially colored marshmallow.

Is it a chicken? A warbler? An artist’s interpretation of a Saffron Finch? Much like the Hero’s Journey to the center of the Tootsie Roll, the world may never know what the true breed the Peep “chickadee” is (then again, I’m not a very good ethnographer). What I do know is that each little plop of Dunkin’s dough is topped with one of these aviary escapees, not to mention being doused in a glaze of sugar and artificial colors, which reminds me of Fruity Pebbles, which reminds me of Childhood Joy. So it stands to conclude that this doughnut is made out of Joy, right?

The doughnut comes out with all the vibrancy of a Lisa Frank commercial and its 21 grams of sugar gives an equally vibrant kick in the pants. As hoped for, the anticipated sugar glaze hits first, tasting of little more than the joy of refined, gritty sugary-ness with a hint of vanilla extract. It’s layered on moderately thick and there’s a little crunch as you bite into the softened glaze as it softens and dissolves into a gritty, sweet mess (the best mess there is). This fructose-laden rainbow-brick-road paves the way as you chomp towards the epicenter that is the Peep. You have the option to eat your Peep as you choose. Just remember: that special feeling that comes with chomping the head of a Peep? No one can take that away from you.

The speed bump in the sugary journey came as I bit into the piece of yeast dough. Dry. Pasty. Stiff. This was not Joy. “Did I come in on a bad morning?” I asked myself. “Is the fryer on the fritz? Has a ill-willed goblin from the 7th dimension taken over the Dunkin’ Donut kitchen? BAH! How do I handle ill-willed goblins? What do they have against doughnuts? And how will I be able to attain a mass-marketed piece of adequately fried dough in light of my incapacity to handle a species I’ve yet to understand?”

These questions were left unanswered as I gnawed my way to the center of the dry piece of bread, each bite bringing only more disappointment. Sure, I always hope for a sugary, dense cake, but even a slightly fresh, modestly moist cake will do. I’ve even been known to take day-old doughnuts and plop them in the microwave to give ‘em a little kick in the fluff. But this? This was overcooked, even cottony, tasting more like stale Wonder Bread. Wonder Bread tossed in sawdust. Combined with the Peep and it was like chomping a slightly stretchy piece of sugar-coated Styrofoam, the little crumbs of dried out cake spewing dried-out shrapnel every which way. Perhaps a slightly denser cake doughnut may have stood the test better? I don’t know, but I fear this one just didn’t cut it for me.

Thankfully, I had a hot chocolate at the ready because what goes better with a bird-shaped marshmallow than a frothy beverage of molten cocoa? I would suggest you consider doing the same: grab yourself a coffee, a Cookie Dough Coolata, whatever joe suits your fancy. While dry on its own, the pastry makes excellent dunking material (this is Dunkin’ after all). The beverage adds a bitter, sharp bite to the sugar onslaught while filling in the nooks of hardened dough with a little bit of moisture and caffeine. You will be happy. Your Peep will be happy. The goblins of the 7th dimension will be happy.

Have a sweet tooth? Or ten? Do all of them crave straight sugar laced with sugar that tastes of sugar on a dry piece of bread? If you answered yes to all of the above, the Peeps doughnut is here for you. While I admire the seasonal charm, the colors threaten to blind your sensitive eyeballs and the dry cake is just blee-blah-bloo. In the future, I’ll steer clear of this one, but again…seasonal. It’s a good idea, DD, but I spoke to the Easter bunny this weekend and he told me he’s looking for a Girl Scout Cookie doughnut to deliver next year. So how ‘bout it Dunkin’: Will you heed the bunny’s call?

(Nutrition Facts – 310 calories, 130 calories from fat, 10 grams of fat, 4.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 340 milligrams of sodium, 39 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 21 grams of sugar, and 3 grams of protein.)

Item: Dunkin’ Donuts Peeps Donut
Purchased Price: $1.09
Size: N/A
Purchased at: Dunkin’ Donuts
Rating: 3 out of 10
Pros: Corn syrup! Fructose! Bright colors! Slight crunch from the glaze. Poofy marshmallow. Stretchy marshmallow. Marshmallow dunked in hot chocolate. Childhood Joy.
Cons: Bright colors may result in blindness. Dry dough. Stale Wonder Bread tossed in sawdust. Still wondering: how many licks to the center of a Tootsie Pop? Goblins of the 7th dimension. Me not being a good ethnographer.

QUICK REVIEW: Rockstar Sparking Energy (Cherry Citrus and Peach)

Marvo / April 22, 2014 / Reviews / 3 Comments

Purchased Price: $2.09 each
Size: 16 oz. cans
Purchased at: 7-Eleven
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Cherry Citrus)
Rating: 3 out of 10 (Peach)
Pros: Cherry Citrus has a nice light citrus aroma and pleasant initial cherry flavor, which turns to a citrus flavor on the back end. If you hate syrupy energy drinks, you may like their light flavor. Zero sugar and zero calories. 80 milligrams of sweet, sweet caffeine per serving. I love the can’s vivid colors which probably look even awesomer if I was on LSD.
Cons: The peach flavor is a bit too artificial, making it kind of hard to drink. As the Cherry Citrus gets warm, the cherry flavor gets lighter. Artificial sweeteners are really noticeable if they get slightly warm. They get their caffeine from green coffee beans, similar to Starbucks Refreshers, but green coffee isn’t listed in the ingredients like it is with Starbucks Refreshers.

Nutrition Facts: 8 ounces – 0 calories, 0 grams of fat, 40 milligrams of sodium, 0 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of sugar, 0 grams of protein, 100% niacin, 100% vitamin B12, 100% vitamin B6, and 100% pantothenic acid.

Energy Drink Rockstar Energy

REVIEW: Hot Pockets Limited Edition Angus Beef Melt

Kevin / April 21, 2014 / Reviews / 5 Comments

Some memories are best left in their own time. Case in point: Third wave ska, Disney Afternoon cartoons, JNCO pants. Let them be. Revisiting these things is a risk, a danger to the fond nostalgia they might evoke at this point in time. This is because they are objectively poor (and memories are unreliable), composed of a multitude of components and emotions, including the way we picture our younger selves—hopeful, untainted, resilient. Memories are a trick. We’re all on the same page here, right? Memories are a trick. Got it? Good.

Cue the time machine. Sometimes it’s a phone booth, sometimes it’s a DeLorean, and sometimes it’s a British phone booth. In this case it’s a supermarket freezer, packed full of frozen treats, yearning to be consumed. The colorful packaging displaying giant carb pills chock full o’ meat ‘n dairy tantalize and beckon, ready to send you back ten, fifteen, twenty years. Whatever you like, master. Look, it’s even a fixed run! Hot Pockets Limited Edition Angus Beef Melt. What a beaut.

Remember Hot Pockets?

Flaky crust injected with beef or pork — an inside-out pizza, a sandwich with no edges. An afternoon treat before soccer practice, or during a Mortal Kombat II jam sesh. Enjoyed with a cold Fruitopia. Mom, stop trying to make phone calls, I’m on AOL! Aw, man I got Hot Pocket all over my hip-hop Looney Toons t-shirt. I know, I know. We just went over this. Memories are lies, yeah yeah. … Eff it, we’re going back! It’s a time machine, bro. You can’t not go. It’s a time machine. Don’t be lame. Let’s do it. Start it up!

The Hot Pockets Limited Edition Angus Beef Melt sucks. The box promises Angus beef, portabella mushrooms, provolone and mozzarella and “soft-baked bread.” The bread is soft, yes, sort of like a ciabatta or something. It’s also super soggy after the requisite minute and fifty seconds in the microwave. Maybe there’s a conventional oven plan we can put this on? The box has no instructions for that. All the best, we’ve seen microwavable burritos. We don’t have 40 minutes to sit around waiting for a Hot Pocket to thaw.

There are a few hits of “premium meat” flavor and mushroom taste, which is somehow immediately fleeting, taken over by steaming hot filling that tastes like nothing. The photo on the box is stuffed with beef and cheese, and the bisected reality is one of a space worm from Dune that feeds on bad choices and nostalgia. The beef on the box is sliced and layered. The beef in the actual pocket is chopped into bits, resembling the leftover bits from a deli slicer. Even the box has memories that lie.

The worst part is that it’s not substantial at all. It barely registers as a snack. If you’re not gonna make it good to eat at least food coma us so we can dream about a Hot Pocket that is satisfying on some level. It was a bad omen when taking it out of the microwave, the Hot Pocket looked like a pet gerbil that had made a doodie mess out of its backside all over the plate. It looked shameful, like it had made a mistake. It’s not your fault, though. The mistake was all ours.

As the time travel effects wear off and we slingshot back to the present, we see a whirlwind of our past: First girlfriend, favorite teacher, Chuck Berry’s cousin Marvin Berry, wife of multiple time travelers Rachel McAdams. Reflecting on our trip, Prophet Gaffigan was right. We should have never gone back. Now the entire past is up for scrutiny. Maybe everything in the past sucks, except for Batman the Animated Series, Starter jackets, and the Hubble Space Telescope.

The question is: Did the Hot Pocket get worse, or was it never good in the first place? The answer doesn’t matter. In 2014, it’s garbage. We’re all about e-cigs, Teslas, and Google Glass now. Perhaps it was a fine product for children. But we’re adults. We’ve had sushi. We’ve eaten Ethiopian food. This is not for us anymore. Forget it, Jake. It’s Hot Pockets.

(Nutrition Facts – 270 calories, 90 calories from fat, 11 grams of fat, 3.5 grams of saturated fat, 25 milligrams of cholesterol, 490 milligrams of sodium, 33 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 2 grams of sugar, and 10 grams of protein.)

Item: Hot Pockets Limited Edition Angus Beef Melt
Purchased Price: $2.00
Size: 2 sandwiches/box
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 2 out of 10
Pros: Very cheap at a buck a piece. Maybe one bite of okay flavor.
Cons: Not substantial. Contents eventually taste like nothing, like a waste of product. Should be at least filling if not tasty, but is neither.

Frozen Food Hot Pockets

REVIEW: Taco Bell Sausage Breakfast Burrito

Jeff / April 18, 2014 / Reviews / 5 Comments

The breakfast burrito encompasses everything that is a guilty pleasure. Eggy richness covered with melty cheese and salty bits of luscious fatty meat, all wrapped in a convenient flour tortilla. Like a grilled cheese sandwich, it echoes comfort and its simple ingredients combine together to create a complex equation of deliciousness.

Long story short, a breakfast burrito (like a grilled cheese) balances on a thin line between awesome and Shitsville.

Taco Bell has toyed with the idea of a breakfast menu longer than Dan Aykroyd has tinkered with endless versions of Ghostbusters III. I remember when I was an undergrad, the Taco Bell in the student union had makeshift breakfast burritos with tater tots, eggs, and cheese in them. I have no idea if these were sanctioned or official but I knew I ate those bastards without consideration to anything, including my girlfriend’s stupid vegan rule.

Every time I heard Taco Bell was testing its breakfast menu, I would pray to the Bell loudly that Orlando would be chosen, but to no avail. And now a few years or so, everyone gets their chance to partake in this once mythical menu.

We all know by 2032, as Demolition Man taught us, that Taco Bell wins the fast food wars; sex involves no touching and sleek headgear; and Wesley Snipes did more than skipping out on taxes. I’m going to make an educated guess that the breakfast burrito was not one of the contributions that led Taco Bell to win that war.

As soon as I bit into the burrito, I knew I made a mistake larger than the last woman who dated Chris Brown. Cheap shot aside, the eggs were chalky and powdery tasting. Normally in a breakfast burrito, the eggs are the binding ingredient that amplifies the other flavors. However, this egg was gritty, bland and just sat there like it gave up on doing much.

Taco Bell states you get a “double portion of fluffy scrambled eggs.” They couldn’t even get that right because my portion was more like Keira Knightly-sized, let alone fluffy.

Collapsing even further was the dreadful, droopy and less than present flavor of the cheddar cheese. There is more cheese flavor to be found if you sucked your cousin’s fingers after they ate a bag of cheese puffs. The cheddar cheese was mostly crusted up which only served to emphasize the boring and apathetic eggs.

You do get a choice of bacon or sausage for your breakfast burrito. I decided on sausage to avoid the old trap that bacon makes everything taste better. It does not…but in any case, I just wanted to stay away from the sweet crispy lull of bacon.

The sausage was as depressing as the rest of the other elements. It was like Ron Jeremy. Greasy, hard in some parts, and unpleasantly fatty. The sausage was also dull and devoid of the punch of spices we are accustomed to in fast food sausage.

To call this a letdown is as much as an understatement as if I said, “I’m sad” after catching my wife getting jackhammered by the mailman. I was in disbelief that a chain that can make fast food burritos well, screwed up this badly. I think if I chewed on my Fleshlight, there would be more flavor.

What about the positives? Frankly, the only one I can think of is that it’s served until 11:00am, or at least the one in my area. The flour tortilla kept everything warm, so I suppose that’s a mediocre plus.

I have a rule that has guided me very well in general regarding going out to eat. If a restaurant can’t make a staple dish well, most likely the rest of their menu is going to suck. For example, if you go to a Chinese restaurant and the egg rolls or fried rice are damn awful, you can bet the Peking duck is going to flatline harder than M. Night Shyamalan’s most recent movie. I mean if you go to your neighborhood Italian restaurant and the eggplant parmesan tastes like crap, do you really think the kitchen can handle the acqua pazza? Hell no!

Bottom line, Taco Bell couldn’t make their breakfast burrito rise like a morning woodster, which stinks because I am less enthused about trying their other breakfast offerings. This review made me realize two things. One, I think I’ll stick to what Taco Bell knows best, the “fourth” meal that comes after a night of hard drinking involving lots of scotches and martinis. Two, movies based on the future are stupid lies.

(Nutrition Facts – 470 calories, 250 calories from fat, 28 grams of fat, 11 grams of saturated fat, 210 milligrams of cholesterol, 930 milligrams of sodium, 36 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of sugar, 3 grams of fiber, and 14 grams of protein.)

Item: Taco Bell Sausage Breakfast Burrito
Purchased Price: $1.69
Size: N/A
Purchased at: Taco Bell
Rating: 2 out of 10
Pros: It’s served until 11:00 a.m. The flour tortilla keeps everything nice and warm. The girlfriend who is now my wife. Makes you appreciate the regular menu. Wesley Snipes in Expendables III (it’s not out but who cares, that movie looks awesome!!!)
Cons: That they serve this at all. The gritty eggs. The flavorless cheddar cheese. The girlfriend who made me eat vegan foods. The grizzle of the sausage. Wesley Snipes in Blade III.

REVIEW: Jack in the Box Jack’s Blazin’ Chicken Sandwich

Marvo / April 17, 2014 / Reviews / 2 Comments

I don’t think Jack’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich from Jack in the Box is spicy. Whenever I’ve eaten one, I’ve never felt the need to reach for whatever Coke beverage that came with my meal, or jump over the cash register counter at Jack in the Box and place my mouth under the ice cream machine’s nozzle, in order to soothe my oral cavity.

Because of my feelings towards Jack’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich, I was hesitant to believe a new Jack in the Box chicken sandwich with Ghost Pepper Ranch Sauce would satisfy masochistic desire to burn my taste buds and give me a good reason to jump over a Jack in the Box cash register counter so I can suck on an ice cream machine’s teat.

For those of you who aren’t Scoville scale scholars, Ghost Peppers, or Bhot Jolokia, were once the hottest peppers in the world. In 2012, the title of world’s hottest pepper was taken by the Trinidad Moruga Scorpion, and, in 2013, both peppers were overtaken by the Carolina Reaper from the PuckerButt Pepper Company. I mention the other peppers because with the information I just gave you, I believe you can now consider yourselves Scoville scale scholars and it allows me to put “PuckerButt” into a paragraph.

Well, it turns out my feelings about the sandwich’s spiciness were right because Jack’s Blazin’ Chick’n Sandw’ch is not blazin’ and its name doesn’t contain that many apostrophes. I added a couple extra.

With the Ghost Pepper Ranch Sauce, I was hoping for a level of spiciness that would, um, make me tear up a little as if I was watching Toy Story 3’s ending, but that didn’t happen. It didn’t even make me sweat. While the Ghost Pepper Ranch Sauce has some heat, the sliced jalapeño are spicier, which emphasizes how tame the sauce is. The sandwich comes with the same spicy chicken patty used in Jack’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich, but as I mentioned at the beginning of this review, it’s not spicy to me. However, the chicken patty did have a little crispiness, but it was also slightly dry.

If your mouth prefers the extreme safe side of the Scoville scale, this sandwich still might be a little too much for you. To give you a reference point for how spicy this sandwich is, it’s noticeably less so than McDonald’s Habanero Ranch Quarter Pounder or their Southwest Premium Chicken McWrap, both of which have made me sweat a little.

But even though it’s not blazin’ and the lettuce I received with my sandwich was the saddest looking piece of lettuce I’ve ever seen, it’s a tasty sandwich.

The flavor from the pickled jalapeño stood out, followed by the Ghost Pepper Ranch Sauce, which has a nice smokiness and pepperiness. It also kind of tastes like a milder version of McDonald’s Habanero Ranch sauce.

The sandwich is also topped with grilled onions, Swiss-style cheese, and tomatoes. I didn’t get very many grilled onions on my sandwich, and I thought it was weird to have grilled onions on a chicken sandwich, but they didn’t add anything flavor-wise because they got lost behind the jalapeño and Ghost Pepper Sauce. The Swiss-style cheese’s flavor does come through a little bit and it slightly tempers the sandwich’s spiciness.

Again, even though it’s not blazin’ to me, it’s a really good sandwich. And I guess it’s a good thing it wasn’t blazin’, because if it was overly spicy, the heat would’ve distracted my taste buds from the flavors. Jack’s Blazin’ Chicken Sandwich is a giant step up in terms of flavor and heat from Jack’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich, and, to be honest, I wish Jack in the Box would replace their Spicy Chicken Sandwich with it.

(Nutrition Facts – 665 calories, 269 calories from fat, 30 grams of fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 1172 milligrams of sodium, 662 milligrams of potassium, 70 grams of carbohydrates, 5 grams of fiber, 8 grams of sugar, and 32 grams of protein.)

Item: Jack in the Box Jack’s Blazin’ Chicken Sandwich
Purchased Price: $4.99 (sandwich only)*
Size: N/A
Purchased at: Jack in the Box
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: A giant step up in terms of flavor and heat from Jack’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich. Ghost Pepper Ranch Sauce may not have a lot of heat, but it does have a nice flavor. Crispy jalapeño provided most of the flavor and heat. Slightly crispy chicken. Thank goodness they used Swiss-style cheese instead of American cheese. Toy Story 3.
Cons: Ghost Pepper Ranch Sauce is not blazin’. My computer’s autocorrect correcting “blazin'” with blazon. Received the saddest piece of lettuce. Grilled onions didn’t add anything. For some reason not available in Austin, Cincinnati, Denver, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Laredo, McAll/Brownsville, Palm Springs, Reno, or Tulsa. Jack’s Spicy Chicken Sandwich.

*Because I live on a rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, things are a bit pricier here. You’ll probably pay less than I did.

Fast Food Jack in the Box