REVIEW: Yoplait Smoothie (Triple Berry, Strawberry Banana and Strawberry Mango Pineapple)

Marvo 19 Comments

The Yoplait Smoothie kits, or as I like to call them, Jamba Juice Action Playsets, allow normal folk, like you, me or your children, to walk and blend in the shoes of a Jamba Juice worker.

With a blender, a carton of skim milk and these Yoplait Smoothie kits, you can experience a day in the life of a Jamba Juice Jockey. Learn to yell loud enough so that patrons can hear you over the whirring and crushing of the powerful blenders, but without straining your vocal chords. Practice your blender container top throwing technique so that you can hit the sink each and every time without looking or hitting your fellow employees. Rehearse your speech to Jamba Juice virgins about the differences between the Sixteen, Original and Power sizes. Learn to hold your tongue when someone orders a Power-sized smoothie and not say, “Holy shit, do you REALLY need a Jamba Juice that big?”

Each Yoplait Smoothie package contains frozen chunks of fruit and yogurt, and it comes in three flavors: Triple Berry, Strawberry Banana and Strawberry Mango Pineapple. It doesn’t come in as many flavors as what’s found on a Jamba Juice menu board and you’re going to have to make your own boosts, but that’s as easy as crushing the pills you might have in your medicine cabinet. Crush a Flintstones tablet for a Daily Vitamin Boost, do the same to a No-Doze for an Energy Boost, or a birth control pill if you want to include the discontinued Femme Boost.

Making a Yoplait Smoothie is as simple as getting rid of your illegal drugs by flushing it down the toilet when the cops bust down your door. Just throw everything in there and watch it spin. After a minute or so in the blender, the cup of skim milk and the entire bag of frozen chunks of fruit and yogurt will turn into 16 ounces of smoothie goodness. Although, I must admit it wasn’t entirely smooth since my crappy $30 blender had trouble breaking down the frozen fruits entirely, so there were small bits in my smoothies.

You really can’t go wrong with any of the fruit combinations the Yoplait Smoothie comes in. All of them are quite good and I enjoyed them equally. The Triple Berry, made up of strawberries, blueberries and raspberries, had an almost candy-like flavor with the blueberries and raspberries standing out the most. The Strawberry Banana had a nice balance between the two fruits in it. Finally, the Strawberry Mango Pineapple had a great tropical flavor. While the fruits are tasty, what truly makes these smoothies really delicious are the frozen yogurt pieces, which gives them an added sweetness and flavor. But that shouldn’t be surprising because there are two things Yoplait is good at: cleverly adding a French word to the English vernacular and making tasty yogurt.

Each smoothie does have a very slight artificial sweetener aftertaste, thanks to the sucralose, but again, it’s very slight and you may not even notice it. Also, the Triple Berry has a lot of seeds, but I can’t blame Yoplait for that, only Mother Nature, or the botanists who haven’t been able to make seedless strawberries and raspberries.

Overall, the Yoplait Smoothie kits are easy to make, delicious and reasonably priced if you compare them with what you get at Jamba Juice. I see myself buying them on a regular basis so that I can have smoothie goodness whenever I want. And if I consume enough of them, I’ll have the skills to work at a Jamba Juice.

(Nutrition Facts – 8 ounces prepared – Triple Berry – 110 calories, 1.5 grams of fat, 0.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, less than 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 20 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 10 grams of sugar and 1 gram of protein. Strawberry Banana – 110 calories, 1 gram of fat, 0.5 grams of saturated fat, less than 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 15 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 9 grams of sugar and 1 gram of protein. Strawberry Mango Pineapple – 110 calories, 1 gram of fat, 0.5 grams of saturated fat, less than 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 15 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 11 grams of sugar and 1 grams of protein.)

Item: Yoplait Smoothie (Triple Berry, Strawberry Banana and Strawberry Mango Pineapple)
Price: $3.00 each
Size: 7.6 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 9 out of 10 (for all flavors)
Pros: All flavors are delicious. Easy to make. Yogurt contains live and active cultures. Contains one serving of fruit. Has significantly less sugar than Jamba Juice smoothies. Reasonably priced.
Cons: Cheap ass blenders might have trouble blending it. Very slight artificial sweetener aftertaste. Triple Berry flavor has a lot of seeds. Turbo-sized Jamba Juice. Femme Boost no longer available at Jamba Juice.

REVIEW: Dannon Caramel Yogurt

Kayla 11 Comments

I’m simple when it comes to yogurt, but that doesn’t mean I enjoy plain yogurt. Ugh, just the site of it makes me throw up inside my mouth a little. I’m simple in the way that I don’t need my bacteria infused snack to get fancy on me, like when fruit on the bottom was the “it” thing. I didn’t enjoy that, partly because I’m such a lazy bastard and mixing up the fruit with the yogurt was too much of an effort. Then came drinkable yogurt, which surprised me that there were even lazier bastards out there who believe putting a spoon up to their lips was way too much to work.

Now we have yogurt that helps you become regular, which, again, boggles my mind. I would think Activia would make you stay irregular, because every time you would see the porcelain goddess, you would think about Jamie Lee Curtis’ bowel movement, whether it be pre-Activia Jamie Lee Curtis all bloated and bitchy or post-Activia Jamie Lee Curtis running for a toilet like she just had a feast at Senor Frog’s.

Dannon’s new Caramel Yogurt doesn’t come with a packet of caramel drizzle sauce to put on it (although that would be a good idea). It doesn’t come in a bottle that’s the size of Polly Pocket’s flask, nor does it make promises for helping you drop the kiddies off at the pool, but this old school-style yogurt doesn’t need all of the glitz and glamour. It’s a no nonsense yogurt with a sweet caramel flavor that’s pretty good.

I’m usually a Yoplait Light girl, but I occasionally indulge in a coffee flavored yogurt from Dannon. The only creepy thing about Dannon’s yogurts is the fluid that always just chills on top. I know it’s common with some yogurts, and it’s not a total phobia, but it just weirds me out a bit. Yoplait doesn’t have this phenomenon and it’s much creamier in taste and texture than Dannon’s. Plus, it has fewer calories overall, if you stick to Yoplait Light.

Dannon Caramel Yogurt has 50 more calories than most Yoplait Light varieties, but it struggles in flavor and texture. I guess I could describe Dannon’s taste as more yogurty; it has that bite that Yoplait really doesn’t have and the caramel flavor is very light. It’s almost an essence of caramel, but that doesn’t make it bad, it’s just not a true dessert type yogurt. If you’re calorie conscious and like your yogurt tasting like pudding, I would stick with the Yoplait Light. But if you have an odd fetish with yogurt fluid, I would send you towards the Dannon.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 container – 150 calories, 2.5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 105 milligrams of sodium, 350 milligrams of potassium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 25 grams of sugar, 7 grams of protein, 0% vitamin A, 0% vitamin C and 25% calcium.)

Item: Dannon Caramel Yogurt
Price: Free
Size: 6 ounces
Purchased at: My Parents’ Refrigerator
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: No-frills yogurt. Knowing that there are lazier people than you. Making fun of Polly Pocket’s drinking problems. Sweet caramel flavor. Anything is better than plain yogurt.
Cons: A bitchy and bloated Jamie Lee Curtis. Flavor is very faint. Jamie Lee Curtis with chronic diarrhea. No caramel drizzle packet. Yogurt fluid.

REVIEW: Hormel Chili ‘n Spuds Chili Meals

Marvo 17 Comments

When the apocalypse happens and survivors are fighting over food, the Hormel Chili ‘n Spuds Chili Meal is probably one of the products they will be brawling over, along with cans of SpaghettO’s and creamed corn.

It’ll be more valuable than gold, silver and platinum combined, because during the apocalypse, they will all lose their value since they’re not edible and the Cash4Gold building was destroyed. The Chili ‘n Spuds Meal will be valuable because it doesn’t need to be refrigerated and has a decent shelf life.

It’s a microwaveable meal that takes 90 seconds to heat up, but since electricity will probably be non-existent in a post-apocalyptic world, there will be no way to power a microwave, unless someone jerry-rigs a way to create electricity from despair.

Fortunately, the sealed meal can also be prepared by boiling it water…or urine, if water is hard to come by because the only source of it is being hoarded by a group of survivors with more guns than you do. Of course, once you get your water (or urine), you’ll need to obtain fire, which will be extremely easy thanks to the never ending supply of burning carnage around you.

The Hormel Chili ‘n Spuds Chili Meal is not pretty looking, but it’s definitely better than your other options, which will probably be creamed corn or the cooked flesh of your fellow humans. It tastes a lot like a canned chili I’ve had in the past. The sauce has a smidgen of spice, but it’s kind of bland and lacks any tomato flavor. But still, it’s better than a can of creamed corn.

The meat chunks are tender and so are the potato cubes, but the starch doesn’t add much flavor. Instead they just provide a different texture and some carbohydrates, which will give you the necessary energy to help you run away from whatever zombified creature that finds you. It’s also bean-less chili, so you’ll less likely to produce the gastronomical leaks that make it easy for the zombified to locate you.

If I was living in a post-apocalyptic world, I would totally kill someone with a can of creamed corn for the Hormel Chili ‘n Spuds Chili Meal. But since I don’t, I wouldn’t kill anyone for it, nor would I send my gold chains to Cash4Gold so that I can have the three dollars necessary to buy another tray of this shelf stable chili.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 tray – 250 calories, 7 grams of fat, 2.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 20 milligrams of cholesterol, 760 milligrams of sodium, 33 grams of carbohydrates, 4 grams of fiber, 3 grams of sugar, 14 grams of protein, 15% vitamin A, 4% calcium, 2% vitamin C and 10% iron.)

Item: Hormel Chili ‘n Spuds Chili Meals
Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Size: 10 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: Tastes like canned chili, if you like canned chili. Has a little spice. Meat and potatoes are tender. Can be either microwaved or boiled. Bean-less chili. Spuds provide the carbohydrates necessary to help you run away from zombies. Fire.
Cons: Tastes like canned chili, if you despise canned chili. Kind of pricey for what you get. Chili sauce was kind of bland. Contains MSG. High in sodium. Being forced to eat human flesh. Living in a post-apocalyptic world with zombies.

REVIEW: Go Girl Bliss Energy Drink

Marvo 18 Comments

Is there anything inappropriate about a man wearing a woman’s deodorant? Smelling “powder fresh” might not be the optimal scent for a man, but the sour smell from going au naturel is even less so.

Is there anything wrong with a man using menstrual cramp reliever Midol to help ease the pain of being kicked in the balls? After all, it’s a great medicine that specializes in lower region pain.

If a man can do those things, then there shouldn’t be anything wrong with my manly self drinking the Go Girl Bliss Energy Drink…or putting on a tight leather dress, stiletto heels, a black wig, makeup, shaving my entire body, going out to pick up rich Asian business men in Waikiki, charging them $1,000 an hour to strap them in a hanging restraint harness while I whip their half naked bodies or making them pay $750 an hour to pin them to the floor and gingerly dance on their bodies with my stilettos on.

Go Girl Bliss is the third energy drink from Go Girl’s estrogen-friendly line, which consists of the original Go Girl Energy Drink and the complexion-helping Go Girl Glo. Just like the first two, it also contains an ingredient Go Girl calls Super Citrimax, which is a mild herbal appetite suppressant.

Out of the three Go Girl flavors, I have to say Go Girl Bliss is by far my favorite. It has a pleasant peach scent and a nice balance of peach and tea flavor. The Yerba Maté tea leaves in the beverage also provide the caffeine, which, along with the added taurine, gave me a decent energy kick. The peach flavor comes from peach juice concentrate, but it tastes kind of artificial.

It’s sweetened using organic agave syrup, but it also contains Sucralose, which gives the non-carbonated Go Girl Bliss a slight artificial sweetener aftertaste. However, I highly recommend drinking it cold because if it warms up, the artificial sweetener aftertaste gets worse.

The 35-calorie Go Girl Bliss Energy Drink is tasty enough that I see myself purchasing more in the future. Now you may think a manly man like myself would be embarrassed to purchase women’s energy drinks, but I am not. Of course, that’s only because when I purchase any of the Go Girl Energy Drinks, I throw in a box of tampons, so instead of looking like a weird male who enjoys women’s energy drinks, I look like a chivalrous man picking up items for his cramping and menstruating woman.

Unfortunately, I now have several unopened boxes of tampons, which I could either giveaway or, if I feel like rioting, use them as wicks for Moltov cocktails.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 can – 35 calories, 0 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of protein, 8 grams of carbohydrates, 8 grams of sugar, 30 milligrams of sodium, 40% riboflavin, 125% vitamin B6, 25% pantothenic acid, 50% niacin, 40% vitamin B12, 5% magnesium. It also contains 400 milligrams of taurine, 100 milligrams of garcinia cambogia, 50 milligrams of inositol and 65 milligrams of caffeine.)

Item: Go Girl Bliss Energy Drink
Price: $1.50 (on sale)
Size: 11.5 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Nice peach tea flavor. Uses organic agave syrup to help sweeten it. Provides a decent energy kick. Only 35 calories. No strong artificial sweetener aftertaste, unless you drink it warm. A portion of the proceeds are donated to breast cancer research.
Cons: Peach flavor tastes kind of artificial, despite using peach juice concentrate. Hard to determine if Super Citrimax is effective as a mild herbal appetite suppressant. Having to slip into a tight leather dress. Trying to find other uses for tampons.

REVIEW: Hostess Sno Balls B.O.B. Cakes

Kayla 12 Comments

I love when brands team up with whatever children’s movie that was recently released on the big screen or on DVD to create a product like the Hostess’ B.O.B Cakes. Usually when this happens, snack food companies create some minimal variation of a tried and true product to make kids pull at their mother’s apron strings mom jeans and beg for them.

Hostess B.O.B. Cakes follow that formula exactly. Basically, it’s a Sno Ball with different packaging and in a different color; it even admits that on the box. However, I fell for it. No, it wasn’t because I loved Seth Rogen’s character in Monsters vs. Aliens. I didn’t even see it. It’s simply because this was a blue Sno Ball; a blue ball, if you will, and I couldn’t pass up buying a product clearly marketed towards children that would be tarnished by the dirty mind of a 22-year-old female with the sense of humor of a 12-year-old boy.

I have to give props to Hostess (and Drake’s who was captured by the corporate clutches of Hostess…that greedy yet tasty bitch) for the lovely names they gave their snacks back in the day. Apparently there was a time when asking for a HoHo got you a chocolate cream snack cake instead of a venereal disease-ridden woman who wears lime green booty shorts everyday because they’re the lucky shorts she wore when she tested 30 men to see if any of them were the father of her baby on Maury (Spoiler alert: none of them were). During that same time period, saying you were craving a Ding Dong didn’t mean you were jonesing to go to that new Asian gay bar.

The B.O.B. is a cream injected chocolate cake that’s covered in fluffy marshmallow, then coated in coconut and then dyed in a food coloring that looks like it could turn your stool into the color of a Smurf. It’s been a long time since I had a Sno Ball, and I almost forgot what they taste like. But when I put that blue ball into my mouth, the memories came back. Maybe it was because of the instant sugar rush I got from the first bite. I guess 23 grams of sugar will do that to you.

Is it really necessary to jam cream inside of a cake that is covered in a heaping amount of marshmallow?

Yes, because the cream is what brings it all together and paired with the marshmallow and coconut, the taste is simply marvelous.

Oh, who am I kidding?

After the first couple of bites you feel like you could be foaming out of the mouth, but it’s tasty, and the coconut isn’t choky like most products with shredded coconut.

You can find Sno Balls at most locations where food that will eventually make you BFFs with Wilford Brimley is sold. Currently, Sno Balls can been found in white, pink, blue and, if you check the Halloween clearance shelves, orange (which are called Glo Balls). Personally, if I did have balls, I’d rather have blue balls than ones that glow.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 Cake – 180 calories, 6 grams of fat, 3.5 grams of saturated fat, 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 220 milligrams of sodium, 31 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of dietary fiber, 23 grams of sugar, 1 gram of protein and 4% iron.)

Item: Hostess Sno Balls B.O.B. Cakes
Price: $2.50
Size: 6 cakes
Purchased at: Wally World
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tasty, like all other Sno Balls. The names Hostess gives its products. Coconut flavor isn’t overwhelming. Not having to experience blue balls, Wilford Brimley
Cons: High in sugar. Mom jeans. Smurf-colored stool. Cream injected chocolate cake. Balls that glow. Diabetes.