REVIEW: Talenti Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Gelato

Talenti Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Gelato

Few people recognize cookie dough’s versatility.

Your kids ate all the Play-Doh? Give those rascals some cookie dough. Out of plumber’s putty? Use a bit of cookie dough to fix that leaky faucet. Need a quick stuffing for your Thanksgiving turkey? Shove some cookie dough up its poultry-hole and call it a day.

Maybe none of those are good ideas. Maybe Google Image searching “poultry-hole” wasn’t a good idea either. Maybe I’m unsure how to transition from talking about turkey orifices to gelato, so I’m just going to pretend I never wrote these first two paragraphs and start over. Were you expecting Pulitzer Prize writing here? Because I’m pretty sure any writer who uses the word “poultry-hole” more than twice is instantly disqualified, and I just hit number three.

One of seven new Talenti flavors for 2015, Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough seduced me with visions of a cookie dough gelato base speckled with plenty of chocolate chips. Due to the container’s lack of a description aside from the flavor’s title and ingredients list, this is what I was expecting.

I was wrong.

Talenti Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Gelato 2

Instead, this flavor features a vanilla bean gelato with swirls of dark butter fudge, mixed with bits of chocolate chip cookie dough.

Sugary sweet in scent, the vanilla gelato base possesses the strong vanilla flavor and subtle bitterness of a vanilla extract — different, but not undesirable. The fudge swirls’ sharp cocoa flavor alludes to watered-down chocolate syrup, but winds up choked by the potent vanilla gelato.

Talenti Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Gelato 3

Worst of all, the cookie dough bits are the Waldo of this flavor; I’m looking, but I just can’t seem to find ‘em. After consuming more than half the pint, I had encountered around five chunks of cookie dough. Their chocolatey, brown sugar flavor suggests a spot-on rendition of cookie dough, but what’s the point if they’re barely present?

At least I can say one good thing about this gelato: according to the Talenti website, the Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough flavor is both kosher and vegetarian. Rest assured, people. You will find no meats inside this pint. You won’t find very much cookie dough either. Hrmph.

Talenti Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Gelato 4

For a flavor titled “Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough,” the cookie dough really seems to take a backseat here. This flavor needs at least twice as much cookie dough to live up to its name. Frankly, Talenti’s new Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough gelato feels more like a pint of glorified vanilla ice cream.

This is one dessert I’ll be keeping out of my poultry-hole, I mean, mouth-hole.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/2 cup – 210 calories, 90 calories from fat, 10 grams of total fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 40 milligrams of cholesterol, 60 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 25 grams of sugar, and 4 grams of protein..)

Item: Talenti Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Gelato
Purchased Price: $4.69
Size: 1 pint
Purchased at: Stop & Shop
Rating: 4 out of 10
Pros: Gelato flavor is similar to vanilla extract. Kosher and vegetarian. No meat inside here.
Cons: Fudge swirls are choked by vanilla flavor. Very few cookie dough bits. Excessive use of poultry-hole.

REVIEW: Edy’s (Dreyer’s) Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard

Edy’s Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard

With the notable exception of some four months Rob Van Winkle’s To The Extreme spent at the top of the Billboard charts during 1990, there have been few, if any, reasons to get excited about anything “vanilla.”

I get it. Vanilla is boring.

Perhaps not as boring as three yards and a cloud of dust Big 10 football boring, but it certainly surpasses C-SPAN2 on a Friday night. But you might not realize vanilla is America’s favorite ice cream flavor.

And after trying Edy’s new Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard, it’s really not too hard to see why.

If you’re familiar with frozen custard, you’ve been fortunate. Well, at least in one sense of the word. Forgetting for a moment that those of you who are familiar most likely have to suffer through horribly oppressive winters and have a potentially high proportion of cows to people in your local community, you and your Midwestern specialty of at least 1.4 percent egg yolks have remained one of the last great frozen treats to avoid being mass produced and shipped to every megamart in America.

Excuse me, had remained, because Edy’s/Dreyer’s has taken the rich, egg-infused dairy dessert and taken it to supermarket shelves everywhere.

On one hand, this is clearly a good thing. For us East Coasters it means not having to stand in ridiculous lines at Shake Shack or putting ourselves at the mercy of unnecessary commutes. But on the other hand it also could mean the inevitable bastardization (or as I like to say, “gelatofication”) that comes with trying to recreate an incredibly fickle product for retail.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. With flavors like Snickerdoodle, Peanut Butter Pie, and Salted Caramel Pretzel, why on Earth would anyone buy Old Fashioned Vanilla?

Because old fashioned vanilla is classic, and if there’s ever going to be a litmus test for whether or not something mass produced truly lives up to the hype of a regional specialty, it’ll be the most pure and unadulterated form of that product. I can get pretzels and cookie bites stuffed into any factory made ice cream or frozen dairy dessert, but if the dairy base is what sets it apart, and if the egg yolks are noticeably present, then custard of even plain vanilla should stand out as the most sophisticated of desserts. In other words: this is where ingredients matter.

Edy’s Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard Closeup 3

The custard is thick and packed tight with little to no overrun and a noticeable yellow shade common with egg-infused dairy products. Two modest scoops weighed in at over 130 grams (about a serving and a half), meaning there’s little manufactured air. It’s a welcomed change from all the frozen dairy desserts on shelves these days.

You can taste it, too.

The texture registers all the common ice cream buzzwords; not only is it extremely creamy and rich, but it holds its texture when licked and scooped. It’s definitely indulgent, but the flavor isn’t heavy or overwhelming. Instead it’s floral and somehow light, with a sophisticated and multilayered sweetness and bold vanilla flavor which stays with you long after that first scoop.

The smooth nature of the custard makes it exceptional and keeps it from becoming too hard, while the vanilla flavor is something of a revelation. I’ve had plenty of vanilla styled ice cream before — Vanilla Bean, Homestyle Vanilla, and French Vanilla — but, with the exception of maybe some premium brands, nothing has come close to the intensity of the flavor. Even Rita’s, a frozen custard chain I once worked at as a teenager, doesn’t compare when matching the authenticity of the flavor.

Edy’s Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard Closeup 2

Knowing I’d probably never choose an unadorned vanilla ice cream when confronted with plenty of other flavor choices, you might say I had my doubts when choosing the Edy’s Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard. But those doubts were accompanied by the hope that if this really was genuine custard then I’d be in for a rich and flavorful treat even without all the bells and whistles.

Thankfully this flavor lives up to the reputation of authentic frozen custard, and more than makes an acceptable and affordable substitute for when standing in line at Shake Shack just isn’t an option.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/2 cup – 210 calories, 90 calories from fat, 10 grams of total fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 65 milligrams of cholesterol, 60 milligrams of sodium, 25 grams of total carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 4 grams of protein, and 8% calcium.)

Item: Edy’s Old Fashioned Vanilla Frozen Custard
Purchased Price: $3.97
Size: 1 Quart
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 9 out of 10
Pros: Exceptionally smooth and creamy texture. Bold sweetness and rich flavor. Floral and distinct vanilla flavor. Rivals premium ice cream price but comes in a slightly larger (weight) container. Not having to travel far for authentic frozen custard.
Cons: Completely unrealistic serving size in terms of actual scoopage. The inevitable backlash of Midwesterners everywhere.

REVIEW: Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Buttah Cookie Core Ice Cream

Ben & Jerry's Peanut Buttah Core Ice Cream

Ben & Jerry’s first wave of Core ice creams consisted of ice cream surrounding a core of ooey, gooey stuff that was sort of like eating a sundae straight out of the pint.

The idea was pure genius and highly successful, if you ask my freezer, which currently contains three pints of the stuff. If you ask my freezer, also inquire as to what’s in the Ziploc in the back of it, because I forgot to label it before I threw it in there and now I’m scared because I think it’s been in there for some years and I should probably just throw it away.

Now they’ve come out with three different Cookie Core varieties. The Boom Chocolatta version sounded like way too much chocolate for my taste, and I still don’t really understand what Speculoos are, so I figured my best bet would be to try Peanut Buttah Cookie Core.

Ben & Jerry’s describes it as “Peanut Butter Ice Cream with Crunchy Peanut Butter Sugar Bits, Peanut Butter Cookies & a Peanut Butter Cookie Core”. This raised Peanut Buttah above just “default flavor” status, because just reading that description probably made those with peanut allergies reach for their EpiPen.

Speaking of EpiPens, have you ever seen the commercial that advertises them? “Ask your doctor about EpiPen today!” What person with a severe allergy doesn’t already know about EpiPens? I imagine someone watching the commercial and saying to themselves, “Wait, you mean I don’t have to take an ambulance ride to the emergency room with my throat closed up every time I accidentally eat something that came in contact with shellfish? This is amazing, and I’m going to get a new doctor since I should have heard about this years ago!”

Sorry, I just had to share that. It’s been bugging me for a while now.

I’ve always considered the gold standard of peanut butter cookies to be my mom’s, who always baked them at Christmas time. Since you probably haven’t tried my mom’s homemade cookies, I give second place to Grandma’s brand, which has the bonus of being available year-round but doesn’t make the kitchen smell awesome.

All other peanut butter cookies pale in comparison, and I hate the taste of artificial peanut butter flavoring, so I approached Peanut Buttah Cookie Core with caution. I also wondered why we had to go with the unnecessarily dorky “Buttah”.

Ben & Jerry's Peanut Buttah Core Ice Cream Top

The only weak explanation is the description on the carton: “For p.b. fans & cookie spread-heads who want it all, here’s a flavor that delivers it, from the creamy to the crunchy to the peanutty core of crushed-cookie stuff that spreads like buttah (and tastes even bettah).” I feel like New Yorkers are going to be insulted by this mockery of their accents. Then again, they do love insults. Eeeey!

I’m happy to report that every bite of Peanut Buttah Cookie Core is the essence of all that is good about peanut butter cookies. The ice cream alone tastes like it, but I dare you to catch a bite that doesn’t contain some evenly-dispersed chunks of delicious peanut butter cookie.

The same goes for the “crunchy peanut butter sugar bits”, that strike me as more grainy than crunchy. “Grainy” doesn’t usually sound like a positive descriptor for food, but in this case it’s representative of the sugar bits that are big enough to crunch and add an extra layer of texture to the ice cream.

Ben & Jerry's Peanut Buttah Core Ice Cream Core

As for the core, it’s like the distilled essence of a peanut butter cookie. Smooth yet crunchy, cookie yet buttery, it is rich, delicious and everything that a Cookie Core should be.

I only have two complaints about Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Buttah Cookie Core Ice Cream. The first is that it comes off as having only one note of flavor. Trust me, if you love peanut butter cookies, you’ll love this ice cream. And the various textures come through in each bite. But it lacks the mishmash of flavors that Ben & Jerry’s is so well-known for.

The second is that it’s so rich. With all that peanut butter cookie going on, after just a few spoonfuls I felt like I’d already overindulged. This may not be a problem for some, but to me, I could only eat it in small doses.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/2 cup — 320 calories, 190 calories from fat, 21 grams of total fat, 8 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 60 milligrams of cholesterol, 140 milligrams of sodium, 27 grams of total carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 20 grams of sugar, 6 grams of protein, 8% vitamin A, 10% calcium, 2% iron.)

Item: Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Buttah Cookie Core Ice Cream
Purchased Price: $3.49
Size: 1 pint
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Absolute peanut butter cookie taste. EpiPens saving lives. Plentiful peanut butter cookie chunks. Wonderful blend of textures.
Cons: Bit of a one-trick pony. Mystery freezer items. Too rich for prolonged consumption. Insulting New Yorkers. Peanut allergies.

REVIEW: Ben & Jerry’s The Tonight Dough Ice Cream

Ben & Jerry's The Tonight Dough Ice Cream

You may think it’s harmless, generous even, to share this pint with your friends.

Don’t.

It seduces and, thus, accumulates a distressing number of amorous relationships. Give a bite here, share a bite there, and suddenly you have callers all over you, ringing you at 2 in the morning to explain their dreams and tugging your arm to elope with them in Vegas. Go through all this and then where will you be?

In Divorce Court. That’s where.

You’ll have to deal with all that paperwork, the taxes, Judge Mallory. Take it from me: avoid Divorce Court. Don’t share. Save the whole pint for your awesome self. Here’s why:

Ben & Jerry's The Tonight Dough Ice Cream Top

Creamy and smooth with a melt slower than Blue Bunny, but not as creamy as a small-batch Gelato Fiasco, the ice cream stands up to the Ben and Jerry standard I’ve come to know: mild, sweet, and inoffensive, if a bit bland. The caramel portion is milky and sweet with the tang of cooked sugar coming in at the end while the milk chocolate portion leans strongly toward the milk with a dry, cocoa-forward finish.

For those looking for dynamically punchy bases, the ice cream alone is not something you’d hoard in your underground nuclear bunker. But then the mix-ins arrive and explain everything: the base is but the palate cleanser. The humble binder of goods. The tabula rasa for a dairy-inspired art installation worthy of the MoMA.

Ben & Jerry's The Tonight Dough Ice Cream Spoon

And it all starts with the cookie dough chunks. There are gobs of them. Everywhere. Gobs of salty-sweet-and-gritty peanut butter dough. Gobs of familiar, sugar-forward chocolate chip dough. Big gobs. Little gobs. Standard gobs. But mainly big gobs. I eat the gobs. You should, too.

Then there’s the cookie swirl: a thick ribbon of gritty dark chocolate wafers so delightful, it may sully forth magical woodland creatures to Twitter about you. With its taste of Oreos and firm integration of bitter-laced sugar throughout the pint, this is the slightly liquefied embodiment of childhood nostalgia. Aside from a snowplow that harnesses the energy of three Hadron Colliders, I can’t think of anything I’d like more.

Ben & Jerry's The Tonight Dough Ice Cream Empty

And after all that’s over, the bowl’s empty, and it was worth it to not share. It was creamy with a mild base that allowed for those excellent mix-ins to shine like so many sequins on a WWE Wrestler at a European discotheque. Sure, the base is mild and the whole thing is composed of already-existing mix-ins, but these elements are combined in a such a way that allows the Whole to be elevated to a new level: gritty, sugary, chewy, melty, salty, bitter, chocolate-y, and peanut buttery. All the elements of the food pyramid.

If you find the chocolate/caramel base too mild, maybe finish it off with some caramel or fudge. If you miss Fallon’s old iteration, perhaps top it off with potato chip chunkies. Or just scoop-scoop it into your bowl and never look back. I know I didn’t.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/2 cup – 310 calories, 140 calories from fat, 16 grams of fat, 8 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 55 milligrams of cholesterol, 100 milligrams of sodium, 35 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 26 grams of sugar, and 5 grams of protein.)

Item: Ben & Jerry’s The Tonight Dough Ice Cream
Purchased Price: $5.19
Size: 1 pint
Purchased at: Food Emporium
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Creamy. Chocolate-y. Peanut-butter-y. Balance of bitter, salty, and sweet. Gobs of cookie dough. The pint is all yours. WWE wrestlers decked out for the disco. Hadron-Collider-powered snowplow.
Cons: Caramel and chocolate bases are mild. No potato chip clusters. Divorce Court. Deluded lovers you don’t love who explain their dreams to you at 2 in the morning.

REVIEW: Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream

Ben & Jerry's Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream

I have something to confess.

After reading what I’m guilty of, many of you will shake your head in disapproval. And some of you will become angry and say in a raised tone, “But children in Africa are starving.”

Well, here it goes. 

I’m a serial cookie butter waster. 

I’ve thrown out almost a dozen unopened and half eaten jars of Trader Joe’s Speculoos Cookie Butter and Biscoff Spread. All the jars were gifts and I do enjoy cookie butter, but why did I neglect them?

I don’t know, the Cookie Monster, Mrs. Fields, Famous Amos, and Keebler Elves in my head won’t tell me.

If I have not finished a jar of cookie butter, will I be able to finish a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream?

The frozen treat is a combination of dark caramel and vanilla ice creams with speculoos cookies and a speculoos cookie butter core. Because there’s a lot going on, you can’t blindly stab your spoon into it like you would with most ice cream. You have to have the finesse of an archeologist working his or her way around the small bones of a velociraptor’s hand, because your goal, should you buy this ice cream, is to get a bit of every ingredient onto your spoon.

Because this ice cream is a bit high maintenance, don’t bother with a bowl. Doing so will just make it harder to get the optimal spoonful. This ice cream (and I imagine every Cookie Core flavor) is best eaten straight from the container.

Ben & Jerry's Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream Core

Now don’t waste your time trying the ingredients separately. I’ve already done that for you because I’m your junk food friend. The vanilla ice cream tastes like vanilla ice cream. The dark caramel has flavor that’s milder than the vanilla ice cream I guess it should’ve been called light caramel ice cream. The cookies are balls that may or may not be crunchy when you mash them with your molars. And the speculoos cookie butter core is pleasantly gritty and surprisingly soft straight from the freezer. But you shouldn’t eat the cookie butter by itself because it’s not as sweet as the cookie butters you can buy in stores.

Ben & Jerry's Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream Cookies

However, the cookie butter flavor is magically enhanced with the dark caramel and vanilla ice creams. It’s not like eating Biscoff Spread straight from the jar, but it has those flavors and spices we all love, like cinnamon and brown sugar, that make it taste familiar. Actually, at times, its flavor also reminded me of pumpkin spice.

Sadly, the speculoos cookies don’t really intensify the cookie butter flavor. It’s the same with or without. The cookies do add texture when you’re able to get a crunchy cookie, which happens only half of the time. Another inconsistency is the flavor of the cookies. A noticeable amount had no flavor at all.

With all that said, Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream is NOT spectacular. It is very good…if you get a little bit of the cookie butter, both ice creams, and a crunchy cookie on your spoon at the same time. But that won’t be a problem, because there’s enough of each.

It’s good enough that, unlike the jars of cookie butter I once owned, I see myself finishing this pint of Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/2 cup – 290 calories, 170 calories from fat, 19 grams of fat, 10 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 65 milligrams of cholesterol, 90 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of fiber, 21 grams of sugar, 4 grams of protein, 8% vitamin A, 10% calcium, and 2% iron.)

Item: Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream
Purchased Price: $3.75
Size: 1 pint
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: It’s very good if you get all the parts of the ice cream on your spoon. Pleasant cinnamon and brown sugar flavors. Some cookies are crunchy. Cookie butter is soft, even straight from the freezer.
Cons: Not spectacular. Some cookies aren’t crunchy. Cookie butter core not good by itself. Dark caramel ice cream has a very light flavor. Some cookies have no flavor. Being a serial cookie butter waster.