Haribo Sour Sodas

New Haribo?! Very exciting. I'm a big fan of soda flavored candy (OK, I'm a big fan of bottle caps), so let's see. 

Well, the texture is freakin' weird. They are soft like the unicorn gummies, but not bite-through-able. Also, they don't taste anything like soda. But they are sour. They also melted and fused together a lot. 

Cherry-cola: I'm getting cherry, I'm getting Haribo gummy, I'm not getting cola. Ehhh. Wait, but another one tastes only of cola, no cherry. Are they unevenly created?! Intriguing. 6/10? 

Peach-blue raspberry: This just tastes like a peach gummy but sour. I like sour but I don't love peach gummy, even in frog or bottle form. Ehhh. 5/10 

Lemon-strawberry: This one tastes like french fries. What the hell is going on here. 5/10

Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 5/10 (except the one cola-flavored one )

Nellie's Free Range Butter - Unsalted

Cute butter. Tragically, it is always within 2 weeks of expiry when I get it in my veg box. This is not very realistic for solo me, because even if I bake with it, I'd need to consume like 2Tbsp butter/day. That seems unwise as a regular lifestyle choice. I did manage to bake+freeze a good old blueberry pie-cake to finish this one off though. No complaints about the taste or form or cute cow box; it is surely butter. Actually, maybe this is what give me a huge stomach ache?? Possible complaint. But probably not. Probably no complaints. I'll give it a 5 to be safe.

Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10 

Skinny Pop Avocado Lime Popcorn

Blergh! This stuff is cursed. I probably could have guessed from the flavor that I wouldn't love this, since lime+savory = tastes like Trix Cereal for me, 100% of the time. Here too. And it even has dextrose in, so it truly is SWEET LIME, and I hate hate hate to mix fruit + savory (possible exception = cranberry+turkey). But if you like, say, fiesta lime tortilla chips, come on down to experience intense fiesta lime flavor. The avocado oil doesn't really come through, so I'd be curious to try a not limey avo flavor to see what's up with that. But it doesn't seem to be contributing anything here. Other than the worse-than-plain taste, the texture is good, the ingredos are clean (and explicitly nut free, we love skinny pop for that), and the taste isn't actually bad (e.g. artificial or chemical), it's just sweet and that's not what I want on a popcorn. I wonder why I hate this and other people (including my dad, who is directly related to me) clearly seem to enjoy it. Weird. I'll still eat it though, I just will never buy again. 

Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 5/10 

Sour Patch Kids MVP Top Picks Mix

This isn't really a new product as much as it is a repackaging of existing product, except I've never had the cherry ones before so I got it to try those. One nice thing about the SPK life (as opposed to Haribo) is: they're way easier to bite, and the serving size is in pieces (9) instead of tablespoons (inscrutable). Lately I'm suffering from stomach issues, so maybe a bunch of sour candy is not the answer to that...but there's no milk or fat, so then again, maybe it is. Only time will tell! Anyway, here's what you get:

Cherries: these are really good. Cherry flavor with the usual sour dust. Something different! They're a little more onerous to chew because they are so big, so I'm glad it's not a full bag of them, but they're nice to break up the parade of kids. 7/10

Kids: normally I don't eat human-shaped foods, but I guess these are the (weird) exception. There is blue raspberry, orange, lime green, red that is probably cherry but tastes pretty different from the cherries cherry, yellow lemon (a highlight)... 7/10

Watermelons: Already discussed previously, these are pretty good and weirdly soft.  7/10

A pleasant assortment. The Star Mix of SPK. 

Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 7/10 

Sunny D Peeps

Easter candy is surely the best and worst thing about Easter. There is so much candy about it. Peeps are nut free and cute. And since they're just sugar, they can't make my internal agonies worse (we hope). These do taste like sunny D (bad sweetened orange "drink"), but they aren't sunny D, they are candy. So they are better than Sunny D. Also very cute. But a serving is 4 and they come in sleeves of 5. Peeps got a (Sunny) D in math I guess. I got a fresh batch so they're pretty decent, all told.

Overall
Cost: 7/10
Taste: 6/10 

Life Savers Swirled Lollipops

Surely X will fix me... today, x=candy. I got these because the picture kind of looked like Cream Savers on a stick, which are a great nostalgia item. However, the white swirl is not at all cream, it's some sort of vanilla flavor (or really, neutral flavor). These aren't even made by Life Savers, actually, they're contracted out to Spanglers, who make some allergy friendly things (like Dum Dums) but also some dangerous ones (like Neccos and Bit-O-Honey). The bag reads as safe, though. 

Orange & Vanilla:  I guess the flavor is pretty true to form. Tastes like orange soda mixed with a little cream soda, but as a lollipop. It's fine, big and flat, but it didn't fix me. 6/10

Blueberry & Vanilla:  This one might be fixing me. It's better, like a nice blueberry flavored dessert (a Dunkin' Blueberry even). Kind of weird notes for a lollipop. But I like it. 7/10

Strawberry & Vanilla:  Ehh. Not fixing me. The worst flavor, I think, although it is fine. Tastes like a low-quality strawberry candy (which, lo and behold, it is!). 6/10

Cherry & Vanilla:  Maybe a fixer. I always like cherry lollipops. Nice bright flavor. Also some weird notes. This vanilla part really isn't adding much. Ah well. Easter, what can you do, right? 7/10

Overall
Cost: 7/10 (I don't actually remember, which means it was probably cheap)
Taste: 6/10

2020 Ravelston Cabernet

Insane day. I found out during a routine meeting that my bosses are planning to close down the department I work in. So, I've unironically turned to the bottle. Was that wise? Surely not. But I don't regret it.... I love you, the bottle. Or at least, this bottle.

Actually, on first sip, this tasted rotten - as if it'd gone off. Not as good as their '22 cab, or so I thought. But if you let it sit! Oh! It improves so quickly. Pretty thick, not too tanniny, pleasant fruity/plummy notes. It's a grower. A breather. A good omen, perhaps. Breathe with me, blog fans.....................

 

Overall 
Cost: 6/10 [9$!]
Taste: 7/10