Really scraping the bottom of the review barrel here, since this is indistinguishable from the Unsalted Chicken Broth and the Regular Chicken Broth. But it is technically a hybrid of those two broths, and therefore a unique product. It was, as always, fine. Made some nice chicken enchilada soup with it. It was a little salty. さすが chicken broth.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
The reviews for this are so bad... I couldn't stay away. The reviews are correct. I should have stayed away. This tastes like frozen lima beans, which I haven't had in a loooong time, because I am allergic to beans. But lima beans are the only bean I don't miss, because they are mealy and gross. This cereal isn't mealy (it's Kix-texture), but it is gross. Genuinely, it tastes like freezer burn (arctic crunch!) and light vegetable. Very weird vibes. I don't get any "cooling effect", though, which is just about the only good thing you get with these novelty frosty cereals. OK, one other good thing here: the aesthetics of the cream & cerulean orbs are very good and unique. It's one of the prettiest cereals I've ever seen. Like glass orbs in a modern Nordic-inspired home catalogue. Other than bad bean, the main flavor note I detect is "aspirational vanilla frosting (gluten free?)". Like me, its aspirations remain unfulfilled.
As I did my usual "eating a new food allergy panic attack website google" (parse that one, syntax nerds), I saw that this is no longer listed under available products on the Quaker site (though it is ostensibly allergen free). Smart move, Cap'n.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 4/10
These taste like a foot, and I do not have a foot fetish. Just a very weird, slightly tangy(?) unpleasant flavor note going on here. Then the aftertaste is much better: like the buttery flour-heavy cookie dough base from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book binder. You know the one. After some mixing of taste and aftertaste, things level out to a slightly weird, slightly fine floury cookie. None of these things are classic OR graham, but it wasn't a total waste of a cookie. Weird stuff. Soft texture. Small circle shape (again, graham who?).
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
I know that 'in for a penny, in for a pound' is one of my most toxic patterns, but also, I'm in for a lot of pennies at the moment. So the fact that this chocolate chip muffin probably weighs a pound is irrelevant to me. This one is better than the big corn muffin and big blueberry muffin, but I'm not sure if it's because I ate it cold and not in a hurry, or if it's truly better tasting. The chocolate chips are like normal lil dark chocolate chips and the rest of the muffin tastes like normal muffin. The texture is a little bit too dense for my preference, but it's not egregious. Overall it is a treat, which is what you want from your weird large nut-free muffin.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 7/10
I had a moment today where a richie rich was complaining about egg prices (up to 3.50$/dozen here, which is frankly still cheap per calorie) and I almost said, "why don't you just replace eggs with carrots?", which is a sign I need to g2b. Luckily I kept my carrot propaganda to myself. Carrots are really cheap though. And so versatile! I don't even like carrots, but I can't deny that they last a long time and add a certain "fun orange color" to any food. Good for rice, good for soup, good for pasta, good for salad if I could still eat raw produce without OAS. Good. But the taste is very "I'm eating this as a chore, but it could be worse". Oh well.
Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 6/10
People seem to like these, but people are dumb. This is another lower-tier white-choco milano. It tastes overwhelmingly like artificial caramel flavor. I know there are better coffee and caramel flavors out there than "janky caramel Dunkin k-cup" flavor. But this is not those. Still a cookie, though.
Overall
Cost: 4/10 [5.70]
Taste: 6/10
I gave up not eating candy canes for Lent.
I always had the perception that all non-mint candy canes are inferior and gross, but since most candy canes are candy may-contains I don't have that much experience to draw from. These are giving me an additional pro-mint data point. But they're fine. Allergy friendly, weren't broken, no artificial colors, taste moderately pleasant. Sweet and kinda fruity. But a cane is actually a dumb-as-hell shape for a candy to be. Who asked for this? By buying it, I fear that I was. Oopsy.
Overall
Cost: 3/10 [10$?!]
Taste: 6/10
Almost didn't review this, since I figured it's the same thing as the non-Petite version (the picture sure looks the same), but based on my comments, this actually is a different, petiter beast. One serving of this is like, 9 florets. Still tastes better than the winter mix broccos, even though I also bought this because they were out of winter mix. Maybe I should give up on winter mix and just go full brocco. But I need all the veggie diversity I can get! Anyway, this was good. I enjoyed it more than I expected to enjoy it, whatever that means.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Huh. I had pretty low expectations for these, because syrup flavored things are horrible usually. And these really do remind me of a French Toast taste! But they're not at all like the weird glazed donut frosted flakes that I said tasted like French Toast Crunch. Perhaps French Toast Crunch doesn't taste like French Toast either!? This is cinnamony, buttery, and yes, syruppy, but not in that artificial maple way. In a good way. The smell is appealing rather than gross. Pretty impressive! The rare non-gross on-sale novelty cereal!
Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 7/10
These are the only happy chicks I see nowadays, you feel me? They're cute though. These gummies are in various states of hatchedness; some are even full egg. The texture is pretty soft for Haribo. The flavors aren't listed on the bag, so these are just my best guess:
yellow: pineapple? fine.
dark yellow: lemon? pretty darn lemony.
pink: strawberry? fine.
orange: orange? okay.
dark red: cherry? good.
green: green apple? fine.
In conclusion, I should have bought more Haribo. These aren't even that good, I just like them.
Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 6/10
Spinach is a great veg (grittiness aside), but the bundle I got from Lakeside Organics was kinda mid. Very dirty, holey, scrunchy, wilty, etc. I salvaged many good leafs, and the taste was solid spinach, as ever, but the time commitment was a lot more than I would want to spend on spinach prep. I guess this is better (morally?) than those store brand pre-washed bags are though, s i g h.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10
It's kinda messed up that people wanted plumper chicken breasts, so they selectively bred massive birds, and now the breasts are TOO BIG so they're selling these "thin cutlet" packages instead (at a premium price point). But a lot of things are kinda messed up, aren't they?
Anyway, I spent a pretty penny on these, but it was worth it to make a nice herby chicken dish. These cook quickly (~8min), taste good, and didn't have any weirdnesses (or pee smell, but I didn't use the oven...). Actually, they had one weirdness: the outside of the package smelled so, so bad, but all the meat in my jank-city grocery store is like that, especially on Saturdays. Luckily the inside was uneventful. I was surprised that there were like 6-7 pieces in a 1.5lb package (5 normie chickens, 2 surprise "oh that's separate" chickens), but I guess that's the whole point. Thin chicken is certainly more delightful than thick chicken. Convenient. If I were rich I'd be buying these weekly I bet.
Overall
Cost: 4/10 [13$]
Taste: 6/10
Hm. Turns out a butter cookie with flavor notes of (1) butter and (2) crisp tastes... kinda boring. It is indeed buttery and a cookie, and sweet but not super sweet. It is round and honestly not very crispy. Just a normal crumbly circle of cookie. I've been having a pretty rough week, brain-wise, which made me fear that the chocolate-containing milano I ate last week was the culprit, so I went for a non-chocolatey option here. But all the non-chocolatey options are crap! I might as well just eat some butter sprinkled with sugar on my own time (but that sounds gross, is my point).
Overall
Cost: 4/10
Taste: 6/10
Degree of Butteriness: 10/10
As a creature of habit, having run out of white chocolate milanos to sample, I went for the original milk choco this week (or dark choco? I actually am not sure. Maybe dark choco). For now, no regrets. These are a top-tier cookie. They taste like a (now-may-contain-nuts) Terry's Chocolate Orange; that is to say: they taste like happiness. Like soft, unfettered innocence. Like a winter festival. Good.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 8/10
A fun new cereal!, I thought. Wrong. It is not fun. But it is a new cereal, so here we are. It also has 'bran' in the name, which maybe should have tipped me off as to its unfunness. But I like Raisin Bran and I mildly enjoy both the frosted & complete brans (although they aren't really fun). Blueberry is a good fruit and crunch is a fine noise to make. So then, what happened here? It's just boring. The blueberry is flavoring only, and not bits like raisin bran has raisin bits (aka raisins). And the flavoring is kinda artificial, like a cheapo blueberry muffin. It's still an OK flavor, but it isn't good. The bran is soggy and typical of kelloggs. As far as I could perceive, there were no crunches. Ho hum. At least there's fiber!
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Just call me Lord of the Broths. This is a good one. I needed 5 cups and it is FOUR cups, and my store had just ONE BOX (bashed up, to boot) remaining. Must be that avian influenza. But it was a good box. I made beef stew (wine-free edition) and the broth was definitely better than the beef, and for that I thank this low-sodium base. It tastes like Beef Broth, but not in a tomatoey or itchy way, just in a warm, thin, vaguely herbal way. Thanks, Swanson! Soy-free as always.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Having exhausted the extra-dark pretzel options from utz, it was time for me to try the "original" version. Well, now I know the original version is inferior. Tastes like nothing (whereas the extra dark ones taste like Pretzel). The texture of these is good -- immanently biteable -- and the size is also good; 5 makes a satisfying serving. The ingredient statement has my heart, as ever. But these pretzels are hardly special(s).
Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 6/10
Yooo this is a weird little cereal. Its tan orbs have seemingly nothing in common with frosted flakes or glazed donut holes (minus the shape: orb). They smell like a French Toast Crunch kinda deal and taste like a dense, mild version of same. It is not unpleasant, but it is very confusing given the branding. I guess these are more cake donut than yeast donut, right down to the little brown speckles. I'm pretty sure [edit: yep] that these are corn based, which is all the weirder since neither frosted flakes nor donut holes (nor glaze) are corn based, other than like, corn syrup. Maybe it is a societal commentary. Maybe "crunchy syrup balls" didn't test well in their focus group. People probably do like to be vexed. Why, I feel a little pleasure in it just now, myself.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Milano historians know that this is not the first coconut milano, but it is the first white chocolate coconut milano. Blog historians know that the other two white chocolate flavors (lemon, strawberry) had some inadequacies, but I was compelled to get to this one eventually. But it's good that I did! This flavor has only adequacies. At minimum! The taste is overwhemingly coconut, but the white choco (which isn't perceptively funky) tempers it with mild sweetness, as does the cookie. All together it's like their coconut cake, but much smaller and therefore less one-note. It also reminds me of the Samoa girl scout cookies, or at least the Dunkin flavor swirl inspired by them. Strong coconut, but not strongly artificial, with some caramelly/choco backnotes (despite white choco only). Delightful for coconut likers, and for me.
Overall
Cost: 4/10 [5$]
Taste: 7/10
I can hardly believe there are still unreviewed pasta shapes, but indeed, this is one. I wanted mafalda for my skillet laz but this was the closest available. It did the job; good bite and cute shape, not too gummy or cronchy. Would be too much pasta without sauce, I expect.
Overall
Cost: 5/10 [3$]
Taste: 6/10
I willfully choose to interpret this as [Sweet Baby] Broccoli, because I sure don't want to eat a sweet brocco. I do understand that baby brocco is classier, fancier, rarer, richer, etc, but it is also (surprise!) much smaller in terms of brocco-content-per-stalk. As a brocco enjoyer I don't want LESS of what I enjoy, even if it is classy and cute. Plus the prep here involves so much more washing, plucking, etc. On the other hand, if I were making a meat main or a fancy italian pasta with a small serving size, I would indeed want these -- it's just that I only ever eat rice-with-veg and (non-fancy) pasta-with-veg and so the baby brocco is not a value add. Taxonomy aside, this is a solid iteration of the Sweet Baby. The taste is good (I'd say mild, not sweet) and it wasn't gritty or mushy or anything, even though I had quite a few yellow flower bits to remove (Sweet Adolescent Broccoli).
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 7/10
Happy 14th! It's Friday, so it actually is a happy 14th, as these things go. And this flavor was a pleasant surprise: I dislike most cherry flavoring, but you add in some lime and I guess it magically becomes ungross. Waterloo seltzers are far from my favorite seltzers, though they are all "OK", but this is my favorite waterloo flavor so far. It smells like cherry limeade (the non-0-cal version) and tastes like, hmm. It tastes like a very fizzy, slightly acidic, vaguely fruity drink. But inhale deep enough and you'll get to where you're meant to go.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
God, I really am change-averse. I do not need to be tearing up over the fact that I will never get these only-mildly-OK cookies for free from work again, again! I can just buy the mildly OK cookies! Self!!
These cookies are just mildly OK. You know how vitamin water etc is like an eyedropper of juice in a bottle of water? These are the solids equivalent. Like a pinch of Girl Scout Thin Mint Cookie in an airy wafer of... neutral wafer. I like the flavor notes (choco, mint) and I guess it's nice that these aren't too sweet, but they just have very little flavor. This is not a gourmet resto, this is a desperation bag cookie snack, let me have some flavor!
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
I've eaten 5 distinct foodstuffs recently (=in my sick sick 48 hour day), and all of them were corn in some form. (Cereal, muffin, chip, popped, this). I don't even like corn in non-corn form!! Things are dire. Globally, personally, and cornlally. Is there a corn vitamin? I doubt it. My hindbrain yearns for ... salt? Who knows.
Anyway. I had some great store brand frozen corn last year before my fridge died, but this time I thought I'd try the Birds Eye for allergy phobia reasons. Well, it wasn't as good. Super sweet? Ha! Hardly! And so on. My reaction to this, even in delicious nacho, was "this is fine. nothing special. I like corn and this is corn, but it's small". That's right. It's small corn. Not plump. Just regular. I'll eat it but I'll return to the risk of Store Brand Corn next time.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Oh, chip. I got these not because of the frankly unappealing branding, but because I was looking for Utz brand tortilla chips in support of their nut-free copy. And behold, THESE are the Utz brand tortilla chips! Must be a recent rebranding (or I'm just really ignorant about tortilla chips, also possible). How silly. I guess for those consumers who like to try new things (haha...) the gambit might pay off.
Anyway, these taste like tortilla chips. Good size (big), nice crunch, no complaints really. Actually, one complaint: 11oz is a stupid size for a bag. Every recipe is for 6oz, 12oz, etc, and you're giving me 11oz? Horrible. Other than that, no complaints. Uncooked they're very generic; baked for nacho (mm nacho) they have a delightful fried aroma (like chinese crispy noodles) the likes of which I haven't seen before. Perfect nacho chip; normie chip chip.
Overall
Cost: 5/10 [5$ish???]
Taste: 6/10
A-N-X I-E T-Y! Makes you wonder why you try! 🎵
I got these after googling "BEST CANDY FOR TUMMY ACHE"; the best candy for tummy ache seems to be ginger (no nut-free ginger candy exists, trust me I've looked) or peppermint (a choco-free mint is not a candy, thank you very much). So the second best candy is "sour candy", or so they say. Of course these have a little "not so sour" emblem which I didn't notice 'til I already bought them and thought "well these aren't very sour"!! Foiled again! They also taste like every other peach candy, and I realise I don't like peach candy much. Peaches are great. Peach pastry, very good. Artificial peach flavor? No thank you. I still ate many of them, but no thank you to the concept. Cute shape/coloring on these, though. And my teeth do hurt a little, which is sufficiently distracting. Wahee~
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Some of my best friends are platanitos! These are a nice iteration of plantain chip. They're thin and pliable, but not too thin to have a good bite. These are green plantains (so, less sweet/ripe) but they taste just as pleasant as the yellow ones. There's a slight sweetness, a slight saltiness, a slight oiliness, and an overwhelming starchiness. Which I like. Good snack.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 7/10
I waited so long [for brain reasons] to try the Dunkin' cold foam (which was originally in the black Reddi-Wip can) that they released their own branded version! Once I saw this, my [possibly fruitless] cold foam fast was over. Hooray, etc. This doesn't have any artificial sweeteners or flavors in it, anyway, so I like it quite a lot. Is it the same as the foam that Dunkin stores use? That I am not sure, because I didn't have it on cold brew, which is the only place I experience cold foam in Dunkin stores. However, the fact that I am not sure either way is a good sign. Tastes like unobjectionable sweet milky cream; melts properly; lasts 2 weeks. Didn't cause any urgent health issues. I don't get the flavor name (Extra Extra? is this little caesar's?) but that's OK, I don't have to get everything.
Overall
Cost: 5/10 [5$ish]
Taste: 7/10
Uh oh! These smell like medicine. Too bad I didn't have these first so I'd think that medicine smells like cookies instead. Alas, I started down the medicine path well before I was ever allowed to have Sweets. Now I yearn for sweets and protest too much about meds; let that be a lesson to all the parents out there. Just kidding (sort of, I dunno).
Anyway, it's a bad sign that the best part of these is by far the (tasty) cookies and not the (cloying, medicinal) choco-center. This is definitely worse than the lemon flavor. I can see more clearly here that the choco comes in two layers, one light pink "strawberry" and one normie. I can't disentangle them without some serious tools, though, which would be fine if I didn't suspect that at least one layer was kind of gross (but maybe both, jury's out). Sad. Sad cookie disappointment. I'm still aiming not to have choco-choco, but I don't know how long it will last since (a) I feel like crap anyway (b) the external world is also very bad and (c) all these white choco foods are inferior!!
Overall
Cost: 4/10 [5.20$]
Taste: 5/10
I have a disease. Well, I have lots of diseases, but one of them is apparently buying stuff that is hard to chew despite hating things that are hard to chew. I have TMJ now! What am I doing! But truly, who could resist "Hards"? What branding. It's a thing of beauty. Also, these pretzels are massive, which is funny, but they're also like teeny versions of soft pretzels, which is doubly funny. A serving size is one pretzel. The taste is 'pretzel'. I would prefer the extra dark flavor profile, but I guess there's only so many pretzel variations utz can handle. As with all the utzes, these are proudly made in a nut-free facility and have no ingredients about which to fret. Many of them are broken in the bag, which is really something because they are indeed extremely hard. The reviews for these are also so wholesome and enchanting. The people love Hards!
Something else stupid about me is that I absolutely hate that "my wets" meme about noodles etc, and I don't know why I hate that so much but I like these (and other silly nominalized adjective names). I hope it's not that I find companies loveable and people hateable, because that's backwards thinking. Maybe the first noticed wets enjoyers (SHUDDER) are just people I particularly disliked, and I've retained that info deep down. I hope so. Anyway, this has been your moment of irrational language prejudice; sleep well.
Overall
Cost: 6/10 [2.50]
Taste: 6/10
This is good. The rare early on-sale Valentine's candy. Sour little black hearts! They are more sour than regular sour patch kids and have a nice flavor (indeed, it is like blue raspberry but less sweet and more sour. good.). The taste is evocative of a simpler time, like pool food or something. If I were in my human interaction era, I'd be giving these to all my lovers. As it stands I am happy to have them for myself.
Overall
Cost: 7/10 [1$]
Taste: 7/10
These are not very good. I like fruit snacks, but even so. It fills no niche, being neither filling (50 cals?!) nor healthy (not an excellent source of vitamin C (23mg), despite the lying box) nor delicious. The texture is not bad -- slimy, pliable, bendy, not too sticky. The smell is intriguing (weed-gummy-esque). The taste is "strawberry, but not sweet strawberry, but not really sour strawberry, almost on-the-verge-of-bitter strawberry". Actually, saying this has made me appreciate it a bit more. I guess it has some nuance. But it's not sweet and delicious, which is what I really want. I should buy more cookies.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Often, due to my lifestyle, someone comes up to me and says something totally prescriptive and horrible and expects me to not only agree, but be proud of them. That is what both ends of decaf tea drinking feels like. However, it's not all bad. First of all, it's a hot drink. And of the horrible decaf teas, this one has a nice texture (thick, not too gritty) and a cute little bubbling effect (even when the water is most assuredly "hot enough", for any British tea evangelists out there). I'm not Irish and it's not breakfast, but I sure as shoot am decaffeinated.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10
"Review the mushrooms," says the devil on my shoulder. "Nothing wrong with reviewing Store Brand Mushrooms!" Sure, sure. Why not. I actually learned this week that the difference between mushroom options (white/button vs brown/bella) is a very small age difference. Like, days. Like 3 days. What?! So my previous method of "ignore mushroom specification, just buy whatever's at the store" feels way more legitimate with this knowledge. I do miss the other, lovelier mushroom types, but Acme has what Acme has, and that's probably for the best, fermentation-wise.
These are good. Sliced already, though not washed of course (I don't think any fresh mushrooms come washed?) and I always worry about it more than maybe I should. These aren't particularly dirt-caked anyway, not like the local ones that are probably from Ireland or something (even though I live 20 min from the Mushroom Capital of the World). Relatedly, on certain humid mornings the air by me smells like mushroom farms, and everyone around here hates it, but I love it. It's so comforting, like the noise of a train or cuddling up in a warm blanket. Maybe if they grew up smelling roasted peanuts and horse manure like I did, they'd put some respect on Mushroom Farm Smell. Anyway, I got a little off track. Mushrooms taste nice, especially when cooked in nice things like shallot and garlic and meat and oil and pepper and etc. I haven't had pizza in decades (months? who knows) but mushrooms are also my favorite pizza topic. All hail mushroom.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
I probably can resist a new Cinnamon Toast Crunch flavor, because I've tried a lot of them by now and they're never as good as regular cinnamon toast crunch. But if we don't try new things, our fear & avoidance of new things will grow ever stronger, and it's pretty easy to try new Cinnamon Toast Crunches, so.
These smell very much like a sugar cookie. Impressive work by the GM smell scientists. They taste like, hmm. Something familiar that I can't put my finger on. (Not a sugar cookie). I'll circle back if it comes to me later. The taste is OK... like a vanilla and less-cinnamony cinnamon toast crunch. Nothing unpleasant here, but it's a little lacklustre. Even the leftover milk just tastes like regular milk (no thank you). One of the better CTC spinoffs, but still inferior to the OG.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
You know I can't resist a new subtype of Milano™. Even though I'm kind of out on the whole brain diet enterprise, I'm still wary of the big 3 (alc ~ choco ~ agéd cheesers), so a white-choco (therefore non-choco) Milano line is coming at a good time for me to go hard. I also like white chocolate more anyway because I am a sicko (or a child at heart). I gotta say, these aren't as good as regular Milanos, though. All the rave reviews seem to be coming from people who've never had a lemon cookie before and are excited by the novelty (which, no shade to them, that's also happened to me before). Here are my main complaints:
- Makes my mouth itchy (well, OK, may be a personal problem, but I dunno what's going on there and I sure don't care for it).
- The choco inside doesn't really stick to the cookie outside, so you get less of a cohesive whole than in other "sandwich" cookies.
- The overwhelming flavor note is sweet lemon, which is fine and good (sugar-lemon tastes nice), but because it's so one-note, that means the texture is more noticeable, and the texture is less delightful than their Ojai lemon cookies, which were already not a top-tier cookie.
- There's a weird, bad (metallic? not sure how to describe) undernote, probably in the white chocolate. May be a fluke, since I've had other white chocolates that I noticed a bad flavor in which later redeemed themselves in other batches, but this is all I have to go on. I guess I'll try the other flavors, but probably not this one again.
So there you have it. Not as good as it could be, but I like that it exists. There should be more white chocolate sweets available to me! More!
Overall
Cost: 4/10 [5$!!]
Taste: 6/10
I thought these massive muffins would be good for me to consume in the .5 seconds I have between classes, and in some ways (calorie density, portability) they are good for that. But in other ways (nutrition, giving me flulike weariness) I am not so sure. They're big and taste like a mushy, slightly processed pound cake. I haven't identified a better option, but to be fair, I haven't put much energy into the task. Maybe if these muffins were better at giving me energy, I'd have energy to replace them. Clever Abe.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Hello, unhealthy coping mechanism! Not wine-drinking. Just going through a backlog of old unreviewed-wine notes. Still not ideal, but could surely be worse.
The same might be said for this wine (at least according to April 2024 me). It was sweet, had a screw top, peachy notes, and was acidic but not horribly so. It may have also permanently damaged my brain, but that's probably not how things work. Still not very confident on this point.
Do I recommend it? I do not. Good riddance, wine!
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
My neighbor has been running his truck outside for 4 hours straight. Why? We do not know. I can't DFW myself into thinking he has a good reason to do it, because he is a rude guy in general. What does this have to do with tomatoes? Nothing, I just am finding it so hard to have a single thought about anything else. But we can do hard things!! (👻)
These are the kind of little tomato I like: a medley of different colors and sizes. They claim to be cherry but their shape indicates to me "grape". They taste good and are fun. The packaging is cute. One of the colors is "half of me is purpley black" which I at first interpreted as "rotten tomato" but I think it was just the natural color of the tomato. Next time I will eat them and see if I perish.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Artichokes have a lot going for them. Cool name (from Arabic! with an l~r sound change!); healthful; cool appearance; artichoke dip is a top tier appetizer (or so the recollections of teenage me indicate); my Canadian friendo used to insult me by saying I had an artichoke heart, which is apparently an actual French idiom.
But, they taste bad. Sorry. Not like, olive-level inedible, but they have a sour flavor and no redeeming (flavor) notes. I get why they're often pickled because they have the essence of "pickle me". Even paired with spinach and chicken and etc, when you notice them you think "wish I weren't". These frozen ones cooked up fine and all, but they do come in their natural stacks (like in the picture), so you either have to spend time de-stacking them or suffer with occasional artichoke-heavy bites in your product. You can guess what I chose.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 5/10
Do these even look like (human) ears? Do ears really look like little cups? Am I just unable to imagine an ear detached from the head? These are the thoughts that calm me as I find myself with too much to do today. I think we've pretty much covered all there is to say about DeLallo pasta by now. It is, on the whole, pleasant. This shape is fun but a little too stackable, such that you get too much pasta-per-cubic-inch and not enough air. These also have a pretty long cook time (~12 minutes), which is no doubt related to the lack of air. Once the DeLallo backlog is complete (soon!) I think I'll return to my usual elbow-spaghett rotation, and only venture outside that on special occasions.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
My cheese education continues! I've had a lot of goat cheeses (mostly LaClare ones), and a lot of cow-milk mozzarella cheeses (mostly on pizza), but never a goat mozz. My (foolish) assumption was that this would be more mozz-like than goat-like. But it is not. It tastes exactly like the sharp, tangy sour notes I have come to expect from a non-mozz goat variety. That's not a bad thing, but it's not really mozz, is it? Well, maybe it is. The texture is absolutely right -- firm, smooth, shiny. Not smooshy or dry like your non-mozz-goat cheese. So the name is accurate, but my priors were not. I'm not sure I have a good use for this stuff, as it's far from neutral, but I'm gonna think on it. Thanks, goats!
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
This sure is a big muffin. Which I like. However, this might be old-fashioned of me, but I think the primary note in a corn muffin ought to be corn (and not sugar, like here, or even salt or butter etc). I could hardly taste the corn! Just a whisp of corn! Other than that minor(?) issue, this was very pleasant. Large, as mentioned, and moist and sweet. Plus the packaging is all about how Abe's dad loves his trago allergy-having son. Some beautiful wish-fulfillment-via-muffin-packaging there.
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 6/10
Can you believe I found a store that sold these? Incredible stuff. A pack of 4 minis was just perfect for my 4-day conference needs; one holds a single egg or a single 1/3 tube goat cheese very nicely. Tastes like plain naan, which it is. No allergens, no mold; good as gold.
Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 6/10
These precooked eggs in a bag were surprisingly good. I don't really like eating eggs, especially plain, as they always make me a bit vommy and the taste is just "eh". But these eggs had no ill effects on me, and if anything I think they made me feel a bit better (the power of protein? idk). They were smaller than your average egg, and a bit wet due to the form factor of "being in a bag", but they do taste like eggs. A yellower yolk than normal, which their non-bagged-eggs have too. It is hard for me to say "non-bagged eggs" (but that's not due to my recent brain issues; it always would have been). Anyway, I can usually boil my own eggs so I don't need this, but if I'm travelling again I will definitely look for these! They were a lifesaver! Yay egg!
Overall
Cost: 6/10 [3$ish]
Taste: 7/10
Philly grocery really crushing it in the allergy-free space!! For an egg-free, milk-free, soy-free cupcake, this is quite good. Surprisingly normal, although not quite as delicious, especially in the frosting (although there is somehow a tangy note, which impressed me). A little bit less sweet tasting than those milkful nutfree mini cupcakes at my local store, even though I believe the sugar content is the same. These were a nice treat to reward me for not dying or vomming during any famous linguists' talks! Yay me!
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 7/10
It's so rare for "hidden veggies" to NOT be peas and beans and etc! Thank you, Annie. I'm in a hotel right now with no cooking implements, so any form of veggie is a plus, even if it's tiny amounts of squash powder flavoring a flat bunny cracker. Which this is. But even though it's flat and not that veg-y, the taste is good. Buttery and heavily seasoned. And the flat-ness is kind of a fun novelty. More fun than a traditional puffed goldfish (or cheddar bunny) shape. Or maybe I'm just in a good mood because I'm back on my "brain diet be damned" bs and sleeping 2 hours a day :)
Overall
Cost: 5/10
Taste: 7/10
Some of my best friends are "Cherry Size". Listen, it seems like mozz should be right out, but it's fresh and not aged so perhaps it is fine. My store didn't have Normal Large Ball, but actually these 1/3oz blops are pretty convenient. They taste like mozz and I have no complaints. 6 of them make for a nice personal pizza lavash.
Overall
Cost: 5/10 (6$)
Taste: 7/10
I'm not sure why I didn't buy this months ago, since it's packaged & sweet & not breaking any rules. But for whatever reason (health???) I did not. It's no raisins and spice, but that's OK. This is oatmeal with apple, cinnamon, and sugar. Sure, you could make it yourself, but this is not particularly costly, so why bother? Tastes a lot like baked apples (which I am eating a lot of now since I can't have Raw apples). It is pleasant. Pie-esque. The biggest downside is the horrible texture; using 2/3 cup water is not enough, but any more is somehow far too much. It is either gloopy or runny. Perhaps this is just the nature of oatmeal, but I seem to remember a non-horribly-textured oatmeal in my past years ago. Perhaps it is a false memory, like so many memories are.
Overall
Cost: 6/10
Taste: 6/10
