Friday, February 3, 2012

Review: Larabar Pecan Pie Food Bar


In my book, Larabar is one of the better companies out there when it comes to dreaming up flavors that sound sinful and/or want to make me eat my hand.  I've already done some Larabar reviews here of flavors that wanted to make me eat my hand at that time and this Pecan Pie flavor is no different.  When Thanksgiving and the holidays come, pumpkin flavored products (oddly, not pumpkin pie itself) and pecan pie are the two things I look most forward to.  Since I'm a jerk, my family falls in behind those.  I picked this one up at Kroger for $1.00 and it clocks in at a smallish 1.6 ounces with 220 calories and only three grams of protein.



If you've read the other Larabar reviews and compare pictures, you'll notice that this one looks very similar to all the others from a visual perspective.  It's a sticky, soft, weird "energy" mix of a bar with whatever fruit and/or nut of choice mixed in.  In the case of this Pecan Pie flavor, there are only three ingredients (dates, pecans and almonds), so using my strong powers of deduction, I can conclude that the stickiness is a result of the processed dates.  Processed dates...mmmm.  For those of you that are in to that type of thing, this one has all sorts of other health benefits too.  It's Gluten Free, Dairy Free, Vegan, Kosher and Soy Free.  This bar is free of so many things that it's almost afraid of the world.  One thing that the packaging neglected to mention is that it's nearly free of nuts as well.  The pieces of pecans/almonds that are there are noticeable, but the problem is that there's just not that many of them and they are also very small.  So far, this bar is a failure.

Continuing the failure of the physical/visual front is the taste.  Those processed dates feel odd in your mouth and doesn't make for an appetizing chew.  It's not that they taste bad, it's just that they taste of some sweet, chewy, soft thing that is not of this world.  That's broken up by the occasional nut pieces and their nice crunch, but those are few and far between.  Also, what's especially strange is that despite this bar having only three ingredients, it does have an aftertaste that reminds me of banana.  I don't know how pecans, almonds and dates somehow make banana, but that was my interpretation of this one and being that banana is one of the very few food that are on my do not eat list, I did not find this appetizing.

Buy It or Fly By It?  FLY BY IT.  In fact, don't even consider buying it.  This one is nothing like it's namesake (seems to be a running theme with Larabar) and classifies as another failure.  It's taken one of my favorite fall treats and made it miserable for me, well, sort of.  That does not make for a happy Crazy Food Dude.

FLY BY IT!!

3 comments:

  1. Yep. Lara Bars are nasty.

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  2. Totally disagree with your dumb review. No banana taste at all but it does taste like dates. Pretty damn good energy bar for cycling...and only 3 ingredients. Damn fine bar for a buck if you ask me.

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  3. just ran across this review. very unfair. For a bar to only have 3 ingredients and taste this good is a big plus in my book. Come on...complaining about the grams of protein in a snack bar is ridiculous. When you eat your next 25 gram protein snack bar count the number of ingredients listed.

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