Review: LUNA Protein Cookie Dough Bar

I've declared my love of cookie dough here on the blog before and seriously, what person doesn't love cookie dough, especially eating it its raw form?  Great, now my mouth is salivating as I type this review.  Time to focus...so, I've reviewed plenty of LUNA bars before, normal and protein kinds, and now its time for another review with this review of the LUNA Protein Cookie Dough Bar that I picked up at Kroger on sale for $0.99.  This one comes in at 1.6 ounces and is 170 calories with twelve grams of protein.

LUNA describes this as "Chocolate chips and cookie-dough pieces swirled in soft nougat with a flourish of vanilla" and while I can visually confirm the presence of the nougat (it wrapped around the interior mix of the bar), I think the cookie dough pieces were only there in spirit as I couldn't see any of them with my naked eye.  In fact, the interior just looked like one big blob of cookie dough and while there is nothing wrong with that, it's not quite what I expected after the lovely description.  I wasn't disappointed by the lack of visual cookie dough pieces, but I will admit to being a bit perturbed that I was once again duped by a product description.  One thing to point out though is that despite the fact that my eyes felt duped, my nose certainly didn't because as soon as I opened the wrapper, the cookie dough smell came rushing at me with speed like Usain Bolt in the Olympics.  It was strong and did not hesitate in announcing its presence.

After I bit into the bar, it turns out that my eyes deceived me and there actually were cookie dough pieces in this bar.  With each bite, I felt a little pop of something that I originally thought was a chocolate chip, but instead was those actual cookie dough pieces and it was great.  While they did provide the initial pop, they quickly turned chewy like cookie dough pieces that you'd find in any ice cream or other product that included them as an ingredient.  As for the rest of the bar, the nougat added a powerful sweetness to the bar, much like you'd get from the nougat of a Snickers bar and the chocolate itself was thick and while unsweetened, was quite a powerful taste.  So powerful, in fact, that it kind of lingered in your mouth for a while after each bite and if you don't have a beverage nearby to wash it down, you are going to be tasting that unsweetened chocolate for quite a long time.

Buy It or Fly By It?  All in all, this bar had the spirit of a chocolate chip cookie, but it didn't deliver that cookie taste 100%.  I would say it was about 75% of the way there and since that is close enough in my  mind, that flavor, mixed with the relative low cost and high protein value gets this bar a BUY IT rating.  Don't  expect chocolate chip cookie decadence when eating this, but you can expect something that has pretty decent flavor.

BUY IT!!