Review: CLIF Peppermint Stick Energy Bar

Every fall, CLIF releases seasonal flavors of their classic CLIF energy bars.  These flavors include Peppermint Stick, Spiced Pumpkin Pie and Iced Gingerbread.  They are only available at certain retailers that sell CLIF products, so they can be difficult to find and that was the case for me.  But, one day, I saw the Peppermint Stick as part of a free giveaway on CLIF's Facebook page, so I signed up and a couple weeks later, my bar arrived.  If you can find this in your local store (they have it available through their website as well), it would normally run you around $1.00-$1.50.  Each bar is a large 2.4 ounces and packs 240 calories with nine grams of protein.

As you can see, this is CLIF's standard chewy energy bar mix with peppermint pieces mixed in.  I have to be honest, these peppermint pieces are larger than I expected them to be.  The peppermint/energy mix is then topped with a swirl of white icing to make it look like a happy holiday treat.

After first bite, my thought was that the energy mix tasted itself tasted the same as I would expect (chewy, wet, etc.; almost like a hardened oatmeal), but WOW, this peppermint had a lot of kick.  Now, I love peppermints and eat multiple peppermint candies a day, but I found the peppermint in this one to be too overpowering.  Frankly, the mix of peppermint with the energy mix was kind of appalling and nasty to me.  The icing was essentially an non-starter as I really couldn't taste it either way.

Buy It or Fly By It?  FLY BY IT.  I'm glad I got this for free because I'd be pretty upset if I spent $1.00 on this one.  It's not that it was awful, but the flavor certainly was not appealing to even me, an avowed peppermint lover.  That said, some people may find this combination appealing, but I certainly am not one of them.

FLY BY IT!!

Review: JELL-O Sugar Free Creme Brulee Rice Pudding

As I've stated before, I love pudding, so next up in the JELL-O sugar free pudding cup review series is JELL-O Creme Brulee Rice Pudding.  Now, most people think gross when they hear rice pudding and I was one of those people for the longest time.  I had never had rice pudding, had no desire to try rice pudding and therefore, had no use for rice pudding.  Being the wacky adventurer that I am though, I decided one day that I would finally give it a shot after seeing it in the store.  JELL-O offers it in the Creme Brulee flavor in six packs and it's seventy calories per four ounce pudding cup.  I picked this one up on sale at Meijer for $2.50.

My picture doesn't do the greatest job of showing it, but rice pudding is as you would expect it to be after hearing the name...it's pudding with white rice in it as you can see above.  Now, if its the first time you've seen that, it can be a little unsettling.  I mean, who would have thought to put something starchy like rice in with something creamy like pudding?  Odd, but people seem to like it.  If you can get over that and give it a try, you are a step ahead of the game.

After you get over the visual uneasiness and take your first spoonful, you are going to be a little uneasy there because the texture is not really something that you'll expect to feal in your mouth.  Pudding normally isn't chewy, but rice pudding is definitely that because of the white rice involved.  Once you get over that and start to chew though, I think you'll fnd this enjoyable.  The chewiness adds an increased texture to something that usually just swishes around in your mouth and then straight down your throat.  Also, the Creme Brulee (French for "burnt cream"; yes, I looked it up) flavor, while somewhat tame, is just strong enough that you actually can taste a faint "burn" in the pudding.  The one thing that I missed though is a caramel taste that you would ordinarily find in a Creme Brulee and that was disappointing.  It may have been there and may have contributed to the flavor, but it was clearly not noticeable.

Buy It or Fly By It?  Personally, I would BUY IT.  Sure, it's a weird feeling in your mouth, but in an odd way, I like it.  It breaks up the normal monotony of pudding and if you can get over that, I think you'll like it too.

BUY IT!!

Review: MorningStar Farms Three Bean Chili with Griller's Crumbles

First things first, I'm a big fan of chili.  I can personally claim to making one of the best chili recipes you've ever had and in fact, it's won two chili cooking competitions, so obviously there are other people that would agree.  That said, making good chili is a pain in the rear and it takes quite a while to do.  But, on those occasions that you just have that chili craving, it's nice to have some store bought product to fall back on and that's where this MorningStar Farms Three Bean Chili with Griller's Crumbles came in for me to try.  I picked up one of their newer offerings at Meijer for $2.99 (on sale for $3.99 and I had a $1 off coupon; regular price is in the $4.99 range).

As you can see, this one at least looks like chili from the outside.  That should be a given, but when you've had some of the disgusting store bought garbage chili that I've had in the past (i.e. Hormel), that actually is an accomplishment.  There were plenty of beans (ingredients say the beans were Cannelini, Kidney and Black Beans), plenty of "crumbles" and also plenty of veggies (onions, red peppers).  The ingredient mix also says this one includes chili powder and cumin and since I am a big fan of cumin, I was quite pleased to see that.  The only thing that disappointed me about this texturally was that the chili "broth" was a little watery.  I like my chili "broths" to be thick and hearty and no matter how much I stirred this thing, it never really thickened up and that disappointed me.  That said, this was a healthy sized portion and had only 270 calories (the package says 170, but those MorningStar Farms goofs somehow think you can get "about 2" servings out of this and I don't see how) and I was looking forward to that.

So, the ingredients were solid, so you'd think the taste would be solid too.  Unfortunately, if you thought that, you'd be wrong.  I'd like to say the taste was offensive, but then I'd be saying that this had taste.  The beans were nice and chewy, so that was nice, but that's really the only flavor I remember about this one.  The "broth" was flavorless, the crumbles were undetectable and the peppers and onions, while there, did not add any spice or kick to the mix.  It's not that this tasted bad, but it also didn't taste good either.  It was just BLAH.

Buy It or Fly By It?  You've got to FLY BY IT with this one.  Really, when you combine with the bland and boring taste with the usual price of this one, it really isn't worth it.  It's not even really worth it on sale with a coupon too.  Based on what you are getting, a fair price would be $2.00-$2.50 but on this, you are paying for just the name and you are paying too much for something that is not going to really make you want to eat more.  Too bad because this had so much promise.  Sadly, this is becoming a common refrain for these MorningStar Farms reviews.

FLY BY IT!!

Oh yeah, because I love the ingredient lists of these MorningStar Farms products (check out the one for the Lasagna), here's the list for the chili:

WATER, DICED TOMATOES (DICED TOMATOES, TOMATO JUICE, CITRIC ACID, CALCIUM CHLORIDE), TOMATO PASTE (TOMATOES), COOKED BLACK BEANS (BLACK BEANS, WATER), CANNELLINI BEANS, DARK RED KIDNEY BEANS, GREEN PEPPERS, RED BELL PEPPERS, VEGGIE BURGER CRUMBLES (TEXTURED VEGETABLE PROTEIN [SOY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE, WHEAT GLUTEN, WATER FOR HYDRATION], WATER, CORN OIL, CHICORY ROOT FIBER [INULIN], YEAST EXTRACT, NATURAL FLAVORS, BLACK MALT POWDER, SALT, SOY SAUCE [WATER, SOYBEANS, SALT, WHEAT], EVAPORATED CANE JUICE CRYSTALS, GARLIC POWDER, ONION POWDER, ONION JUICE CONCENTRATE, SPICES, TOMATO POWDER, CITRIC ACID, NIACINAMIDE, IRON [FERROUS SULFATE], SKIM MILK, EGG WHITES, THIAMIN MONONITRATE [VITAMIN B1], PYRIDOXINE HYDROCHLORIDE [VITAMIN B6], RIBOFLAVIN [VITAMIN B2], VITAMIN B12), ONIONS, SOY PROTEIN CONCENTRATE, RICE STARCH, SPICE, CHILI PEPPER, EXPELLER PRESSED CANOLA OIL, SALT, XANTHAN GUM, CARAMEL COLOR.


FYI, Freezer Burns did a review of this one recently too.  Check it out if interested!

Review: CLIF Kid Z Bar Full Moon Brownie

Next up in the the myriad of bars that I'll be reviewing for this site is a seasonal offering for Halloween by one of CLIF Bar line of products, the CLIF Kid Z Bar.  This one is the Full Moon Brownie flavor and despite that I have long since not been a kid, I'll try it out anyway.  CLIF bills their bars as all natural, so they at least win the mythical packaging award compared to some of the other bars that I've reviewed around here.  I bought this as part of a on sale at Kroger for about $0.69.  It's 130 calories a bar and roughly the same size/weight as a Quaker Chewy bar, so that's a decent comparison.

Also, as a side note, CLIF is routinely rated as one of America's best companies to work for, but that's neither here nor there, let's talk about the energy bar...

Review: Pure Protein Peanut Marshmallow Eclipse Bar

In a lot of the names of these protein bars, you can obviously tell what the bar is trying to simulate.  For example, a Strawberry Shortcake bar is trying to impersonate an actual strawberry shortcake (see my review of Pure Protein's attempt; it was NOT a good attempt), except in protein bar form.  But, every now and then, you come across a protein bar (roughly $1.25 at Meijer) that has a mind-boggling title and this Pure Protein Peanut Marshmallow Eclipse is one of them.  Now, I obviously know what peanuts and marshmallows are, but what the heck is an eclipse as it relates to food?  I have no idea.  Granted,  it's probably just some "cute" marketers idea of making the product noticeable, but the name kind of bothers me.  Anyway, onto the review...

Review: Ben & Jerry's Limited Batch Pumpkin Cheesecake Ice Cream

In honor of today being National Pumpkin Cheesecake Day, I feel it is my duty as an American to cancel the previous review I had scheduled for today and do this one instead!

First things first, I'm a Ben & Jerry's addict.  I shouldn't be an addict, I don't want to be addict, but sometimes in life you just have to admit something, accept it as fact and move on.  The fact that I'm a Ben & Jerry's addict is one of those things.  Now, you should also know that due to Culver's and their annual fall roll-out of pumpkin flavored shakes and concrete mixers, I'm also a pumpkin ice cream freak now as well.  When I saw that Ben & Jerry's was rolling out their Pumpkin Cheesecake flavor as a Limited Batch this fall (surfing the web, I see that they do this seemingly every fall too), I knew this one had my name written all over it.  It's 290 calories per serving and each pint includes four servings (I've never really been able to figure out how or why they get four servings out of this) and I picked up a pint at Walmart for $3.39.

Review: JELL-O Sugar Free Dark Chocolate Pudding

I admit, I have a strange infatuation with pudding.  I absolutely love it and eat it after dinner at least four nights a week.  If you were to look in my refrigerator or cabinets, there is a 95% chance that would find either pudding cups or pudding mixes.  The prolem with pudding though is when you are eating regular pudding, the calories can stack up pretty quickly and become a major calorie load.  So, I always opt for the "healthy" alternative of sugar or fat free puddings.  One of the major purveyors of pudding is JELL-O and since they don't want to drive themselves completely out of the market, they offer several of these sugar/fat free pudding options.  I've had nearly all of them, so there will be quite a bit of reviews on these products coming in the future.  First up will be the Dark Chocolate flavor that I picked up at Meijer on sale for $2.50 for a six pack.  Each four ounce sugar free pudding cup is sixty calories.

Review: Quaker Wild Blueberry Mulitgrain Fiber Crisps

Along with their line of mini-rice cakes called Quakes, Quaker Oats has another line of mini-snacks called Multigrain Fiber Crisps that come in a variety of flavors.  Since I'm always looking for snack items that aren't going to break my diet, I am always willing to try out things like this and that led me to the Wild Blueberry variety of crisps.  At 110 calories per serving (about three servings per bag), this is a low calorie (and high fiber) snack treat as well.  FYI, I got this at Meijer on sale for about $1.00.

Review: Kashi GOLEAN Crunch! Cereal

I've never had a lot of luck with Kashi products in the past.  I've always found that their products have an identity crisis as I can't figure out whether they are supposed to be granola or just something else that I can't really define.  Couple that identity crisis with their high prices and I've always stayed away.  Yet, I was in Kroger recently and saw a Manager's Special where they were selling a big box of Kashi GOLEAN Crunch! Cereal for $3.49 from the regular price of $6.99.  I love granola and since the price was steeply discounted, I figured I would give Kashi another chance since it had been quite a while since I'd had any of their cereals.  At 190 calories per serving, it's somewhere in between healthy cereal and junk cereal on the caloric chart.

Review: Gorton's Frozen Classic Grilled Salmon

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the world's biggest fan of seafood.  For the most part, I've stayed away from it my entire life because I don't like the "fishy" taste and therefore am no expert when it comes to different kinds of seafood.  That said, after watching countless hours of Food Network, I decided I would start to explore the world of seafood (albeit, store bought and frozen) and paired with a coupon that I got at my gym, that led me to Gorton's frozen line of grilled products and more specifically, this Classic Grilled Salmon.  I know this is not the real thing and the quality would show that, but the mission of this blog is to review pre-packaged foods, so that is the reason I picked this up at Meijer for $3.00 ($4.00 without coupon).

Review: Walden Farms Marshmallow Dip

Next in our Walden Farms odyssey is their Marshmallow Dip.  I will be the first to say that I'm not a fan of marshmallows by themselves, but I do like marshmallow cream when mixed with ice cream or other types of foods.  So, having marshmallow as a dip seemed to fit right in my marshmallow tolerance zone, so I picked this one up at Kroger for about $3.50 and was anxious to give it a try.

Review: Skinny Cow Peanut Butter Flavor Heavenly Crisp Candy Bar

A few months back, Skinny Cow announced to much fanfare that they were going to step outside their successful line of frozen treats and start offering a candy line of Heavenly Crisp bars and Dreamy Clusters.  Curiosity sometimes kills the cat and in this case, it caused me to make a purchase in their candy bar line with this Peanut Butter Heavenly Crisp bar.  Try that one on for size...have a longer name!  Seriously, do they not see that candies are often marked as single iconic one or two word names?  Snickers, PayDay, Nestle Crunch, Reese's Pieces, M&M's, etc.  I think those candies have done okay for themselves.  Obviously Skinny Cow doesn't believe in the same market research.  Name aside, these things are 110 calories, so they are not calorie busters on that front.  I picked up a six pack box of these babies at Meijer on sale for $3.49.

Review: Quaker Chewy Peanut Butter Granola Bar

I'll be the first to admit, I'm a light breakfast eater.  Eating breakfast usually makes me feel drowsy and that's not a good way for me to start the day.  Still, breakfast is the most important meal of the day and I've read countless studies that say that even if you don't eat a big meal, you should eat something to get your mind and metabolism running for the day.  So, after reading all these studies (and perhaps listening to my parents growing up), I believe I found the perfect, light way to start the day:  granola bars.  There are countless granola bars out there and Quaker's Chewy series is one of the most extensive and available varieties.  They have many, many flavors, but for the purposes of this review, I stuck with the Peanut Butter Chewy bar version.  At only 90 calories for a small bar, this is a great way for me to get the day going.  I picked this up as part of a 48 bar variety pack at Sam's Club, so I can't really attach a unit price.

Review: MorningStar Farms Frozen Lasagna with Sausage-Style Crumbles

First things first, I am not a full-on vegetarian.  That said, as a way of controlling my calorie intake and monitoring my health, I do try to live a semi-vegetarian lifestyle be trying to contain my meat intake to only two days a week.  Because of this, I'm always looking for ways to get past the normal "boring" vegetarian-type food of fruits, grains, vegetables, etc.  That led me to MorningStar Farms line of frozen vegetarian products and this Lasagna with Sausage-Style Crumbles.  At 270 calories for an "entree", it's not a belt buster either.  This was purchased at Marsh on sale for $3.99.

Walden Farms Reviews from WouldIBuyItAgain.com

I've already done a Walden Farms review here at Crazy Food Dude and there will be more to come, but like I mentioned in that post, I have done some previously at WouldIBuyItAgain.com.

Since I've reviewed some of those products before and my reviews are on record on the web, I will not be reviewing those products again on this site in order to avoid redundancy (and excess typing).  So, if you are interested in reviews of the following products (the Buy It/Fly By It rating system added below):

*Blue Cheese Salad Dressing (BUY IT)
*Honey Dijon Salad Dressing (FLY BY IT)
*Caesar Salad Dressing (BUY IT)
*Peanut Spread (FLY BY IT at the time, but I have changed that opinion now)
*Thick 'N Spicy Barbecue Sauce (BUY IT)
*Chocolate Syrup (BUY IT)

Head on over and check out that post with the reviews at WouldIBuyItAgain.com.  Thanks!

Review: Dannon Light & Fit Vanilla Yogurt

Dannon, the French purveyor of yogurt, has a "healthy" line of yogurt in their product offerings called "Light & Fit."  Light & Fit yogurt is 0% fat and depending on the serving size (individual six ounce cups or part of a large 32 ounce container), I have seen it range anywhere from 80-110 calories.  Since I was eating out of the Vanilla flavor out of the large 32 ounce container, my calorie count was 110 calories per eight ounce serving (obviously four per container).  FYI, I picked this up on sale at Meijer for $2.00, but depending on the store, it usually runs anywhere between $2.25 and $2.50 per container.

Review: Quaker Popped Chocolate Rice Snacks

Editor's Note:  While the product has stayed the same, Quaker now markets these under a different named and they are now called "Quaker Popped Rice Snacks." The review below applies the same.

I realize that I have already done a Quakes review and there are more on the way.  The good news is that unless Quaker introduces a million new flavors, I'll eventually run out of flavors to review and these reviews will go way.  Hopefully people do not get sick of the site before then.  That said, next in line are the Chocolate Quakes.  At 120 calories per serving (about three per bag), it's not the healthiest thing in the world, but hey, it's better than Doritos.  These were purchased on sale at Meijer for $1.00.

Review: Bell Plantation PB2 Powdered Peanut Butter

If you've followed me over from WouldIBuyItAgain.com and remember this or if you are a new visitor and have never read this before, I am a peanut butter freak.  Personally, I love it.  I had to put it on my personal "do not buy" list at home because whenever I had it around, I would set up camp over the jar with a spoon and just destroy it non-stop.  Technically, peanut butter is a healthy fat in moderation, but there was nothing healthy about the way that I was eating it, so I try to no longer keep it in my house.  That said, I was cruising around on the internet a few weeks back and came upon an article or advertisement (can't remember which) preaching the virtues of Bell Plantation's PB2 Powdered Peanut Butter product and knew I had to try it out.

Instead of me describing what makes it "PB2", I'll let Bell Plantation's website do all the work:

"We call it peanut butter’s second generation because it’s unlike any peanut butter you’ve ever experienced. Through a unique process that doesn’t involve the use of any chemicals and doesn’t alter nature’s intended balance found within the peanut, we remove over 85% of the fat from premium quality peanuts. Essentially, the oil is squeezed out of roasted peanuts and what remains is our famous powdered peanut butter – all natural with no artificial sweeteners or preservatives. When you mix water or a favorite drink with PB2 you get the same consistency as full-fat peanut butter, with all the roasted peanut flavor, but 85% less fat calories."

When I saw that it was 85% less fat and calories (45 calories per two tablespoon serving versus ~200 for regular peanut butter) and it still tasted like peanut butter, I had to know more.  So, I got onto my friend Google (Google is the reason I am employed, although I am not employed by Google) and did a little search for some external reviews and found that everything out there was mostly positive.  Armed with this information and seeing there was a sale on their website store at the time, I knew I had to make the leap.

There's two versions of PB2 (regular and chocolate), but for the purposes of this review, we'll stick with the regular version.

Review: Ben & Jerry's Schweddy Balls Ice Cream

I promised comfort reviews on this blog from time to time, so what better way is there to kick off those occasional reviews than a post about one of the most comforting, yet fattening foods there are?  Yep, it's time for Ben & Jerry's ice cream and since I've been reading about all the so-called controversy over the Ben & Jerry's Schweddy Balls Ice Cream limited batch offering, I was anxious to head to the store to try this one out.  Unfortunately, it took me about two weeks before I could find a store that had this in stock.  While at Walmart this past Sunday, I was finally able to find a pint of Schweddy Balls for $3.29.  Now, the name of this ice cream is quite sophomoric since it is based on a Saturday Night Live skit, so me sliding in the occasional sophomoric joke into this review will probably be unavoidable.  I'll TRY to act like an adult, but there may be an attempt at a joke that bounces in from time to time.  Just a word of warning.

For your reference, Schweddy Balls is "Vanilla Ice Cream with a Hint of Rum & Loaded with Fudge covered Rum & Malt balls."  Also, it should also be written before this review that I HATE rum in general, so I may be a little biased toward negativity.  Still, that's why I taste test these things...sometimes they surprise me and overcome my initial prejudices against a particular taste.  Also, at 270 calories per serving (four per pint), it's not exactly a health freebie, but hey, it's "premium" ice cream, so you have to expect that.

Review: MET-Rx Big 100 Colossal Super Cookie Crunch Bar

Because of my odd daily diet of primarily fruits and vegetables, I often get asked where I get my daily protein allotment.  For the longest time, I didn't really care and eventually ended up degrading into a major weakling.  I finally reached a breaking point and decided that while I wasn't going to start eating meat every single day, I would at least find a way to introduce protein into my diet more regularly and that led me to start trying protein bars.  That effort of trying protein bars led me to MET-Rx products and their Big 100 Colossal series of bars, which they market as meal replacement bars due to their high calorie counts.  Recently, I was in CVS and picked up their MET-Rx Big 100 Colossal Super Cookie Crunch Bar variety for around $2.50.

Grocery stores helping with healthy purchases?

Courtesy IndyStar.com/Zach Dobson

A friend sent this article that was in the local paper yesterday.  Basically this is grocery stores putting health ratings on the product tags in the aisles to help consumers make healthy food purchases (look at the picture above).  They've found by putting the tags out has led to an increase in healthy food purchases.

This was the first that I've heard of this and it's something that I definitely think is a major positive and is pretty cool.  I'll definitely be looking at this stuff next time I am in the store.

I'll be back tomorrow with a whole new week of reviews!

Thank You!

Just wanted to send out a quick thank you to everyone who has visited within the first few days of the site.  I've been shocked at the overwhelmingly positive response so far in terms of page views and for that, I am grateful.

I'll be back on Monday with more reviews and plan on running reviews every day next week and finally settling into a trend of 3-4 reviews per week in the week after that.  There's a lot more "healthy" foods to come, so be on the lookout!

Thanks again for your patronage and I look forward to hopefully entertaining you for a long time to come!