Review: Magnum Gold?! Ice Cream Bars

It's April Fool's Day, so I can think of no better way to celebrate with a review of something that I initially thought was a joke.  Before I get to that though, I will be the first to admit that Magnum bars are not the first thing I think of when I want an ice cream treat. That's despite the fact that I've had some very positive experiences with them on the blog.  A little while back, I saw what I at first thought was a joke based on the name of the product with a review of these new Magnum Gold?! Ice Cream Bars on the wonderful blog On Second Scoop and after reading the review, I was absolutely certain that I had to get my hands on these for a review. It was that quest that led me to pick up a box of these at Kroger on sale for $3.00. Each box contains three 3.38'fluid ounce bars and each bar is a fairly robust 290 calories.

As you can see these Gold?! bars are a a change of pace from most of the Magnum bars that we see as the Belgian milk chocolate in the outer layer of this bar is golden colored, thus the name of the bar. Maybe that's the reason for the extra punctuation marks...the coloring of the bar makes you think "what the f*ck?!"  I know it did for me.  The interior of the bar is Magnum's traditional vanilla bean ice cream speckled with flecks of vanilla bean with one addition:  there is a swirl ribbons of sea salt caramel which not only provide quite visual appearance, almost like tiger stripes. As always, the bar sits on Magnum's "M" branded stick.

So as I took my first bite, I was immediately met by the crack of the hard chocolate (and oddly colored) outer layer.  As with all Magnum chocolate, the flavor was dense, sweet and rich.  It's decadence is its ultimate form.  The vanilla bean ice cream was also wonderful, as usual, with wonderful and strong vanilla flavor.  As you would expect, the major thing of note in this flavor was that of the caramel and while it may have been sea salt caramel, I couldn't taste a whole lot of salt in that flavor.  Instead, what I tasted was some additional sweetness with a hint of burnt caramel flavor.  Also, it did provide a break up of the mouthfeel of the bar as it added some gooey characteristics to the normally dense ice cream.  While the caramel flavor was not strong or overpowering, it was a great complement to the chocolate and vanilla of the normal recipe.

Buy It or Fly By It?  This is not Magnum's greatest offering, but it is very good and gets a BUY IT rating.  The only "what the f*ck?!" question I was asking after eating this was whether I should have another or not (I wisely chose not to; my waistline thanked me).  If you see these in your store as they creep out to mass audiences as part of the new product introduction, I think you'd be wise to grab a box on your own and I believe that you'll definitely enjoy it.

BUY IT!!