Review: Private Selection Coconut Caramel Flan Ice Cream

Private Selection and my proclivity toward binge purchasing continues with another Kroger-related review with one of the more interesting flavors that I picked up in my binge in this pint of Private Selection Coconut Caramel Flan Ice Cream.  I've written far too much about how my love of coconut flavor has come to me late in life, but just in case there are first time readers here, I'll just go ahead and bring it up again.  Wait, I guess I just did.  Anyway, this pint was at the same $0.99 price as the others and it is four half-cup servings of ice cream with each serving clocking in at a fairly economical 200 calories.

It's pretty obvious why the calorie count on this is so economical:  there is a noticeable absence of add-ins.  Outside of the caramel swirl, the only other add-in are flakes of toasted coconut and according to my highly trained (and I say that in jest) eyes, those toasted coconut flakes were nowhere to be found.  Obviously they are white and white flakes against the white coconut ice cream makes those difficult to see since there is little-to-no contrast.  As for the swirl, it was gooey and amply spread throughout the pint, so that was a nice component of an almost naked pint of ice cream.  As for the coconut ice cream itself, it had only a very faint smell of coconut, so that aspect was quite disappointing.

The lack of powerful flavor in the coconut was disappointing too.  Don't get me wrong, I could detect a mild hint of coconut, but it really was not anything more than that.  Honestly, it was so bland that I could have confused it with vanilla and that is not a good thing when you clearly are trying to pattern your ice cream flavor after coconuts.  Also, the toasted coconuts flakes were nowhere to be found, which was also disappointing since I expected them to not only add some coconut flavor, but also some graininess to each spoonful.  The only thing that wasn't disappointing about this was the caramel as it had its expected gooeyness and provided some additional sweetness, although that flavor wasn't particularly strong either.

Buy It or Fly By It?  In the end, all I can say about this pint of ice cream was that it was boring.  It wasn't good or bad, it just was what it was.  Because of the sheer boredom I felt after eating this, I have to give it a FLY BY IT rating because there's nothing memorable about this that would get me to purchase it again or recommend it to others.  It's too bad because if the coconut flavor had been strong in this, I think it really could have been enjoyable.

FLY BY IT!!