At first I really thought these Kellogg’s Eggo Minis Chocolatey Chip Cookie Dough Waffles were really cool. Not because they were mini Eggo waffles or the fact they were labeled “Limited Edition.” I believed they were cool because I thought if I stuck them in the oven and baked them, chocolate chip cookies would sprout out of them, like leaves on a branch.

Unfortunately when I tried this, all I ended up with were really burnt waffles, smoke, and a really loud beeping smoke detector.

Okay, so there’s no actual chocolate chip cookie dough in the waffles, it’s “naturally and artificially flavored.”

So next someone is going tell me that the cookie dough in chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream isn’t “real” cookie dough.

It isn’t?

I could get possible salmonella food poisoning?

So I can’t bake the chocolate chip cookie dough found in ice cream?

No?

Dammit!

Well if these waffles don’t have actual chocolate chip cookie dough, they better at least taste like chocolate chip cookie dough.

Nope, disappointed again. I could taste the chocolate chips, but it tastes much like regular chocolate chip waffles.

What’s next? Is someone going to tell me that soy “milk” isn’t really milk?

It isn’t?

Shit!

Well I’ve learned a few valuable lessons today: (1) I should never judge a product by its name. (2) Eating real cookie dough could possibly kill me.

Item: Kellogg’s Eggo Minis Chocolatey Chip Cookie Dough Waffles
Purchase Price: $3.89
Rating: 2 out of 5
Pros: No chance of possible salmonella food poisoning because there is no real cookie dough. Vitamins and minerals.
Cons: Doesn’t really taste like chocolate chip cookie dough. DON’T BAKE THEM LIKE COOKIES!!!

“Dump that zero and get with the hero,” apparently is an effective pick-up line, because it has been used by other men to cause all my past dates to walk out on me.

Because of this I used to think that being a zero was a bad thing, but along comes Diet Sprite Zero, which reminds me a lot of myself. No color. No carbs. No caffeine. No sugar. No fat. No protein. No personality. No knowledge on how to please a woman.

Because the Diet Sprite Zero had none of the above, I thought that it wasn’t going to have any taste, again just like me.

I was surprised and jealous that it actually had taste, and a pretty good taste I might add. Well I guess I can still hope that the Diet Sprite Zero doesn’t know how to please a woman.

I wondered how a beverage with almost the same characteristics as water could taste so good.

Well I didn’t really find the answer in the ingredients list on the bottle, but I did find something interesting. There were two words that stood out, not because they were printed in bold, but because I have no idea how to pronounce them: phenylketonurics and phenylalanine.

(Just a note to all those young folks who aspire to be future spelling bee champs. You should try to remember these two words and when you win the National Spelling Bee by spelling the word “phenylketonurics,” please remember to thank me.)

Hmm, let’s look up these words in a dictionary.

Phenylketonurics: relating to a genetic disorder of phenylalanine metabolism, which, if untreated, causes severe brain damage and progressive mental retardation.

Um, excuse me. I’ll be right back.

(Puking sounds)

(5 minutes later)

Okay, now where were we. Aaah, yes.

Phenylalanine: an essential amino acid, occurring in proteins.

Just to make sure everything was all right and I wasn’t going to end up “special,” I Googled the two words and I think my bulimic-like actions were a little premature. Despite the scary definition of “phenylketonurics,” I assure you that most of us have nothing to fear.

That’s the short answer, but if you want the long, technical, and boring answer, read this.

Diet Sprite Zero surprised me in many ways. Despite its lack of sugar, calories, fat, and carbs, it’s a good tasting beverage.

I guess sometimes it really is better to be the zero than the hero.

Item: Diet Sprite Zero
Purchase Price: $1.29 (20 oz.)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Surprised that there actually is taste. No sugar, calories, fat, and carbs.
Cons: If you’re phenylketonuric, DON’T DRINK THIS!!!

Must finish review. Must not have two straight days without a review. I’m sooo tired.

Need caffeine. Where’s Jolt Cola when you need it?

Must settle for the 79 milligrams of caffeine in the Sobe Adrenaline Rush.

What the hell is Taurine, D-Ribose, L-Carnitine, Inositol, Guarana, and Panax Ginseng?

Must Google funny names. Must not fall asleep.

Taurine is an amino acid. D-Ribose is a simple sugar that begins the metabolic process. L-Carnitine is another amino acid. Inositol helps emulsify fats. Guarana is nut-like seed. Panax Ginseng is a dietary supplement.

What good is all that stuff if it doesn’t keep me up to finish this damn review.

Come on caffeine, kick in.

Must finish review. Must not fall asleep.

At least the Sobe Adrenaline Rush tastes pretty good, but it ain’t keeping me up.

Not even the 37 grams of carbs and 35 grams of sugar have kicked in.

I blame the damn Mountain Dew chuging contest. Who would’ve thought drinking an entire 2-liter bottle of Mountain Dew in 1 minute and 56 seconds and staying up for 30 straight hours would affect me this much?

Damn, I sure could use another 2-liter bottle of Mountain Dew, because this Sobe stuff ain’t cutting it.

Maybe I’m immune to caffeine.

Eh, I’ll make this review short. Sobe Adrenaline Rush. Tastes good. Made out of a few things I don’t know how to pronounce. 100% RDA of Vitamin C. Lots of sugar. Lots of carbs. Lots of caffeine. Blah, blah, blah.

Done.

Now I can go to sleep.

Item: Sobe Adrenaline Rush
Purchase Price: $2.50 (on sale)
Rating: 3 out of 5
Pros: Tastes good. Lots of sugar, carbs, caffeine, and things I don’t know how to pronounce.
Cons: I am immune to caffeine. Can is small.

Oh man we feel sick.

I don’t know what was worse, the contest to see who could eat the most cans of canned cheese or the competition to see who could chug a 2 liter bottle of Mountain Dew the quickest.

All I know is that it hasn’t been pretty since and the bathroom has been occupied a lot in the past 24 hours.

Whose idea was it to have a Food Olympics?

Oh yeah, it was mine.

Thank goodness I made it so that the Food Olympics comes around every four years.

So we have to apologize to The Impulsive Buy’s twelve readers, because there will be no review today.

Ugh! Someone please pass me the Pepto Bismol.

I’m suspicious of “health foods,” or as we used to call them while growing up, “hippie food.” It all began with my parents’ attempt to feed me plain rice cakes during my “husky” years. If you’ve never had a plain rice cake, you know that it tastes nothing like cake, not even the crap you can make with an Easy Bake Oven.

Ever since then I’ve avoided anything “healthy.” Unfortunately, due to my slowly expanding gut, I’m beginning to see less and less of my penis. So I’ve decided to give another shot at health foods.

Recently I came across the EcoBar, which was on sale at the local 24-hour drugstore. The name of it sounds healthy, doesn’t it?

There were several flavors to choose from: Rain Forest Frost, Mountain Majesty, Ocean Berry, Desert Delight, and Tropical Splendor. At first, I thought about the Desert Delight, figuring it must be good like a scoop of vanilla ice cream and hot apple pie. However, after reading the ingredients, which consisted of dates, nuts, figs, honey, toasted oats, and crisp rice with a creamy yogurt coating, I thought it didn’t seem much like a desert. Maybe if they added some chocolate, then it would seem like a desert.

Instead, I decided on the Tropical Splendor, which sounded pretty tropical with its pineapple, papaya, coconut, and mango, along with honey, toasted oats and crisp rice with a yogurt coating. It sure ain’t no plain rice cake.

One of the first things I noticed about the EcoBar was its nutritional value. It contains 17 vitamins and minerals: Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Calcium, Iron, Vitamin E, Thiamin, Riboflavin, Niacin, Vitamin B6, Folate, Vitamin B12, Biotin, Pantothenic Acid, Phosphorus, Iodine, and Zinc.

With a plain rice cake, I believe you get vitamins and minerals as well.

Hmm, let’s see. Nope, no vitamins or minerals, just oodles of tasteless rice.

How do you expect to get healthy from that?

With my past plain rice cake experience, I was expecting the worst from this health food. Instead, I was pleasantly surprised by how good the chewy Tropical Splendor EcoBar was. The yogurt coating made the bar sweet, like a good candy bar. The mixture of dried fruit also made it very tasty.

The “Eco” in EcoBar stands for “ecology,” which is the relationships between organisms and their environment. Too bad the “Eco” in EcoBar didn’t stand for “economy,” because if they were a little cheaper, I would eat them a little more often.

For the price of one EcoBar, I could get two chocolate bars. Hey, isn’t chocolate considered health food?

Item: Tropical Splendor EcoBar
Purchase Price: $1.19 (on sale)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Surprisingly good. Yogurt coating makes is taste more like candy.
Cons: Cheaper to buy candy bars. (Hey isn’t chocolate good for you!). A little pricey.

Where the hell is Toucan Sam? I want to barbeque his blue-feathered ass.

What’s up with this 1/3 less sugar in his Froot Loops?

Doesn’t Toucan Sam realize he’s ruining the lives of grade school children everywhere? Sending them to school without adequate sugar levels is a recipe for failure in the classroom.

I hate to imagine where would I have been without sugary breakfast cereals? I probably wouldn’t have survived grade school. I wouldn’t have paid attention to my teacher, gotten good grades, completed my math worksheets before anyone else, gotten gold stars on my progress chart, become the tetherball king of the playground, or be able to handle the beating I received for being the biggest nerd, geek, dweeb, and dork.

For me, sugar was like steroids. It made me a better student. Sure I was a little “husky,” but I excelled in school and that’s all that really mattered. It’s better to be a smart “husky” kid than a stupid “husky” kid.

For a while the cereal companies had it right by adding more. They were adding more chocolate, more marshmallows, and more rainbow fruity colors.

But now the trend is to have less. So eventually is there also going to be less chocolate, less marshmallows, and less rainbow fruity colors?

Where’s the neural stimulant that kids are going to need to make it through lunch? They can’t drink coffee, because no grade school child can afford Starbucks everyday.

Despite having 1/3 less sugar than regular Froot Loops, I was surprised that it tastes almost like regular Froot Loops. But still, I wish it had more sugar, some marshmallows, and more rainbow fruity colors.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It’s where we all get the energy to make it through work and school. For many adults that energy comes in the form of caffeine. For kids, that energy comes in the form of sugar, because I don’t know of any parents that are irresponsible/cool enough to allow their kids to drink soda with breakfast.

So Toucan Sam, please put the sugar back into Froot Loops.

What?

They still sell regular Froot Loops?

Oh, never mind.

Item: Froot Loops with 1/3 Less Sugar
Purchase Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Tastes just like regular Froot Loops.
Cons: Won’t be able to function without adequate amounts of sugar.

B is for Bug

I have the iTunes Music Store bug. So far I’ve bought 453 songs from iTunes. Although as you regular Impulsive Buy readers may know, 117 of those came from the Mozart: Symphonies collection I bought a few months back in my attempt to win the iTunes 1,000,000th download contest.

The great thing about the iTunes Music Store is the ability to purchase and download individual tracks. I want “Ice Ice Baby,” but I definitely don’t want the rest of To The Extreme. Okay, maybe I might want “Play That Funky Music,” but just for those I Love the 90s nostalgia moments and when I decide to get lines shaved on the side of my head.

On occasion, I do purchase whole albums from iTunes, like Less Than Jake’s B is for B-Sides

B is for Bargain

B is for B-Sides is a bargain because I bought the album for $7.92. At Amazon the CD can be purchased for $13.98. That’s a six-dollar difference. Sure you can rip the songs and distribute them across peer-to-peer networks with the CD, but I’m really scared of the RIAA and Metallica, although not as much since they cut their hair.

B is for Brief.

B is for B-Sides contains 12 tracks that total about 28 minutes in length, which is quite brief. Almost all of the songs run under two minutes and thirty seconds. Just to let you ladies know, my lovemaking sessions last much longer than this album. So what album would best describe the length of my lovemaking abilities? All 9 hours and 56 minutes of the Mozart: Symphonies collection, of course.

Okay, not really.

B is for Bitchin’

Despite its length, the album is bitchin’ (Wait. Do the young folks still use that word? How about B is for Bad Ass?). All the tracks for B is for B-Sides were recorded for the Anthem album, which was released last year. If you’re a hardcore fan of the group, this album will probably sound a little different than their earlier albums, because the horn section isn’t featured as much. But the songs are as fast-paced as ever. Some of my favorites include “Portrait of a Cigarette Smoker At 19” and “Bridge and Tunnel Authority.”

B is for Bill

Because the iTunes Music Store uses your credit card information for purchases, the $7.92 was added to my slowly growing credit card bill, but it was worth it.

Item: Less Than Jake – B is for B-Sides
Purchase Price: $7.92 (iTunes Music Store)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Bargain. Bitchin’ and Bad Ass.
Cons: Brief.

The Impulsive Buy has reviewed a couple of yogurt smoothies over the past couple of months: The Yoplait Nouriche and the Dannon Frusion. Both of them were good, but if you read the nutritional information, you will notice each product has enough carbs and sugar to cause the late Dr. Atkins to un-cremate his body and scold your carb-craving fat ass.

If that whole coming back to life by un-cremation were possible, the zombie Dr. Atkins would probably recommend the Hood Carb Countdown Strawberry-Banana Lowfat Yogurt Smoothie. He would also try to eat your brains, because he’s a zombie and it’s protein.

While chewing on your cerebellum, he would probably tell you that the Hood Carb Countdown Strawberry-Banana Lowfat Yogurt Smoothie is low in carbs, low in sugar, low in fat, low in calories, and has more protein than the Yoplait Nouriche, Dannon Frusion, and your brain stem. Also, he might brag about the fact his name in prominently on the bottle a couple of times.

Unfortunately, the zombie Dr. Atkins probably wouldn’t mention the fact that the Hood Carb Countdown Strawberry-Banana Lowfat Yogurt Smoothie tastes much worse than the Nouriche and Frusion, but slightly better than the frontal lobe he’s chewing on.

The texture of it was kind of chalky, and yes I did remember to shake well. I guess I should’ve expected this, after all it is “lowfat.”

Now boys and girls, to avoid selecting crappy products while you’re shopping, it’s very important to remember this fun and simple equation:

If you’re trying to reduce your carbohydrates intake, this is a great product with only 4 grams of carbs, but that’s all it’s got going for it.

Item: Hood Carb Countdown Strawberry-Banana Lowfat Yogurt Smoothie
Purchase Price: $2.39 (on sale)
Rating: 1 out of 5
Pros: Low carbs. Low sugar. Low fat. Low calories.
Cons: Low carbs. Low sugar. Low fat. Low calories. Low taste. Low desire to buy another.

I was going to start off this review with some sexual analogy about how some women say size doesn’t matter. Then I realized how overused these types of analogies are. I’ve even used it in a previous review. I didn’t want to stoop to that level again, because this is a classy, well-respected quasi-review website that averages 20 visitors a day.

I could have said something like, “The KFC Snacker is small, but many people say it’s cute.”

Or I could have said, “The KFC Snacker maybe small, but it tries its best to get the job done.”

Or “The KFC Snacker is small, because it admits it’s very cold outside.”

Or “It’s not the size of the KFC Snacker that matters, it’s the motion of the ocean of secret herbs and spices.”

Okay, that last one was pretty lame.

However, instead of complaining about how small the KFC Snacker is in the form of badly written sexual innuendoes, I will tell you that the KFC Snacker was disappointing because of it’s size and performance.

The KFC Snacker is roughly the size and shape of a bar of soap, which is about half the size of other chicken sandwiches offered by other fast food joints. It comes with a sesame seed bun, some lettuce, mayonnaise, and a strip of chicken with the Colonial’s secret herbs and spices, all for 99 cents.

The $1 McChicken from McDonald’s isn’t as tasty as the KFC Snacker, but you definitely get more bang for the buck, since it is significantly bigger. I guess Colonial’s secret herbs and spices are getting rare or something.

Despite the typical delicious taste of those herbs and spices, I couldn’t get over the disappointment of how small it was and how it probably wouldn’t satisfy most people’s hunger.

I guess in the case of the KFC Snacker, size really does matter.

Item: KFC Snacker
Purchase Price: $0.99
Rating: 2 out of 5
Pros: Typical Colonial secret herbs and spices. Tasty.
Cons: Too small in size, but cute.

This review is a very emotional one for me, because it brings back a memory I’d like to have permanently erased. I have tried really hard to suppress this memory, but for you, my loyal…one…two…three…four…um…five readers, I will relive it.

It was the summer of 1990. As I recall, it was an extremely hot summer season, with days filled with cloudless skies and parched pastures. Without school, the each day was one long recess spent with the other neighborhood kids. The beach is where we spent many days, bodysurfing in the two-foot waves and getting sunburnt because we forgot to reapply sunscreen. But it didn’t matter because we were young, innocent, and free.

Saved by the Bell was on the small screen; MC Hammer’s “U Can’t Touch This” was played across the radio waves; and Pepperoni Pizza Hot Pockets were the lunch of choice.

Oh those Pepperoni Pizza Hot Pockets, a delicious and hearty lunch I could eat outside, once I took it out of the microwave and let it cool down for a while. They were quite scrumptious, although I would soon find out how dangerous they could be to my wardrobe.

The one bad thing I discovered about those Hot Pockets was the possibility of the pepperoni pizza filling oozing out from the other end. The first time it happened to me was when I was wearing my green shiny, baggy MC Hammer pants. After taking a bite, a glob of cheese and pizza sauce fell onto my lap and onto my cherished dancing pants. I quickly reached for something to wipe the glob away, but there was nothing around and it was too late. The flimsy material was no match for the quick staining combo of cheese and pizza sauce.

I was devastated because I could no longer wave my hands in the air, bust a few moves and run my fingers through my hair, move slide my rump, or just for a minute do the bump. Nor could I break it down. From that moment on, I vowed never to eat another Hot Pocket again.

(Just give me a moment to collect myself)

So I had some trepidation when I purchased the Hot Pockets Chicken and Broccoli Pot Pie Express, but I couldn’t help myself because they looked so good and it had the word “New!” on the box in big, fancy letters.

Each box comes with two 5-inch pot pies, which were kind of small. It takes 2 minutes to warm up one in the microwave and 24 minutes in a conventional oven. I decided to try both ways.

To warm it up in the microwave, there’s a crisping sleeve that you stick the pot pie in. If I recall from the summer of 1990, they don’t do a good job of crisping anything. However, I guess crisping sleeve technology has improved over the past decade because it did a pretty good job on the chicken and broccoli pot pie. The crust was flaky and the filling was hot, although the parts that didn’t have direct contact with the crisping sleeve were a little soggy.

As for the conventional oven, which was a toaster oven, it did a great job of crisping every inch of the pot pie. The crust was noticeably flakier than the one from the microwave. Was it worth waiting twelve times longer than the microwave one? No.

Both of them tasted very good. The sauce mixed in with the chicken and broccoli was a nice cheese sauce, all of which stayed in the pot pie and stayed away from my favorite tight red leather pants.

Item: Hot Pockets Chicken and Broccoli Pot Pie Express
Purchase Price: $2.50 (on sale)
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Damn good. Flaky crust. The filling stays where it should, so I won’t ever ruin another pair of shiny, baggy MC Hammer pants.
Cons: Kind of small. Microwave crisping sleeve doesn’t do a good job a crisping compared to a conventional oven or toaster-oven. A little expensive for just two pot pies.