I do not know if any of you noticed, but Honey Bunches of Oats is reproducing like rabbits and I bet people in China are pissed. While each couple in China can have only one child, an asexual semi-healthy cereal can have seven offspring, with the possibility of more. I bet you right now that Honey Bunches of Oats is off somewhere breeding. Its most recent spawn is the Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters.

With a plethora of Honey Bunches of Oats variations, I am wondering when it is going to stop popping out new flavors. Right now, there is Honey Bunches of Oats Honey Roasted, Honey Bunches of Oats with Almonds, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Strawberries, Honey Bunches of Oats with Cinnamon Clusters, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Peaches, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Bananas, Honey Bunches of Oats with Vanilla Clusters and of course, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters.

You know what? Maybe Honey Bunches of Oats is on welfare and its timing these births so that it doesn’t have to go off of welfare. Just keep reproducing and it can keep getting welfare. There is an endless amount of Honey Bunches of Oats possibilities, like Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Apples, Honey Bunches of Oats with Caramel Clusters, Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Starfruit or Honey Bunches of Oats with Orange Zest. If Honey Bunches of Oats is defrauding the government and stealing our tax dollars, I am going to get its tubes tied.

Or maybe Honey Bunches of Oats is a polygamist and part of the Fundamentalist Crunchy Cereal Church and it lives with all of its Honey Bunches of Oats wives in a secluded ranch in the middle of Texas. Oh, the inbreeding could lead to some fucked up offspring, like Honey Bunches of Oats with Bacon, Honey Bunches of Oats with Fluoride or Honey Bunches of Oats with Honey Bunches of Oats.

Anyway, I am exciting about Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters because it means we are one step closer to having Little Chocolate Donuts on our breakfast table. Fortunately, this cereal comes with real semi-sweet chocolate (with cocoa butter) and not that “chocolatey” bullshit, which is the equivalent of a Waikiki transvestite hooker — looks good on the outside, but do a little digging and you’ll have a bitter taste in your mouth. Unless a bitter taste in your mouth is something you are into and willing to pay extra for.

Like I wrote in the previous paragraph, this cereal has semi-sweet chocolate, which makes sense because having sweet chocolate would be retarded in a cereal that supposed to be healthy. Unfortunately, the semi-sweet chocolate clusters gives the cereal a really weak chocolate flavor and I was hoping that Barney Rubble would give me some his stolen Cocoa Pebbles to mix with this cereal.

Despite its weak chocolate flavor, I have to say that it is one of my favorite Honey Bunches of Oats variations. It has got the whole grain goodness for the adult in me, the chocolate goodness for the kid in me, and it allows me to buy a chocolate cereal that doesn’t make me look like a pathetic bachelor, puerile adult, or possible pedophile.

(Nutrition Facts - 3/4 cup - 120 calories, 2 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 150 milligrams of sodium, 65 milligrams of potassium, 25 grams of carbs, 2 grams of dietary fiber, 7 grams of sugar, 16 grams of other carbs, 2 grams of protein, a whole lot of vitamins and minerals, and 1 step closer to getting mini Hershey’s Kisses into a cereal.)

Item: Honey Bunches of Oats with Real Chocolate Clusters
Price: $4.00 (on sale - 14.5 ounces)
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Real chocolate in it. Clusters are crunchy. Honey Bunches of Oats. One step closer to having Little Chocolate Donuts. Vitamins and minerals.
Cons: Chocolate didn’t stand out. My excessive use of “Honey Bunches of Oats” in this review (to kill some time, count the number of times I used it). Honey Bunches of Oats with Fluoride. Chocolatey bullshit. Welfare fraud.

My doctor told me last week that I wasn’t getting enough of my fat intake from canned foods.

Actually, he told me that I was lucky to make it to his office from my car, but this is what I would buy if the previous sentence were true. It’s Casa Fiesta’s Beef Tamales in a can. It boasts that it needs no preservatives, which sounds healthy until you realize that it’s packed in its own grease.

The whole idea of tamales in a can would be enough to give some purists a heart attack — and not just from the cholesterol. Real tamales are lovingly made by hand by an Mexican woman and steamed over several hours with obnoxious mariachi music playing in the background.

They are wrapped in either corn husks or banana leaves, both of which are usurped here by the practical-yet-bland parchment paper. All six tamales are individually wrapped and ready for consumption.

For who?

I’m not certain, but I think I fit right into their self-loathing bachelor demographic. Low standards here are important because they’re not what I’d call pretty. In fact, the process of canning and shipping has left these tamales looking a little bit like spent condoms. I’ll let you use your imagination for the chili sauce.

Fortunately, it does not taste awful. I would never dare serve these to other people, but they are good when you are too lazy to cook and want some spicy food out of a can. The masa dough on the outside is passable even though it kind of blends in with the beef. The beef paste has no real discernible texture; it is comparable to a dryer version of Chef Boyardee’s mystery beef.

If it weren’t for the color, I wouldn’t be able to tell where one ended and the other one began. After drenching it in hot sauce and sour cream, however, you will cease caring and begin enjoying this bastardized Mexican classic.

(Nutritional Facts - 2 tamales - 220 calories, 15 grams of fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 25 mg of cholesterol, 680 mg sodium, 14 grams of carbs, less than 1 gram of dietary fiber, 1 gram of sugar, 5 grams of protein, 8% Vitamin A, 2% Vitamin C, 2% Calcium, and 4% Iron)

Item: Casa Fiesta Beef Tamales
Price: $1.39
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tastes pretty good once you throw a bunch of stuff on it. Convenient and good to have on hand. No preservatives.
Cons: Very greasy if you don’t scoop out the excess. Lacks any discernible texture. Obnoxious mariachi music. Kind of look like spent condoms.

If you want your kid to succeed, because you weren’t athletic, talented, pretty, or smart enough to be successful when you were growing up, then Frosted Flakes Gold cereal just might be what your kids need to give you the opportunity to live vicariously through them. According to the box, the crunchy flakes made with whole grain and baked with honey is supposed to provide long-lasting energy, a label usually reserved for energy drinks and wang medications.

With a name like Frosted Flakes Gold, I was hoping that there would be gold in the box, like the gold flakes in Goldschlager or the golden light that shines out of Selma Hayek’s va-jay-jay. Despite my extensive digging, I couldn’t find any gold, not even with the help of Heather Mills. The only thing shiny about the cereal was the box it came in, which had a foil exterior.

Frosted Flakes Gold cereal smelled like Golden Grahams cereal and it tasted like store-brand lite pancake syrup, which actually isn’t bad compared with this cereal’s predecessor, the shitastic Kellogg’s Tiger Power. After eating a bowl of Frosted Flakes Gold cereal every morning for a week, I have to say that I didn’t feel like it was giving me long-lasting energy. If the high fructose corn syrup it in was replaced with caffeine or meth, it would probably give me two to three hours of lasting energy, followed by some downtime or my mouth wrapped around things it shouldn’t be wrapped around.

I’m not a parent, but what I’ve learned from watching “I Know My Kid’s A Star” is that children don’t need special whole grain cereals that’s promoted by a cartoon tiger in order to be successful. All they need are parents who are crazy enough to stab someone in the back for their child, demanding enough to cause their children to turn to alcohol before they can drive, and shameless enough to have their child be a part of a reality show on VH1 with Danny Bonaduce.

(Nutrition Facts - 3/4 cup - 110 calories, 0.5 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 190 milligrams of sodium, 30 milligrams of potassium, 27 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of fiber, 10 grams of sugar, 14 grams of other carbohydrates, 2 grams of protein, and a whole lot of vitamins and nutrients.)

Item: Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes Gold
Price: $6.59 (16.9-ounces)
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Fancy shiny box. Decent tasting. Tastes like lite pancake syrup. Smells like Golden Grahams. 3 grams of fiber per serving. Better than Tiger Power cereal. Selma Hayek’s va-jay-jay.
Cons: High Fructose Corn Syrup. Doesn’t seem to give me long-lasting energy. The parents on “I Know My Kid’s A Star.” Couldn’t find gold with Heather Mills’ help. Wrapping my mouth around things it shouldn’t be wrapped around.

Back in 1996, my life was at a crossroads − kind of like that crappy Britney Spears movie, I forget what it’s called. Anyways, it was a crazy time to be living. I had done some experimenting with alcohol and drugs, which was a big deal considering I was eight years old at the time. The only thing that kept me going was my torrid love affair with dance. It was during this time period that I became known as the Asian Sensation.

In those days, political correctness had not yet spread throughout the country. My racially exploitive nickname was simple, catchy, and just as memorable as my jumping splits. Dancing was the only time I felt free. This was mostly because they kept me in a small cage when I wasn’t dancing, but I digress. My upstart career came to an abrupt end when I grotesquely tore my groin muscles right off of the bone. I had not thought about dance since then until I tuned in to the new season of Dancing With the Stars to indulge my irrational man-crush on Adam Carolla.

All of the memories came rushing back to me, filling me with a deep sorrow fueled by the stagnation in my soles. I had to cope with my disappoint the same way that I always do: shopping and eating. It’s one of my many ambiguously feminine traits. To my surprise, I came across egg rolls that shared my former moniker. They were Asian Sensations Chicken Egg Rolls, produced by the probably-not-Asian-but-sounds-Asian-enough-to-be-sort-of-authentic Schwan’s frozen food company. The picture on the box looked appetizing, so I decided to give it a shot.

Once taken out of the box, I was cheered up by the fact that the individually-wrapped egg rolls were fairly substantial. One is big enough to pair with some fried rice for a filling lunch. I threw one in the toaster oven and waited as it cooked, tapping my toes all the while. When it finished, I tore it open to see its innards. It contained cabbage, processed chicken, celery, carrots, and onions, but all I could really see was chicken and cabbage. It was all I could taste too; the vegetables were chopped so fine that all of the texture was lost. Even worse, the indiscernible sauce was annoyingly sweet and added no spice or excitement to the experience. The egg rolls were edible, but certainly not deserving of the Asian Sensation name.

Still feeling kind of down, I visited their website, AsianSensations.com, to see if it might be a porn site of some kind. It is not, but apparently I can win a private concert with singer Julie Roberts. This begs several questions. One − who the hell is Julie Roberts? Two − why is Asian Sensations promoting a white blonde as their big star? And finally − is “private concert” a thinly-veiled euphemism for “hot sexual tryst?”

Either way, none of it adds up and I haven’t been this confused since my high school crush explained that she was “not necessarily un-attracted” to me. Alas, it was another lesson learned: don’t look to egg rolls to solve your life problems.

(Nutritional Facts - 1 egg roll - 140 calories, 5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 10 mg of cholesterol, 400mg sodium, 20 grams of carbs, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 2 grams of sugar, 5 grams of protein, 15% Vitamin A, 6% Vitamin C, 2% Calcium, and 8% Iron)

Item: Asian Sensations Chicken Egg Rolls
Price: $2.50
Purchased at: Albertsons
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Reasonably priced and fairly big egg rolls. Egg rolls are both microwaveable and oven-able. Being a badass on the dance floor. Possible contest sex with Julie Roberts.
Cons: Flavor is a little to sweet to eat by itself. Vegetables all come together in a soggy mass. Eating away your pain. Tearing groin muscles. Crushes that try to let you down easy but end up destroying your psyche instead.

If all it takes to achieve bliss is to eat the Kellogg’s Special K Raspberry Bliss bar, then I’m staying home and eating nothing but these natural and artificial flavored bars. But really, after trying them, I doubt that these bars have the ability to give someone any amount of bliss. Even if it could, it would end up being like a vibrator, it would satisfy you for a while, but eventually you’re going to need something real.

Speaking of being real, these Kellogg’s Special K Raspberry Bliss bars lack some of that in its ingredients. Each bar is made up of multigrain cereal, bran flakes, rice cereal, raspberry flavored fruit pieces, and partially dipped in what I’m now calling, I Can Believe It’s Not Chocolate, or as the packaging says “chocolatey.”

Not chocolate, “chocolatey.”

To explain “chocolatey,” I’m going to refer to a comment for The Impulsive Buy’s review of the Kellogg’s Special K Chocolatey Delight cereal from my favorite female candy expert, “Partially hydrogenated palm kernel oil + cocoa processed with alkali + cocoa = “chocolatey.” There’s no cocoa butter in there to make it chocolate.”

Its overall taste was not bad. The “raspberry flavored fruit pieces” made the bar taste like raspberry jujubes. The chocolatey part of the bar didn’t seem to add anything, since the raspberry is what stood out. For a bar that claims to be healthy, it would’ve been nice of Kellogg’s to keep it real by including actual dried raspberries in it, or at least a coupon for a free lap dance, because I think that’s the only thing that would make up for it.

Another thing that bothered me was that in the nutrition facts it claimed to have zero trans fats, but if you read the ingredients list and look at the footnotes, there’s a line that says “Less then 0.5 g trans fat per serving” thanks to the partially hydrogenated palm kernel oil. Each bar weighs less than an ounce (0.77 ounces) and is 3.5 inches long and one inch wide, which is great for people trying to portion control and lose weight, but bad for people who are hungry or guys insecure about their junk.

Overall, I think the Kellogg’s Special K Raspberry Bliss bars are like Playboy Playmates, they seem good at first glance, but deep down you know there was some tricks involved. With the Bliss bars, it’s the raspberry flavored fruit pieces and the chocolatey dipping. With the Playboy Playmates, it’s Photoshop.

(Nutrition Facts - 1 bar - 90 calories, 2 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 70 milligrams of sodium, 17 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 grams of fiber, 9 grams of sugar, 1 grams of protein, 10% niacin, 4% iron, 10% vitamin B6, and zero grams of bliss.)

Item: Kellogg’s Special K Raspberry Bliss
Price: $3.00 (on sale, six-pack)
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: 90 calories per bar. Decent tasting. Bars are small for those who want to control portions. Coupons for lap dances.
Cons: No bliss from eating bars. Ingredients list is kind of scary. 0.5 grams of trans fat. Raspberry flavored fruit pieces not actual raspberries. Chocolatey not chocolate. Not much in vitamins and minerals. Bars are small for hungry people. Chocolatey doesn’t add to the bar. Being insecure about your junk.

The Burt’s Bees Milk & Shea Butter Body Wash is 98.50 percent all natural. I too am 98.50 percent all natural when I walk around my apartment. What is the non-natural 1.5 percent when I’m strut my stuff in my apartment?

It is a sheer polyester g-string with gold sequins…and I work it.

Burt’s Bees personal care products are known for being made with natural ingredients and the company engages in environmentally friendly business practices. Once the secret of hippies everywhere, it has been available to all the smug Toyota Prius drivers out there for several years. I’ve known about Burt’s Bees products for almost a decade, but avoided them at first because they were too pricey for my dried ramen-eating, college-aged ass. But now that I’m an employed 30-something, I guess it’s about time for me to lose my virginity and experience the hippie wonder that is Burt’s Bees products.

The idea of bathing with milk and shea butter may sound unappealing, but when compared to bathing with a cow in the middle of Shea Stadium, it is not so bad. According to the bottle, milk, along with coconut and sunflower oils, create a gentle and richly foaming cleanser. Also according to the bottle, the shea butter, which is rich in vitamins A, E, & F, deeply penetrates skin to nourish, soften, and replenish essential moisture. This combination is supposed to leave skin soft, smooth, and beautiful.

After taking several showers with the Burt’s Bees Milk & Shea Butter Body Wash, I have to say that it isn’t my favorite shower buddy. Honestly, in the bottle, it smells like a warm swimming pool filled with sunscreen-smothered swimmers and enough chlorine to bleach my pubic hairs. On my skin, it smells kind of like clay, which would make sense since I do have a body that should be memorialized in the form of a statue…and then pooped on by pigeons.

Compared with most body washes I’ve used, its consistency was watery, which caused me to squeeze out more product than I wanted to use. While using it, the body wash didn’t lather as much as most of the products I’ve used. This was due to the lack of sodium lauryl/laureth sulfate, which makes a mean lather, but can cause skin irritation to some. Rinsing it off was easy and it didn’t leave a slippery residue that many moisturizing body washes do.

The Burt’s Bees Milk & Shea Butter Body Wash did make my skin soft, but I don’t think it made it beautiful. But then again, the only thing that can make my skin beautiful are the tears of orphan Asian babies.

(Editor’s Note: Thanks to Impulsive Buy reader Cinby for suggestion a Burt’s Bees review.)

Item: Burt’s Bees Milk & Shea Butter Body Wash
Price: $7.99 (12-ounces)
Purchased at: Longs Drugs
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Made me clean. Made my skin soft. 98.50% natural. Sodium lauryl/laureth sulfate free. Rinses off easily. Not tested on animals. Losing my Burt’s Bees virginity. My sheer polyester g-string with gold sequins.
Cons: Disappointing scent. Watery consistency. Doesn’t lather as much as other body washes. Bathing with a cow in the middle of Shea Stadium.

Kona Coffee is known worldwide as one of the best varieties of coffee. To reach that level of excellence, you may think there’s something special about the town of Kona, like it’s a magical place where coffee beans rain down from the sky and the wonderful smell of coffee lingers like the aroma of urine in every public stairwell.

You may think the beans are collected by little men called Menehune who come out of their tiny grass huts at night and each bean is carried on a donkey-shaped cloud to a magic grinder that uses the bones of unicorns to turn the coffee beans into a fine dust for the world to enjoy. Sadly, I’m here to let you know that Kona is not the magical coffee heaven on Earth that you may think. Kona is just like most towns.

There’s a Wal-Mart, Kmart, multiplex movie theater, Costco, Home Depot, Borders, Bubba Gump Shrimp Company restaurant, Hard Rock Cafe, a couple of Starbucks, a variety of national fast food restaurants, and there used to be a shitty Sizzler. Also, the coffee isn’t picked up by Menehune, it’s picked off of trees by Filipino immigrants.

So what makes Kona Coffee good?

I don’t know, but whatever it is I wished the new Jack in the Box Kona Coffee Shake had some of it. I’m a big fan of Jack’s Oreo Shake, which I order whenever I want to add a second chin or another dimple on my ass, but I don’t feel the same way about this creamy coffee-flavored milkshake. The coffee flavor was noticeable, but not strong enough for those who have Starbucks flowing through their veins. I didn’t really think it tasted like Kona Coffee, but it did taste like all the faux Kona Coffee products I’ve tried over the years.

Another problem I had with the Jack in the Box Kona Coffee Shake was its thickness. I couldn’t get that thickness into my mouth, not even with my vacuum-like oral sucking skillz. I sucked and sucked, but it was hard to get the creamy goodness into my mouth. After awhile, all that sucking just made my mouth sore and I waited for that thickness to get soft before I tried sucking it again. When it did get soft, I was able to suck it dry.

But I really wished I also had the option to spoon the Jack in the Box Kona Coffee Shake.

Item: Jack in the Box Kona Coffee Shake
Price: $3.09 (regular-sized)
Purchased at: Jack in the Box
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Mah oral sucking skillz. Cool. Creamy. If you like the fake Kona Coffee taste, you’ll like this. Jack in the Box Oreo Shake. Costco. Real Kona Coffee. Spooning.
Cons: Coffee flavor was light. The aroma of urine in every public stairwell. Thickness of milkshake was a little too thick for my mouth. Kona is not a magical place.

Get the audio version of this review here.