Machismo + 90’s Xtreme = the present day douchebag.

I have concluded that the above is the correct formula. Or as a recipe it would read, one part exaggerated masculinity and one equal part X-Games generation, a gallon of penis envy, and a pinch of misdirected anger will give you the douchebag.

Everyone remembers the late 90’s where every…fucking…thing was so damned EXTREME! (Extreeeeme!!!) And you know it was extra extreme when they got rid of the “e” and it was just X-treme or some stupid variation. Images of snowboarders, tats, overdone spiked hairdo’s with goatees grasping some neon green drink, you know XXXXXTREME MUTHAfuckas!!! Red Bull’s and Frïs Vodka anyone?

Once the 90’s gave way to the new millennium, the very common denominator of the public latched on to all the worst things about the EXTREME (Extreeeeme!!!) crowd. After the Y2K scare, Buckle clothing stores were popping up all over the malls like a gonorrhea infection. Davidoff’s Cool Water cologne stepped aside for Axe Tiger Cock or something like that. Walking billboards for midlife crises were wearing Affliction shirts with Ed Hardy jeans and populating posh bars as they imbibed Jager-bombs (note: Sake bombs fall in this category too and if you order a sake bomb in a sushi restaurant, I guarantee your sashimi has been deservedly seasoned with ass-crack sweat).

This is the mutated ugly side of men who were not smart enough to understand metrosexual (which is a term I hate as well). And yes, food wasn’t immune to this movement either. You aren’t a real man unless you can eat those fucking ghost-chili hot wings or scotch bonnet poppers filled with Szechuan whatever the hells. Be a man and eat it!

Or at least that’s what the sticky laminated stained menu tells me and douchebags gotta eat too. As much as I love hot food, I know it’s entering the realm of overly macho men who either eat it hot or eat it big (and sometimes both). Fuck me.

Our love of spicy food is demonstrated in the growing popularity of Thai and Indian cuisines. The general public is beginning to accept flavors more exotic than a Cajun spiced chicken finger. In fact, sriracha is now offered at a lot of restaurants. I assure you it won’t be long before we slather some kimchi on hot dogs, I have and it’s good.

Like anything that becomes popular, they are dumbed down for a dumb public. So as much as I admire those Trekkie-like hot sauce collectors and the adventurous eater tucking into a Ethiopian goat stew scorching with berbere, I was a little pessimistic when I saw the Fiery Fusion flavors for Doritos and Cheetos. I love hot food and normally when it is in snack form, it’s tepid.

The name was a bit douchebaggy too, Fiery Fusion. It sounds like it’s some kind of new scent. When I hear “fusion” in regards to food, I picture bad Asian cuisine mixed with western elements. Ahi-tuna salad comes to mind. Like flies, these places are inhabited by shaved headed “bro’s” in an un-tucked shiny shirt using a pair of chopsticks in one hand and bumping fists with other “bro’s” Tapout-style. Good God.

Fusion, however, for Frito-Lay means “Sizzlin’ Cayenne & Cheese.” Both respective packages have “Fiery Fusion” written in red orange to clue you in that it is “sizzlin’” which may be different from sizzling.

Frito Lay has played around with spicy offerings before in regards to both brands. The wasabi dusted Mr. Dragon’s Fire Chips Doritos were a bit flaccid in the heat department but tasty. The progressively hot “Degree Burn” series released by Doritos are another good example. Not one to be eclipsed, Cheetos brought out their FLAMIN’ HOT and Cheddar Jalapeño variations. Without a fist bump to spare, I gave in and bought both at the gas station bro.

Doritos Fiery Fusion

Upon opening, an immediate rich smell of peppers emanated from the bag and this was a good sign. The chips had the normal orange look of Doritos without a fleck of red powder. At first crunch, it tastes like a nacho chip crossed with a barbecue potato chip if you can imagine that. Then the comforting vinegar tang hits your senses. The chips had a faint earthy sweetness, almost like brown sugar. While it tasted good, I was ready to chalk up my $1.29 as a casualty because I didn’t sense any heat.

Like sleight of hand, I never saw it coming or in this case…taste. A slow burn started to build on my tongue and then it crept to the back of my throat before I even knew it. This was really good. The more I ate, the hotter my mouth became. Surprisingly, the heat also never competed with the flavor unlike so many other spicy chips. I prefer the gradual fire that builds into a storm and would say the effect is similar here.

These chips are the hottest Doritos I’ve eaten. They taste better and are spicier than the Doritos Flamas that has been selling as of late. And unlike the Flamas, I left no red handprints all over my walls like it was the freaking ending of Blair Witch.

Let me caution you, do not expect a capsaicin-fueled roller coaster or your tongue to IGNITE (as the bag claims it will). Even though these are the spiciest Doritos I’ve had, it is far from the spiciest food I’ve ever eaten. I would place the Doritos way above the level of Taco Bell’s Fire sauce but below Tabasco. Still, it’s a welcome punch from a bag of corn tortilla chips. My only complaint is wishing Doritos would turn up the heat a bit more, but that’s negligible.

Despite my feelings, these Doritos really can back up their claim that these are hot. The burn will linger around for a minute and then it’s gone, like a sip of good angry bourbon. I would buy these again. It satiated my hunger for something spicy and who doesn’t love a Dorito chip now and then? Or a bourbon? Fistbump yo!

Cheetos Fiery Fusion

I waited almost a day to open these, partly because I didn’t want to eat them immediately after the Doritos and not get a clean taste. …Mostly because I spent the rest of the day on a scotch fueled bender celebrating my friend’s birthday. (Extreeeeeme!!!)

So here I am staring at Chester Cheetah’s mug at five in the morning. That creepy ass show about missing people in America is on with a theme song that is as scary as the one from Unsolved Mysteries.

I stared at the bag over the chorus chanting “Missing. These people are missing” (see? I told you it was creepy). I went ahead and opened the bag in a clumsy manner. The smell of corn and fake cheese powder made its presence. I took one out and noticed there were patches of red splotches as if the Cheetos had a rash.

Eating one, it tasted very bland. What the hell? These were really boring. Taking a swig from a can of Sprite that has been lying on the counter since the day before, I went back to bed. I needed to sleep off my impending hangover. Additionally, my mouth felt like I went down on a bag of mulch.

I awoke to the sound of that CBS Sunday Morning opening. Feeling better, I decided to give those Cheetos a second try. Lulled from the trumpet of Wynton Marsalis, I walked into the kitchen and grabbed the bag. After eating a few, I confirmed it for myself.

These were so boring and dry. All I could taste was the corny corn puffs and fake-o cheese powder. The heat barely registered but like the Doritos, it would come up from the backside. That is the only similarity between the two.

I would compare the heat to that of a paper cup filled with coffee and too much non-diary creamer that has been sitting in a conference room for a day because the cleaning staff was too lazy to toss it away and now there is a ring on the table, so please clean it. I don’t care if that is a run on sentence, but it’s the best way I can describe the lack of any burn.

Sizzlin’ Cayenne & Cheese hmm? The cheese part is right but these were terrible if you could not tell. I couldn’t taste the cayenne and eating them felt like a mouthful of Styrofoam peanuts. I don’t know if it needed more salt or more cheese. More heat for sure.

Compared to the Doritos, these Cheetos are the lazy brother who sits around all day smoking pot, perpetually borrows money to buy more vinyls, and at the end of the day has accomplished nothing but a big fart. I know I’m being harsh, but these just plain sucked. I would rather wear a stupid Affliction t-shirt than eat another.

Even though it cost me $1.29, I want my money back. I feel ripped off and now I know why Chester is dancing on the bag. I want to knock his stupid sunglasses off. The bag is pushing “0 grams of trans fat” instead of how these things are so hot it will melt your eyeballs into a soup that you can drink later. This should have been a clue.

I’m not sure what makes me angrier, the fact that they are so bland or that the heat is neutered. I want my $1.29 back assholes! And in pennies so I can put them in a sock and flail it into Chester’s face.

(Nutrition Facts – Doritos Fiery Fusion – 1 ounce/12 chips – 140 calories, 70 calories from fat, 8 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 160 milligrams of sodium, 16 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 0 grams of sugars, and 2 grams of protein. Cheetos Fiery Fusion – 1 ounce/21 bland pieces – 150 calories, 10 calories from fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 190 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of dietary fiber, less than 1 gram of sugar, and 2 grams of protein.)

Other Doritos Fiery Fusion and Cheetos Fiery Fusion review:
Food Junk
That Bootleg Guy
Hot Chicks Eatin’ Spicy Chips

Items: Doritos Fiery Fusion and Cheetos Fiery Fusion
Prices: $1.29 each (A bargain for the Doritos, an obscene rip off for the Cheetos.)
Size: 3 ounces (Doritos Fiery Fusion)
Size: 3.25 ounces (Cheetos Fiery Fusion)
Purchased at: 7-Eleven (where the bottled water is spicier than these friggin’ Cheetos)
Rating: 9 out of 10 (Doritos Fiery Fusion)
Rating: 3 out of 10 (Cheetos Fiery Fusion)
Pros: In a saturated market of spicy chips, Doritos Fiery Fusion stand out. The Doritos are hot and the flavor alone was delicious, I would eat it even if they weren’t spicy. The heat lingers on both snacks and stays in the back of your throat comfortably. The Cheetos are not as bad as getting scrotum cancer. The Cheetos are also not as bad as a robot led apocalypse.
Cons: The Doritos could be a tad hotter. Cheetos are devoid of taste or heat. Fist bumps and sake bombs. The Cheetos have an unpleasant feel in your mouth. Theme song to Unsolved Mysteries. Chester and his sunglasses annoy me. Cunnilingus on mulch.

Here are a few product reviews posted this week from other blogs we follow.

I’m no beer drinker. I’ll stick with adult beverages that have either umbrellas or straws in them. But this Newcastle Brown Ale Ice Cream sounds good. It definitely sounds much better than Old Milwaukee Light Ice Cream. (via Foodstuff Finds)

Frito-Lay combines cheesy and spicy for the billionth time. Okay, I’ll admit, billionth time is a complete exaggeration. It’s more like the millionth time. (via Food Junk)

Do kids in Japan giggle whenever they see the words “Crunky Ball Nude“? Because If I were to say those words to a typical sixth grader here in the US, I would make them giggle. Then they would tell their parents about what I said to them and soon after I would find myself being taken into police custody. (via Japanese Snack Reviews)

I can’t believe this is a favourite in Canada. It’s flavour doesn’t sound very good and it’s colour doesn’t look very good. But I kinda still want to eat it. (via Tasty Lies)

Wendy’s adds more cheese to a cheeseburger. I look forward to the day when they add more frost to their Frosty. (via We Rate Stuff)

Update: Click here for our Doritos Fiery Fusion and Cheetos Fiery Fusion review

Snack powerhouse, Frito-Lay, has come out with a new line of spicy snacks called Fiery Fusion. According to the Frito-Lay website, the Fiery Fusion line currently consists of Doritos Fiery Fusion and Cheetos Crunchy Fiery Fusion.

What is Fiery Fusion?

According to the packaging, it’s a combination of “Sizzlin’ Cayenne & Cheese.” But looking through the ingredients list, it’s much more than that. It also includes jalapeno pepper powder, paprika, and other spices.

The Fiery Fusion line continues Frito-Lay’s push into spicy crunchy snacks. Earlier this year, the company released a line of Tapatío hot sauce-flavored snacks.

The nutrition facts for a one-ounce serving of Cheetos Crunchy Fiery Fusion: 150 calories, 10 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 190 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, less than 1 gram of sugar, and 2 grams of protein.

A one-ounce serving of Doritos Fiery Fusion has 140 calories, 8 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 160 milligrams of sodium, 16 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 0 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein.

Update: Click here for our Doritos Fiery Fusion and Cheetos Fiery Fusion review

Source: Frito-Lay website

If all the snacks in the Frito-Lay family got together and played Never Have I Ever, I imagine they would quickly settle into the classic participant archetypes. Rold Gold would be the (pretzel-)stick-in-the-mud who hems and haws for ten minutes before saying something completely boring and inoffensive like, “Never have I ever been to Canada.” Funyuns would be the guy who the whole group would expect to tell wild and entertaining stories (after all, “fun” is his first name), but he’d only end up disappointing everyone. (Really, Funyuns, you’ve only had four flavors in 40 years?)

Cheetos would be that most annoying of Never Have I Ever players, the guy who claims to have done everything. He’s likely more of a liar than a slut, yet no one dares question him for fear of being portrayed as a prude. “Yeah, I was milk-chocolate flavored this one time at summer camp. Who doesn’t have an anthropomorphic mascot that could probably sell cigarettes to kids? You’ve never tried having an interpunct in your name? Bro, did you even go to high school?”

But eventually, it would get to Cheetos’ turn, and he would drop this bomb: “Never have I ever been honey-barbecue flavored.” All the other snacks would go nuts (Cracker Jack especially), but as they listed out all of his varieties, they would slowly come to realize that, somehow, with 100 varieties in 16 countries over the last 60 years, Cheetos has never had a honey-barbecue flavor… until now. Cheetos can put down another of his hypothetical (but sure to be cheese-dust-covered) fingers, as Frito-Lay recently introduced the Cheetos Puffs Honey BBQ.

These new Cheetos have a coating of honey barbecue powder in addition to the regular coating of cheese dust. The honey barbecue provided a definite sweetness that stopped well short of cloying, while the smokiness was understated but grew slightly more pronounced the more I ate. The amount of cheese dust had been noticeably scaled back in comparison with regular Cheetos, and the cheesiness, sweetness, and smokiness generally worked well together.

The flavors were well-proportioned, but I think they were all too mild to the point of being unmemorable. After I first opened the bag of Cheetos, I ate about one serving, put the bag away, and didn’t think about it again until I sat down to write this review. These Cheetos were pleasant-tasting but not at all addictive, which seems to run completely counter to the essence and appeal of Cheetos.

A love of Cheetos has become a principal feature of the compulsive gamer stereotype because we all intuitively recognize their addictiveness. A bag of Cheetos should make me feel helpless to my urges and thus compel me to purchase a couple cases of Mountain Dew and start playing online poker again. If I wanted some snacks that let me regulate my appetite so easily, I would have bought a bag of rice cakes or Baked Lays.

OK, obviously I just got weirdly over-the-top there, so let me take a step back: the Cheetos Puffs Honey BBQ were fine but nothing special. If you’re looking for a new snack that you can enjoy in moderation, go ahead and give these a try. Otherwise, you certainly shouldn’t feel embarrassed to leave your finger up if someone says, “Never have I ever tried those new honey barbecue Cheetos.” (Also, that person sucks at playing Never Have I Ever. I bet he’s never even been to Canada.)

(Nutrition Facts – 1 ounce – 150 calories, 90 calories from fat, 10 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 220 milligrams of sodium, 15 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 1 gram of sugar, and 1 gram of protein.)

Other Cheetos Puffs Honey BBQ reviews:
That Bootleg Guy
Stephen Loves Candy

Item: Cheetos Puffs Honey BBQ
Price: $2.99
Size: 9 ounces
Purchased at: Shaw’s
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Nice mild sweetness and smokiness. Flavors played well together. Cheetos finally has a honey and/or barbecue flavor. Writing about the “essence and appeal” of Cheetos. Going to Canada.
Cons: Flavors were all too mild. These Cheetos weren’t addictive. Pretzels are boring and inoffensive. Feeling compelled to play online poker again. Playing Never Have I Ever with that guy who claims to have done everything. Yes, I went to high school, FRANCES.

The new Honey BBQ Cheetos Puffs surprised me because it seemed like a weird flavor for Cheetos to produce. Every variety I can think of has been cheese-based or based on a food that has lots of cheese, like pizza.

Honey BBQ Cheetos still has cheese flavoring, but it’s not the main flavor. I guess Cheetos is running out of cheesy varieties, although Garfield and I have been waiting for lasagna-flavored Cheetos.

I learned about the new variety of Cheetos after read a review of them over at That Bootleg Guy. After doing a quick Google search, it appears Honey BBQ Cheetos has been available since May.

A one ounce serving has 150 calories, 90 calories from fat, 10 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 220 milligrams of sodium, 14 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 1 gram of sugar, and 1 gram of protein. It’s gluten-free and contains no MSG.

Source: That Bootleg Guy

Here are a few product review posted today from other blogs we follow.

I took a semester of Russian in college. Okay, part of a semester. Stopped going after my throat got sore from trying to pronounce words, the cute girl in the class dropped out and I learned drinking vodka was not part of the curriculum. All I can say in Russian is “Nice to meet you. My name is Marvo.” So I have no idea what’s printed on this Russian candy. (via Obsessive Sweets)

These Chinese Cheetos probably weren’t produced in the United States, which is too bad because sending them snacks that could make them fat would partially make up for the Chinese sending us toys with lead paint. (via Foodstuff Finds)

The ability Taco Bell has with making multiple menu items with seasoned ground beef is the same ability Subway has with sliced turkey. (via Brand Eating)

Freeze-dried blueberry cheesecake? Tang must be so proud. (via Probably Edible)

Rockstar’s latest energy drink has 250 milligram of caffeine in a 12 ounce can, which will provide some serious kick. But if you want a more serious kick, 250 milligrams of cocaine will do it, but will cost you about thirty dollars more. (via Energy Fiend)