Update: Click here to read our review

In 2010, Kellogg’s introduced Krave cereal in the UK and then bombarded its citizens with commercials like the one above. Our friend Jim at Chocolate Mission reviewed a couple of Krave cereal flavors a few weeks ago.

Oh wait, I’m sorry. According to the TIB Style Guide, because I’m referring to a UK product, I have to type, “reviewed a couple of Krave cereal flavours a few weeks ago.”

Ever since reading that review, I’ve been kraving Krave because I love a cereal that borders on the line of cereal and candy. Thankfully, I soon won’t be kraving Krave, instead I’ll be kramming Krave down my oral kavity because Krave is koming to Amerika.

The US version of Krave cereal will come in two varieties: Chocolate and Double Chocolate. The chocolate version consists of a crispy multi-grain cereal outside with a smooth chocolate inside, while the double chocolate version will have a chocolate flavored cereal on the outside with a smooth chocolate inside.

A serving of Krave Chocolate has 120 calories, 3.5 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 1.5 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 24 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of fiber, 11 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein. A 3/4 cup serving of Krave Double Chocolate has 120 calories, 3.5 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 1.5 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 23 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of fiber, 10 grams of sugar, and 2 grams of protein. Both varieties are fortified with vitamins and minerals.

Source: Kellogg’s website

Hola, mi amigos!  Como estas?  Esta es la Compra Impulsiva, y hoy–

Ah, dammit… sorry, I was looking at the wrong side of the box.  As it happens, the package of Frosted Flakes Chocolate I picked up has English on one side; but instead of a maze or outlandish claims about being healthy for you on the back, we’re treated to a mirror image of the front except the product name is now “Choco Zucaritas.”  (Es nuevo!)  Interestingly, the top and bottom of the box only use the Spanish name, and that’s what’s shown above the nutritional information on the side, so I guess it’s primarily targeted at Spanish speakers?  Either way, I applaud Kellogg’s for reaching out to the Latino community, despite it serving as another painful reminder that when choosing a second language in school, I picked French instead of one that might conceivably be useful to me someday.  That’s okay — I’ll be the one laughing when Canada finally invades, ya hosers.

But let’s get serious for a second: we’re talking about a product that on the surface sounds… well, fantastic.  Awe-inspiring.  God’s own breakfast cereal, one might reasonably speculate.  I’ve sampled plenty of cereals in my day, but I always find my way back to Frosted Flakes in the end, because it’s one of the best.  Which begs the question: can you improve upon the best?  True innovators always think so, and Kellogg’s has given it a shot by adding a chocolate coating to the classic sugared flakes.  You might consider that overkill — can your palate really handle frosting AND chocolate at the same time? — but it’s that kind of thinking that could have deprived the world of Peanut Butter Cups, so I’m prepared to give this a shot.

Opening the package immediately wafts a strong chocolate scent into your nostrils.  I wondered for half a second why it smelled so familiar before realizing it’s the identical aroma given off by Cocoa Krispies.  Promising, and a look at the flakes doesn’t change that assessment, though it is a little surprising.  I think I was expecting flakes that were entirely chocolate, but that’s not what these are.  Nor are they regular flakes with just a slight dusting of chocolate on them.  It’s a little hard to describe, but basically they look like Frosted Flakes that are in the process of converting to chocolate, like you caught them mid-transformation or something.  Remember in The Monster Squad when that cop shot Dracula, and they found him stuck halfway between human and bat forms?  It’s like that.  Also, don’t think about that scene before you eat these, it’s gross.

Unfortunately, if the smell and the appearance of Frosted Flakes Chocolate are like the first 1:18 of “The Final Countdown,” the taste is the remaining three minutes and fifty-two seconds, where even Europe fans pack up their stuff and head for the exits.  I don’t know what it is, but for some reason the two flavors of frosting and chocolate don’t mesh well together.  It’s just too much, and I’m a guy who never shies away from the most cavity-inducing option.  For the first second or two they taste fine, but then it’s almost like a time delay kicks in and both the sugar and chocolate flavors burst onto the scene at once.  And like every pair of cops ever depicted on TV or in the movies, they don’t play well together.

It highlights the danger of going in with such high expectations, I guess, because it’s not like Frosted Flakes Chocolate are terrible.  They’re chocolatey, they’re sugary, they stay crunchy for the same length of time as the regular variety.  We’re all familiar with gimmick cereals and I guess I hoped these would be different, because chocolate + frosting = win, right?  But it’s like listening to two talented rappers battling, only instead of taking turns they’re both going at the same time, so everything sounds like, “Yo, your girlfriend your momma came over last really knows how to WORK that pole my rhymes are dope, you got no hope to cope, you’re a joke and my ASS, bitch.”  Then they both drop their microphones at once and you go deaf.

Or, as Antonio el Tigre would say: No son gr-r-randes!

(Nutrition Facts — 1 cup — 110 calories, 10 calories from fat, 1 gram of total fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 135 milligrams of sodium, 45 milligrams of potassium, 26 grams of total carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 12 grams of sugars, 13 grams of other carbohydrates, and 1 gram of protein.)

Other Kellogg’s Choco Zucaritas reviews:
Grub Grade

Item: Kellogg’s Choco Zucaritas… I mean, Frosted Flakes Chocolate
Price: $2.93
Size: 18 ounces
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: Learning Spanish while I eat breakfast.  Smells just like Cocoa Krispies.  The Monster Squad.  Satisfying your curiosity.  Peanut butter cups.  The first 1:18 of “The Final Countdown.”  Both individual tastes are good.
Cons: Chocolate and frosting tastes do not mesh well.  That much hype is a lot to live up to, and it doesn’t.  Choosing French in school.  Simultaneous rap battles.  My rhymes.  No son grandes.

Update: Click here to read our Frosted Sugar Cookie Pop-Tarts review

Over the past few years, Kellogg’s has been producing their Limited Edition Printed Fun Gingerbread Pop-Tarts for the holiday season. These Pop-Tarts have images of what appears to be spray tan addicted folks skiing and snowboarding.

This holiday season, Kellogg’s is not only re-releasing Gingerbread Pop-Tarts, it’s also introducing the Limited Edition Printed Fun Frosted Sugar Cookie Pop-Tarts. According to the Kellogg’s website the limited edition Pop-Tart is, “Topped with white icing and fun, wintery pictures of decorated cookies, these pastries have delicious sugar cookie dough baked inside a sugar cookie crust.”

The “wintery pictures” on the Frosted Sugar Cookie Pop-Tarts don’t consist of spray tanned skiers or snowboarders. Instead, they have slightly less creepy images like a polar bear ice skating and a penguin wearing earmuffs and a scarf.

A Kellogg’s Printed Fun Frosted Sugar Cookie Pop-Tarts have 200 calories, 50 calories from fat, 5 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 2 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 200 milligrams of sodium, 35 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 14 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein, and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.

Source: Kellogg’s website

Yes, another Pop-Tarts review, but this time it’s in video form.

This is our 24th Pop-Tarts review and it’s also TIB’s 1,000th review overall.

WOO HOO!

I’d like to thank TIB’s past and present writers, who have helped this quasi-product review blog achieve this milestone. But we wouldn’t have reached this milestone if it weren’t for all of you who read our words (and watch our occasional videos). Because, seriously, if no one read this blog, I would’ve allowed it to join the millions of dead blogs floating around on the internet.

So sit back, relax, and enjoy TIB’s 1,000th review.

Notes:

I believe Gwyneth Paltrow was the first big celebrity to bring it to the attention of the mass public. Gluten free is supposedly the new rage diet of those settled in the film industry. But I ask you, what do they know? These people are the same dum-dums that gave us The Human Centipede and still allow Owen Wilson and Diane Keaton to collect a paycheck. Ask anyone with celiac and I bet you they would prefer to go back to a normal diet instead of that no wheat crap. So if you’re gluten free by choice, I have to say you are a tool with a glutton for punishment. Is it hip to say you choose to have herpes? Neither is it cool to say “I’m choosing to be gluten free” moron.

Eating and being afflicted with celiac is akin to that one bad relationship we all get ourselves into. You know where the sex is good but you have to put up with the needling snipes, the roll of the eyes, and the hours of arguing only to be followed by steeping oneself in cheap gin and tonics. As an aside, I will tell you that I was lucky because my comic book collection shielded me from many intimacies. You could say I was a connoisseur of scrambled porn. In fact, I watched so much of it in college that Picasso’s figures appear normal to me. (I lurve you channel 68!)

Celiac is the awful curse of being allergic to anything with wheat and my wife has it (Yes, I still have my comic books but she needed a green card). Seeing her bowled over in pain when she accidentally eats something with wheat is awful. Yet even with the stomach pangs and crippling discomfort that she suffers, my wife still misses eating a real slice of pizza or twisting her fork in a bowl of noodles. As a lark, I sometimes secretly toss flour in my wife’s food when she and I have a disagreement. Score one for the passive aggressive psychopathic behavior.

Amongst the quinoa pastas and breads made with tapioca flour, I have the misfortune of trying many things that are gluten free. A lot of them taste terrible or weird and some are passible. Now I have to admit, most gluten free versions suck but I have to believe when Marie Antoinette said let them eat some damn cake, she meant people who have celiac too.

So like most couples do on a mundane Sunday morning, we were shopping at our local supermarket hoping to beat the crowds and old people who leave their carts in the middle of the aisle looking for foot ointment.

Perusing the cereals, my wife let out a scream I haven’t heard since she got her said green card for our sham marriage. She stumbled on a box of the fabled Kellogg’s Rice Krispies Gluten Free. Leery of the cereal, I had to try it for myself. I was suspicious as Snap, Crackle and Pop had a fake smile on the box, but most elves do, right?

Upon opening the package, I noticed the corner was stamped “Whole Grain Brown Rice” in a cartoony font. Now all my friends know my extreme loathing for brown rice so this gave me a slight dramatic pause. We went ahead and tossed it in our cart and scurried home to try it.

I reached in the box and grabbed a handful of kernels to examine. They looked like the real stuff, felt like the real stuff but I was unsure if they would taste like the real stuff. Munching on a few, the familiar toasted rice flavor was immediate. The cereal was not too sweet like the normal version. So yes, despite using brown rice, they taste just like the ordinary Rice Krispies. I ate a bit more just to make sure because I couldn’t believe it was made from brown rice and they were gluten free.

I poured some in a bowl with milk, still not convinced they would still taste the same. I usually use skim milk but I selected the 2% in anticipation that it would taste bland. Like alchemy, the cereal let out that nostalgic popping once the milk touched the rice. Spoonful upon spoonful, it was hard to believe but these things tasted exactly like Rice Krispies. The cereal held up in the milk too, retaining that crispness.

These are a summer release and hopefully will be a part of Kellogg’s regular offerings. I am sure that if someone switched the cereals on me like those old Folgers coffee commercials, I would not be able to tell the difference. This was a winner in my opinion and for a gluten free option to taste like the real thing…well it’s rarer than me getting lucky in college.

I was excited because the back of the box has a recipe for Rice Krispies Treats. There is a shortage of really good tasting sweets that are wheat free so I’m sure this will be a godsend to my wife and others who have celiac. I plan on making a batch of these since we bought so many boxes.

This cereal is an example that gluten free is not synonymous with repulsive. I hope other manufacturers can take a page from Kellogg’s and give people suffering from celiac a delicious option. You truly do not appreciate great tasting gluten free choices until you’ve eaten a pretzel devoid of wheat or downed a sorghum beer. I think I would rather eat exactly what those girls did in The Human Centipede, which is probably gluten free too when you think about it.

(Nutrition facts – 1 cup is 120 calories, with ½ cup of skim milk, 160 calories, 1 gram of fat – none being saturated, trans, polyunsaturated or monounsaturated fats, 0mg of cholesterol, 190 mg of sodium, 90mg of potassium, 27 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, less than 1 gram of sugars, 25 grams of other carbohydrates, 3 grams of protein and NO WHEAT)

Item: Kellogg’s Rice Krispies Gluten Free
Price: $2.99
Size: 12 ounces free of wheat
Purchased at: Publix
Rating: 9 out of 10 (if you like Rice Krispies)
Pros: You cannot tell they are gluten free. They still snap, crackle, and pop. Being able to tell if those are boobies or legs.
Cons: May be hard to find right now. Sham marriages. Choosing to be gluten free. Celiac sucks too.

I don’t bake, hang out at bakeries, or lollygag in the aisle at my local supermarket that consists of sugar, spice, and everything needed to make baked goods, so I didn’t know about the confetti cake.

If I lingered in the baking aisle like I linger in the magazine section at Waldenbooks Borders Barnes & Noble, I would’ve eventually noticed Duncan Hines makes a Confetti Cake Mix. But instead I had to learn about the confetti cake’s existence via Kellogg’s Limited Edition Frosted Confetti Cake Pop-Tarts.

I also probably would’ve learned about confetti cake earlier if one of the baker’s dozen or so of cake reality shows out there made one. Seriously, I’ve watched Ace of Cakes, Amazing Wedding Cakes, Cake Boss, Ultimate Cake Off, Fabulous Cakes, Cupcake Wars, DC Cupcakes, The Cupcake Girls, Last Cake Standing, Staten Island Cakes, and Have Cake, Will Travel, and not once did any of them bake this colorful dessert.

With its white frosting with colorful sprinkles on top, Limited Edition Confetti Cake Pop-Tarts look they contracted clown herpes, which I believe one can get by either being sprayed with water from a water squirter that looks like a flower or while stuffed in a small car with many other clowns. While the exterior looks like clown herpes, the multicolored cake-flavored filling looks like the pus that would ooze out of clown herpes sores.

Geez, I totally made these Pop-Tarts sound completely unappetizing, which, by the way, they are not.

The Limited Edition Confetti Cake Pop-Tarts are surprisingly tasty and they do taste like cake, albeit a slightly artificial cake. The crust does have a buttery flavor to it, but because that butteriness seems to linger in my mouth for a while it’s a little off-putting.

Okay, those last two sentences probably didn’t help make these Pop-Tarts sound appetizing, but, overall, I really like them and I think they’re yummy enough that I would put them somewhere at the bottom of my list of Top 10 Favorite Pop-Tarts Flavors of All-Time.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 pastry – 190 calories, 35 calories from fat, 3.5 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams trans fat*, 1.5 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 0.5 grams of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 230 milligrams of sodium, 36 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 15 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein, and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)

*made with partially hydrogenated oil

Item: Limited Edition Frosted Confetti Cake Pop-Tarts
Price: $2.79
Size: 8 count
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Tasty. Tastes like cake. Buttery crust. Tastes great toasted or not toasted.
Cons: Looks like they have clown herpes. Limited edition. Confetti sprinkles come off easily. The number of cake reality show. The number of brick and mortar booksellers.