Author: Joe

QUICK REVIEW: Baskin-Robbins Cannoli Be With You Ice Cream

Joe

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I live life by a few simple principles gleaned from Hollywood.

For example:

  • Don’t eat vegetables after midnight… or before midnight… pretty much just don’t eat vegetables.
  • Always wear your anti-sea rhinoceros undergarments.
  • Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line.

Baskin-Robbins wants to add another rule involving Sicily to the list with its February Flavor of the Month, Cannoli Be With You Ice Cream. With mascarpone ice cream, cannoli shell pieces, chocolate chips and pistachios, having this cannoli on hand sounds like a great addition.

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The mascarpone cheese base might be the best and creamiest ice cream I’ve sampled at Baskin-Robbins. With a light touch of sweetness, it is rich, buttery and smooth; the perfect backdrop for the accompanying flavors. Things improve with the milk chocolate chips that are neither too sweet, nor too bitter but just right — no anti-sea bear circle required.

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If this were simply a mascarpone ice cream with chocolate chips, it would earn high marks for its simple but delicious execution. Dismayingly, both the cannoli shell and the pistachio pieces took the wrong lesson about hiding from a nuke in a fridge. The cannoli pieces’ texture is that of soggy corn flakes with about as impactful a flavor. The pistachios are rare, though large and overpowering, and hold no roasted notes I can detect. Crushed pistachios would create more consistency and balance bringing it closer to the genuine article.

With a fantastic first impression made by the mascarpone and chocolate chips, I’m disappointed in this flavor given its potential. A cannoli is a balance of distinct flavors that create a cohesive treat which is not the case here.

New rule for Baskin-Robbins: Never go in against a Sicilian when a cannoli is on the line.

Purchased Price: $2.39
Size: Small scoop (2.5 oz.)
Rating: 6 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (Small Scoop) 180 calories, 11 grams of fat, 7 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams trans fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 55 milligrams of sodium, 17 grams of carbohydrates, 12 grams of sugar, 1 gram of dietary fiber and 3 grams of protein.

QUICK REVIEW: Dairy Queen Dipped Strawberry with Ghirardelli Blizzard

Joe 1 Comment

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Strawberries and chocolate are as synonymous with Valentine’s Day as the Patriots are to the Super Bowl. Siding with the 99 percent of the country that does not associate romance with Tom Terrific emblazoned bed sheets, Dairy Queen is taking inspiration from the chocolate-covered fruit for February’s Blizzard of The Month -— Dipped Strawberry with Ghirardelli Blizzard.

An apparent upgrade of the bygone Choco Chunk Strawberry Blizzard, this treat features strawberry topping blended with vanilla soft serve and Ghirardelli chocolate chunks along with a sexier title.  

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With a creamy pink pelagic canvas bestrewn with dark chocolate isles and ruby red strawberry reefs, it certainly looks like a dessert from Cupid’s freezer. The vanilla base combined with the strawberry syrup create a flavor closer to the fruit’s Fragaria roots than that of artificial chemical.

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As for the advertised Ghirardelli pieces, they come in both dark and white chocolate and are immediately recognizable as the genuine article. The occasional strawberry chunk and bitter chocolate pairing is as good as a Brady to Gronk Iso slant, but unlike their NFL counterparts, the connection is infrequent.

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The chocolate pieces are smaller and more numerous which leads to many bites of bitter chocolate that overwhelm the strawberry topping alone. The white chocolate chips on the other hand deserve their own Lombardi, but they are too sparse for my liking. I found only three or four of them in my bowl, but the hint of buttery flavor meshed exceptionally well with the other elements.

Overall, the topping and fruit pieces create a delightful base and the Ghirardelli chocolate pieces are the real deal if a little darker than I would have liked. Quasi-retuning flavor or not, I’m glad DQ opted to give us the holiday-inspired Dipped Strawberries and Ghirardelli Chocolate over something more novel like “Brady’s Deflated Brownie Bash.”

Purchased Price: $2.99
Size: Mini
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (Mini) 350 calories, 15 grams of fat, 10 grams of saturated fat, 0 gram of trans fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 115 milligrams of sodium, 48 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 40 grams of sugar, and 8 grams of protein.

Click here to read our other DQ Blizzard reviews

QUICK REVIEW: Dairy Queen Triple Truffle Blizzard

Joe 5 Comments

Dairy Queen Triple Truffle Blizzard

Dairy Queen subscribes to the same belief as me that the only thing better than chocolate candy is even more chocolate candy. In that vein, January’s Blizzard of the Month is the returning Triple Truffle Blizzard which consists of vanilla soft serve blended with chocolate topping mixed with fudge, caramel, and peanut butter truffles.

Caught up in the excitement of this announcement, I celebrated by channeling Chunk with my best Truffle Shuffle. Having never seen The Goonies apparently, my wife was less amused and more poised to call an ambulance, clearly unimpressed and rather disturbed by my spasmatic gyrations.

After consulting with my divorce attorney (what monster has never seen The Goonies?!) I chose to sample each of the candy pieces individually before going in for the ménage à truffle.

As a card-carrying peanut butter-holic, the salty, gritty quality of the peanut butter candy is particularly satisfying and well balanced in its chocolate shell. The caramel truffle is no Sloth though as it provides a sweet, syrupy texture that finishes with a deeper but faint coffee note. The fudge truffle is less potent but lingers more than the other Goonies with a pleasantly fudgy aftertaste.

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When multiple pieces converge on one’s spoon, the Triple Truffle becomes, dare I say it, three times as good. The peanut butter and caramel complement each other particularly well while the fudge pieces lend a needed cohesive backdrop. Unfortunately, the chocolate topping they advertise as being included is so faint and has less depth than One-Eyed Willy’s vision.

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In the end, the bites with healthy truffle representation are excellent but infrequent, leaving many a naked spoonful of the somnolent base. While a decent romp through the Goon Docks, this adventure doesn’t lead to a long-lost trove of pirate rich stuff.

Purchased Price: $2.99
Size: Mini
Rating: 7 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (Mini) 380 calories, 15 grams of fat, 10 grams of saturated fat, 0 gram of trans fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 140 milligrams of sodium, 54 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of dietary fiber 46 grams of sugar, and 8 grams of protein.

QUICK REVIEW: Baskin-Robbins Bobsled Brownie Ice Cream

Joe 2 Comments

Baskin Robbins Bobsled Brownie Ice Cream

When the snowmen in my yard light impromptu bonfires to fight the frigid cold, ice cream is the last thing on my mind. Still, the sight of Baskin-Robbins returning Bobsled Brownie made me race over for a frozen treat. January’s Flavor of the Month boasts blonde brownie pieces and a fudge crackle ribbon mixed with milk-chocolate-mousse and butter-caramel-flavored ice creams.

The dessert itself is an imposing sight with a large crag of the fudge crackle ribbon jutting out of the ice cream mountain base. The chocolate and caramel ice cream slopes are swirled together preventing one from isolating a single track. Fortunately, the two combine to provide a smooth, creamy consistency with a flavor that vacillates depending on the ratio in any given spoonful.

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Depressingly, the brownie pieces that always excite me when advertised are neither large nor frequent enough to add more than a spongy textural contrast. They don’t detract from the dessert, but I would not have noticed their absence. An unexpected rider for me is the attenuated but still chewy chunks of caramel that are as commonplace as the brownie bits. The flavor works well, but I do not appreciate having to chew parts of my ice cream.

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The fudge crackle ribbon, on the other hand, is bold and pervasive but also firm and difficult to break apart. Small pieces occasionally cleave off from the core and find themselves in the mix, but a pickaxe the pink plastic spoon is not. This does, however, result in unavoidably fudgy, dark spoonfuls of the crackle ribbon that my chocoholic self adores.

Despite flirting with the lip of a caramel curve, Bobsled Brownie is an enjoyable treat. While some of the elements seem as out of place as a Jamaican bobsled team, everything works well enough together to be a cool running.

Purchased Price: $2.79
Size: Large scoop (4 oz.)
Rating: 7 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (Large scoop) 310 calories, 19 grams of fat, 9 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams trans fat, 45 milligrams of cholesterol, 130 milligrams of sodium, 31 grams of carbohydrates, 24 grams of sugar, 2 grams of dietary fiber and 5 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Lindt Lindor Limited Edition Gingerbread Milk Chocolate Truffles

Joe 4 Comments

Lindt Lindor Limited Edition Gingerbread Milk Chocolate Truffles

I know there are Santa-hatted zombies who advocate for the head first consumption of anthropomorphic treats. But as gingerbread-based lifeforms are known to bolt at the first sign of milk, I prioritize immobilization.

With no central nervous system, a headless treat may leave your cookie craving unfulfilled. For inexperienced or squeamish cookie eaters, Lindt is offering up Lindor Limited Edition Gingerbread Truffles. Sourced from the finest cuts of cookie anatomy, the classic Lindor milk chocolate shell is infused with gingerbread cookie pieces encapsulating a gingerbread truffle filling.

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The cookie bits add a pleasant grit to the standard and delicious chocolate shell, but all of the limited edition flavor comes by way of the creamy truffle center. As gingerbread cookies are far from creamy in their natural state, liquefying them must be a disturbing transmogrification that only those haunted by the memories of gingerbread houses gone awry can stomach.

The trauma of these tortured souls is evidenced by their Bond-villain like maniacal laughter as licorice bound gingerbread people are slowly lowered into magmatic vats of palm kernel oil.

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Unfortunately, the disturbingly produced core is much sweeter than any gingerbread cookie I’ve eaten and comes across with almost floral notes. These Mr. Big inspired chocolatiers must take particular umbrage with the housewives of the ginger-burbs where saccharin-based Botox is all the rage. A little less literal sweet revenge and a bit more bitter molasses may have produced a better balance and left a few more cookie families intact for the holidays.

While I possess the confectionary architectural aptitude of a blind Fraggle, I hold no ill will towards gingerkind. Even so, Lindor Gingerbread Truffles are worth trying for the novelty, but I will embrace my role as the apex predator of cookie munching interspersed with bites of a standard truffle when the mood for both strikes.

Purchased Price: $5.94
Size: 8.5 oz. bag
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 6 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (3 Balls) 220 calories, 17 grams of fat, 12 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams trans fat, 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 35 milligrams of sodium, 16 grams of carbohydrates, 14 grams of sugar, 1 gram of dietary fiber, and 2 grams of protein.