REVIEW: Nature Valley Granola Thins (Dark Chocolate and Peanut Butter)

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The square-shaped Granola Thins by Nature Valley makes the company look like it has become bored with producing long rectangle granola bars.

Good.

Because I’m bored with eating long rectangle granola bars.

As a matter of fact, screw eating quadrilaterals! How about an enneadecagon granola snack? Or if Nature Valley has the nuts, and the ability to channel the spirit of M.C. Escher, a dodecahedron or apeirogon granola snack.

But I guess until then, I’m stuck with quadrilaterals.

The Nature Valley Granola Thins come in two flavors; they are either partially dipped in peanut butter or dark chocolate, which I’m not 100 percent sure is actual dark chocolate because of the words “naturally flavored” printed on the front of the box.

The folks at Nature Valley describe the snack as, “The uniquely delicate crunch of crispy, toasted granola paired with an irresistible, melt-in-your-mouth taste.”

Unfortunately, I haven’t experienced that “melt-in-your-mouth taste” very often because I live on a tropical rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean and the first couple of individually wrapped Granola Thins I opened encountered a phenomenon I like to call “melt-in-its-own-packaging-because-the-temperature-rarely-drops-below-80-degrees.” It causes most of the dark chocolate and peanut butter to stick to the cardboard that’s included in each wrapper.

To overcome this, I suggest sticking a Granola Thins in the refrigerator for a few minutes before opening.

Can’t wait a few minutes? Oh, I think you can, because while the Granola Thins are good, they’re not irresistible like the marketing copy on the box claims. How do I know? Both boxes have been sitting on my desk for the past two weeks. If they’re “irresistible,” why have I consumed only two of the ten 2.5-inch Granola Thins from each box?

But, again, I did enjoy both flavors. The peanut butter one reminds me of a Nutter Butter in flavor and in the fact that the peanut butter doesn’t taste like any peanut butter I’ve ever had. As for the dark chocolate version, the crispy granola is a bit more noticeable than the chocolate. Strangely, the combination of granola with the chocolate makes it taste like a graham cracker. Maybe the fact that the chocolate is “naturally flavored” might have something to do with the light flavor.

As good as they are, the Nature Valley Granola Thins aren’t as satisfying as their long rectangle granola brethren. It would take three or four of these to equal the hunger-crushing power of Nature Valley’s regular granola bars, which come with two per wrapper. Also, I wish the peanut butter and chocolate were baked into the crispy squares, like Nature Valley does with their regular granola bars, so that they wouldn’t be so messy to eat on this rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 pouch/17 grams – Dark Chocolate – 80 calories, 4 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 75 milligrams of sodium, 11 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of dietary fiber, 6 grams of sugar, 1 gram of protein and 2% iron. Peanut Butter – 90 calories, 4.5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 85 milligrams of sodium, 10 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 6 grams of sugar, 1 gram of protein and 2% iron.)

Item: Nature Valley Granola Thins (Dark Chocolate and Peanut Butter)
Price: $3.49
Size: 10 pack
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Dark Chocolate)
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Peanut Butter)
Pros: Enjoyable. Crispy. Peanut butter one tastes like a Nutter Butter. Dark chocolate one tastes like a graham cracker. Looking at M.C. Escher pieces. Looking at M.C. Escher pieces while on an illegal substance.
Cons: Seems pricey for what you get. “Naturally flavored” dark chocolate has a weak flavor. Not irresistible to me. Messy if you’re eating it on a rock in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. No enneadecagon granola snacks.

REVIEW: Pepsi Strong Shot

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When I first received the Pepsi Strong Shot from Japan, I instantly noticed the five warnings printed all over it. But because my ability to read Japanese is so poor that my college Japanese professors should deeply bow their heads in shame for passing my Japanese illiterate ass, I didn’t know what they were warning me about.

Perhaps the can contains an evil tengu. Or a tentacled demon that wants to stick its tentacles in every single one of my orifices to torture me. Or maybe it’s a Pokemon. Or perhaps it’s telling me I watch too much anime at Crunchyroll.

After doing some research on the internets, I learned the warnings on the Pepsi Strong Shot tell potential drinkers that it’s HIGHLY CARBONATED and we should wait 15 seconds before opening it.

Really? Honto ni?

Does extra carbonation really warrant the five warnings printed on the can that’s four and a half inches tall? Because, seriously, the best case scenario from opening the can would be thirst quenching. The worst case scenario? A little more burping.

However, if the can’s warnings said it contained a tentacled demon, I believe the multiple warnings would be justified. Because the worst case scenario from opening the can would be a tentacle entering every hole in my body at the same time. The best case scenario? A tentacle entering every hole in my body at the same time, but leaving a three dollar tip after it’s done.

The Pepsi Strong Shot not only contains extra carbonation, it also includes extra caffeine. However, I’m not sure how much caffeine, since, again, I’m quite illiterate when it comes to Japanese. But I did get a small energy boost from it. Although, I have to admit, tentacles slithering into every hole in my head would do a better job of waking me up.

Even with a small energy boost, the Pepsi Strong Shot isn’t worth it, whether you pay 120 yen for a can in Japan or five dollars a can plus shipping via eBay from an expat living in Japan. It tastes just like regular Pepsi and the extra carbonation is probably the worst Japan Pepsi gimmick ever. I expected something spectacular from the company that developed cucumber and baobab flavored sodas.

The only thing the extra carbonation did was provide a little more pressure than usual when opening the can. If I want a Pepsi that provides a little more pressure when opening it, I’ll just get a regular can of Pepsi and shake it a bit. Even after it explodes, it’ll still probably have more soda left than what’s in the Pepsi Strong Shot’s small can.

(Nutrition Facts – 100 ml – 47 kcal, 0 grams of protein, 0 grams of fat, 10 milligrams of sodium, 11.7 grams of carbohydrates.)

(NOTE: Thanks to Orchid64 from Japanese Snack Reviews for sending me the Pepsi Strong Shot.)

Item: Pepsi Strong Shot
Price: 120 yen (about $1.35 US)
Size: 190 ml
Purchased at: A store in Japan
Rating: 4 out of 10
Pros: Tastes like regular Pepsi. Caffeine gave me a small energy boost. 0 grams of fat. Tentacled demons leaving a tip. Crunchyroll.
Cons: Nothing spectacular from the company that made cucumber and baobab flavored sodas. Extra carbonation is the worst Pepsi Japan gimmick ever. Excessive amount of unnecessary warnings. A demon’s tentacle entering every hole in my body at the same time. Available only in Japan. Being Japanese illiterate despite 2.5 years of college Japanese.

REVIEW: P.F. Chang’s Home Menu Shanghai Style Beef

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I don’t dine regularly at P.F. Chang’s because the horse statues in front of their restaurants freak me out. I swear they’re watching me with their blank stone eyes. I’m also afraid, while during the 30-45 minute wait time to be seated, the statues will start glowing, come to life and then chase after me like I’m in an episode of Scooby-Doo.

But I don’t have to face possible horse spirits anymore because I can now enjoy P.F. Chang’s at home with only my personal demons, thanks to their Home Menu line of frozen meals. There are eight varieties: Beef with Broccoli, Orange Chicken, Sweet & Sour Chicken, Ginger Chicken & Broccoli, Shrimp in a Garlic Sauce, General Chang’s Chicken, Shrimp Lo Mein and Shanghai Style Beef.

However, with the Shrimp Lo Mein and Shanghai Style Beef, you won’t be experiencing the frozen versions what you would get at a P.F. Chang’s restaurant since they don’t appear on the menu. The Shanghai Style Beef contains slices of beef with a sweet and savory sauce, onions, string beans and red bell peppers. Unfortunately, unlike the Wanchai Ferry frozen meals, the P.F. Chang’s Home Menu Shanghai Style Beef doesn’t include a starch, like rice or noodles.

To prepare the meal that foolishly doesn’t include rice, you have the option of either preparing it on the stove top or in the way that would’ve made Percy Spencer elated. Since he’s dead and I don’t expect what’s left of his body to start glowing, come back to life and chase after me, I decided to shun Percy Spencer’s invention and kick it stove top style, which involved dumping the contents of the bag into a skillet and letting everything cook for several minutes.

When prepared, the P.F. Chang’s Home Menu Shanghai Style Beef is a very pretty dish. The string beans are a healthy green, like alluring green eyes; the bell peppers are a nice bright red, like luscious red lips; and the beef comes in an edible shade of brown, like perfectly tanned skin. It’s so pretty that if it were a woman in a nightclub, I’d go up to her and say, “You have a beautiful face. I hope it’s the first thing I see when I wake up tomorrow morning.” After that line, I’d expect her to pour her Cosmopolitan on top of my head, laugh at me and yell “jerk” as she storms away.

While it looks pretty on the outside, making out…I mean, eating it out…I mean, consuming it helped me discover that it might be better to look at than eat. The sauce is supposed to be sweet and savory, and it is. But it’s also too mild for my tastes. As for the beef, the slices are a nice size, but I was disappointed I couldn’t really taste the flavor of the beef.

The only things the P.F. Chang’s Home Menu Shanghai Style Beef really has going for itself are the serving sizes, which I thought were ample for two people, and the fact I don’t have to make eye contact with eerie stone horses to eat P.F. Chang’s food.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/2 package (312 g) – 320 calories, 12 grams of fat, 2.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 1010 milligrams of sodium, 38 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of fiber, 23 grams of sugar, 17 grams of protein, 10% vitamin A, 10% calcium, 20% vitamin C and 30% iron.)

Item: P.F. Chang’s Home Menu Shanghai Style Beef
Price: $7.00
Size: 22 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: Quick to prepare on the stove. Looks really good. Good sized portions for two people. Allows me to eat P.F. Chang’s food without having to make eye contact with scary stone horses. Knowing who the inventor of the microwave oven is. Scooby Doo.
Cons: Sauce is too mild for my tastes. Lacks rice or noodles, which other Asian frozen meal competitors have. Can’t really taste the flavor of the beef. Awesome source of sodium. Waiting for a table at P.F. Chang’s. The horse statues outside of a P.F. Chang’s restaurant.

REVIEW: Quaker Life Soft Baked Nutrition Bars For Adults (Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan & Banana Walnut Bread)

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Oh, I wish I knew where Mikey was now. I want to know so that I can find out what he thinks of the Quaker Life Soft Baked Nutrition Bars For Adults.

He’d be the perfect person to ask because he likes Life Cereal and he’s now an adult. But he’s probably too busy with real life, which may include a wife, and maybe a young Mikey Jr. or a daughter he wanted to name Mikey, but the wife shot him down. He probably works in insurance sales or is a financial planner and drives an 2001 white Toyota Camry nearing 100,000 miles with the vanity license plate ILIKEIT.

For many years, the license plate was probably one of the few reminders of his past celebrity, because the VHS tape recordings of his commercials were eaten up by a VCR with heads that were never cleaned. Fortunately, YouTube was invented and someone posted his Life Cereal commercials online. He is probably responsible for half of the 450,000+ views of his most popular commercial on YouTube.

Mikey probably doesn’t eat Life Cereal anymore because he’s become lactose intolerant and it’s hard to eat the cereal without milk. If he has a wife, he loves her, but feels she only married him because he was “the guy from the Life commercials.” He feels this way because she introduces him to people as, “My husband, the boy from the Life commercials.” He thinks his wife is cheating on him, because she bought a lot of lingerie from Victoria’s Secret that he’s never seen her wear. But he also has a mistress, who has no idea Mikey has a place in pop culture, because she was born many years after the commercials stopped airing.

Although doing those Life Cereal commercials brought him some fame, when he looks at where his life has gone, he probably sometimes wishes his parents never forced him into auditioning for those commercials. If he didn’t, he probably wouldn’t be Mikey, he would be just Mike, or perhaps Michael.

If Mikey were here and tried the Quaker Life Soft Baked Nutrition Bars For Adults, I think he would like them, even though there’s nothing that resembles Life Cereal in them. The chewy adult bars come in two varieties: Banana Walnut Bread and Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan.

The Banana Walnut Bread flavor actually smells like banana bread. The banana flavor is noticeable, and thankfully isn’t artificial tasting. However, it tastes more like banana chips, which have a slight greasy flavor to them. The chopped walnuts yield little flavor and they seem like they’re mostly there to provide vitamins, minerals and to compliment the crunch of the whole grain oats and rice crisps in the bar.

The Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan bars have a sweet cinnamon aroma. The cinnamon and frosting drizzle on top overpower the rest of the ingredients, which might make this bar too sweet for some. Even the chopped raisins got lost in the sweetness. Perhaps using whole raisins might’ve helped. As for the pecans, they play the same role the walnuts do in the other flavor, provide some nutritional value and add some crunch, but not deliver much flavor.

The folks at Quaker suggest warming up their Life Soft Baked Nutrition Bars For Adults by sticking them in the microwave for 10 seconds, which seems to soften them. Does warming them up make them better? No. Is warming them up worth the 10 second wait? No. If you were immortal, would you wait the 10 seconds? Maybe. It would depend on how hungry I am.

Overall, the Quaker Life Soft Baked Nutrition Bars For Adults are decent tasting, a good source of B vitamins and provides 5 grams of fiber per bar. But I’m not sure why they’re under the Life Cereal brand, since they’re not made with Life Cereal, and why they’re labeled “For Adults.” Because unlike other things I’ve bought that were “For Adults,” I didn’t have to pull out my driver’s license to prove my age when I bought them.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 bar – Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan – 150 calories, 4 grams of fat, 0.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 140 milligrams of sodium, 25 grams of carbohydrates, 5 grams of fiber, 11 grams of sugar, and 6 grams of protein. Banana Walnut Bread – 150 calories, 4 grams of fat, 0.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 10 milligrams of cholesterol, 140 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 5 grams of fiber, 10 grams of sugar and 6 grams of protein.)

Item: Quaker Life Soft Baked Nutrition Bars For Adults (Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan & Banana Walnut Bread)
Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Size: 5 bars
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 7 out of 10 (Banana Walnut Bread)
Rating: 6 out of 10 (Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan)
Pros: Both flavors were good. Banana Walnut Bread smells like banana bread. Banana isn’t artificial tasting. Contains 5 grams of fiber. Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan bar have a sweet pleasant cinnamon scent. Good source of B vitamins. Full of other nutrients. Didn’t have to pull out my driver’s license to buy these adult bars.
Cons: No Life Cereal in them. Don’t know what Mikey thinks of them. Nuts don’t provide much flavor. Raisins got lost in the sweetness of the Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan bars. Cinnamon Roll Raisin Pecan bar might be too sweet for some. The sad world I imagine Mikey lives in.

REVIEW: Kellogg’s Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola

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Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola

The Kellogg’s Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola was inevitable, which is unfortunate. If you break it down, you’ve got two food innovations (I use the term semi-sarcastically) that came together in a perfect storm of potential horror.

On the one hand, you’ve got the gourmet pizza movement, which cropped up a few decades ago. Based entirely on shit someone told me with no empirical evidence, Wolfgang Puck made the first gourmet pizza, so you can blame him for shit like cream cheese smoked salmon pizza and foie gras pizza and god knows what else. I also blame, again, with very little evidence, California Pizza Kitchen for bringing gourmet pizza to the masses, with creations like cheeseburger pizza and Pear & Gorgonzola pizza. Don’t get me wrong, I love me some gourmet pizza and non-traditional toppings. One of the little local pizza joints in my town has a $10 large unlimited topping offer that I abuse on a regular basis to create my own monstrosities. White pizza with a butter parmesan crust with double green olives, feta, onion, tomatoes and artichoke hearts, anyone? I wouldn’t be surprised if they take that deal off the table because I’m single-handedly putting them out of business.

The other part of this equation is the recent explosion of breakfast frozen food products. I don’t know when this started – maybe it’s been around for quite a while and I just never noticed – but I seem to remember a time when, if you wanted a breakfast frozen food, you grabbed yourself a box of Eggo waffles and shut the fuck up about it. Now you’ve got crazy options, from sausage Mcmuffins to bowls with all your shit thrown together to…whatever in God’s name this is.

My point, quite obviously by now, is that Eggo took these two concepts, herded them into a small pen, watched them do the nasty, and what came out a couple minutes later (food gestates quickly) was the Eggo Real Fruit Pizza. They wiped off the amniotic maple syrup and disgusting globs of strawberry jam and said, “I think we’ve got something here.” Kind of like how my friends think their newborn babies are cute, and I think they look like horrible aliens.

I hadn’t noticed this before, but there’s a strange purple sauce-like substance underneath the toppings. Ugh, is that supposed to be yogurt? I am not looking forward to having hot yogurt in my mouth. I’m also not comfortable with that sentence.

The instructions are simple: unwrap the pizza, flip the box over that it was resting in, set it on the silver circle on the back of the container, and throw it in the microwave for a minute to 1 1/2 minutes. I split the difference, and stuck it in there for 1 1/4 minutes. It was still a little cold in the middle, so I stuck it in for the extra 15, but my microwave is also a piece of shit, so bare that in mind. Waiting a minute and a half for a quick breakfast when you’re on the go is a little impressive. It takes me longer to smear cream cheese on a bagel. I have some pretty strict rules about cream cheese.

Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola

It actually smells pretty good coming out of the microwave. It smells like a bowl of oatmeal that has berries and granola in it – warm and inviting, something you’d want to eat on a cold, snowy day. Unfortunately it’s 106 and humid right now where I live, but I’ll close my eyes and use my imagination.

There’s obviously blueberries going on, scattered about the top of the pizza, shriveled up as they tend to do when cooked. They’re distributed nicely, but I would have liked to have seen a few more of them.

I don’t see any other recognizable berries, but there’s some red glop haphazardly strewn over the top. I took some off and tasted it by itself, and it tastes like they took some raspberries and turned them into a puree. It’s definitely real raspberries; it’s got that delicious tartness of the berry and I even got some seeds stuck in my teeth, which is the one thing that annoys me about raspberries. But I welcome them here, since they offer proof of real berry, unless Eggo spent millions of dollars attempting to create a facsimile of raspberry seeds to fool consumers. Probably a lot easier just to throw some berries in a blender and hold true to their claims of “real fruit.”

The dreaded yogurt sauce was nothing to fear after all. It’s very thin, and when I tasted it on its own, it had the faint flavor of mixed berry yogurt, but it was very mild and inoffensive. The granola is spread generously on one side of the pizza, but tapers out until there’s barely any on the other side.

I was truly surprised to see that the crust wasn’t actually a waffle. If I’d look more closely at the box, I might have figured it out, but my mind associates “Eggo” with “waffles” so decisively that I just assumed that would be the case. Instead, the dough of this “pizza” seems to be made out of wheat. It looks like a thin crust pizza crust, except darker. Unfortunately, it’s tasteless, soggy and way too chewy. I’m not even really sure what to call it. Wheat…pizza crust…thing. Except it tastes more like a bland PowerBar than a pizza crust.

There seem to be two fundamental problems with the Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola: sogginess and poor topping distribution. The crust and the granola were both way too soggy. Perhaps it would have turned out better if I’d cooked it in the oven, but if you’re eating fruit pizza for breakfast, you either don’t have time to wait for the oven to preheat, you’re a college student who doesn’t even own an oven or you’re young enough that you’re not allowed to use the oven.

As far as the toppings go, the mysterious purple sauce was thin to the point where in some places, you could see bare patches of crust. The raspberry puree, which I think is the best part of this item, is strewn halfheartedly across the pizza, globbed up in some places and simply nonexistent in others. The granola is piled high on one half the pizza, but peters out into scattered flakes.

I have to say, I expected this whole “fruit pizza” thing to be a horror show. Instead, it just left me disappointed. If done correctly, it would have been quite tasty. A less chewy, less soggy, more flavorful crust, coated thickly with the delicious raspberry puree, a generous layer of crispy granola, and piled high with blueberries, would have actually been something that I’d consider spending 1 1/2 minutes nuking in the morning for a quick breakfast. Unfortunately, that’s not what the Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola really is, so I think I’ll just stick with real pizza for breakfast. That box of double green olives, feta, and everything else pizza that’s been sitting out on the counter all night looks pretty good right now.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 individual-size pizza (5.3 ounces) — 390 calories, 110 calories from fat, 13 grams of total fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 3 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 2.5 grams of monounsaturated fat, 15 milligrams of cholesterol, 390 milligrams of sodium, , 62 grams of total carbohydrates, 4 grams of dietary fiber, 17 grams of sugars, 10 grams of protein, 0% vitamin A, 6% calcium, 0% vitamin C and 8% iron.)

Item: Kellogg’s Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola
Price: $1.67 (on sale; normally $3.29)
Size: 1 individual-size pizza (5.3 ounces)
Purchased at: Albertson’s
Rating: 4 out of 10
Pros: Raspberry puree was delicious. Taking advantage of unlimited topping deals. Quick and easy to make. Purple sauce was not scary.
Cons: Soggy, tasteless crust and soggy granola. “Hot yogurt in my mouth” making me uneasy. Uneven and sloppily applied toppings. Just the idea of fruit pizza making me shudder. 46 percent of total fat was saturated fat on what appears on the surface to be a healthy food item.

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