The Impulsive Buy

SPOTTED ON SHELVES: Russell Stover Summer Dream Bars

Marvo / May 30, 2018 / Spotted on Shelves / 1 Comment

Russell Stover Summer Dream Pina Colada Bars

Russell Stover Summer Dream Banana Split Bars

Russell Stover Summer Dream Peanut Butter Fluff Bars

I’m dreaming of the chocolate melting all over my hands if I eat these this summer. (Spotted by Amanda Y at Kroger.)

If you’re out shopping and see an interesting new product on the shelf, snap a picture of it, and send us an email ([email protected]) with where you found it and “Spotted” in the subject line. Or reply to us (@theimpulsivebuy) on Twitter with the photo, where you spotted it, and the hashtag #spotted. If you’ve tried the product, share your thoughts about it in the comments.

Also, if you want to send in photos and are wondering if we’ve already covered something, don’t worry about it. Let us worry about it.

REVIEW: Sparkling Ice Mystery Fruit Flavor Sparkling Water

Leonard / May 30, 2018 / Reviews / 10 Comments

Flavor innovation is all the rage recently. From mystery Peeps and Oreo to the ever-popular public vote or creation like Lay’s and again Oreo.

Now enter Sparkling Ice’s new Mystery Fruit Flavor Sparkling Water. With so many of the recent mystery entries being food it’s nice to see a beverage brand decide to follow this trend.

This mystery sparkling water has a cloudy-white appearance as to not offer any hints to the correct flavor. A trick color would have been pretty fun, though, as it would play with your mind as you wonder about its true purpose.

Upon opening the bottle, you get an immediate whiff of just citrus. It definitely smells like it could be lemon-lime like (how lame would that be or absolutely genius depending on how you look at it) but it also does have a little something extra as if maybe another fruit is thrown in there. While executing the sniff test, I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.

Before drinking I decided to examine the bottle for any clues to see if the mystery gods dropped any breadcrumbs for us. Look at the back, for example, the question mark graphic contains line art of different fruits.

There’s a lemon or lime or orange, a strawberry, a blackberry or raspberry, some cherries and then one that looks to me like a tomato. Remember a tomato is a fruit, not a vegetable, so it totally counts! How clever!? However, I’m not holding my breath that’s the flavor.

The others are your most basic fruits. LAME. The ingredients list shows lemon juice and green tea extract but they are both trumped by natural flavors as an ingredient. So not much help there either.

Taking my first sip I’m completely underwhelmed. It tastes like, umm, fruit? Again there are the citrusy undertones but it’s hard to pinpoint what else it actually is. I was initially thinking something kiwi but Sparkling Ice already has a kiwi strawberry flavor so it can’t be a recycled one.

Then it hit me.

What’s exotic and different but also kinda kiwi-like? A dragonfruit! As I kept drinking that’s all I thought of, and once I started thinking about it, that’s all I could taste. So that’s my guess.

Overall, it’s a nice tasting zero sugar sparkling water, but I was expecting something more captivating. Just be warned it definitely tastes diet-y as in you can make out the artificial sweeteners from a mile away, but nothing worse than a diet cola.

When the flavor is revealed, I hope it is something more trendy or out there like avocado toast. Just please don’t be lemon-lime coupled with generic fruit, unless it’s an official Sprite or Mist Twist partnership because we all know brand mashups are pretty hot right now. It would be neat and almost make up for the boring flavor.

Almost.

(Nutrition Facts – 8 fl. oz. – 0 calories, 0 grams of fat, 0 grams of sodium, 0 grams of carbohydrates, 0 grams of sugar, and 0 grams of protein.)

Purchased Price: $1.00
Size: 17 fl. oz. bottle
Purchased at: Giant
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Liquid mystery item for once. No color trickery. Pretty good citrus fruity beverage.
Cons: Packaging and ingredients offer no help. Tomatoes and avocados are in fact fruits. TBD for when the flavor is revealed and it’s a huge let down.

SPOTTED ON SHELVES (FROZEN TREATS EDITION) – 5/30/2018

Marvo / May 30, 2018 / Spotted on Shelves / 10 Comments

Here are some interesting new or limited edition frozen treats found by your fellow readers. If you’ve tried any of the products, share your thoughts about them in the comments.

Trader Joe’s Gone Berry Crazy! Dark Chocolate Covered Strawberry Pieces

(Spotted by Debra G at Trader Joe’s.)

Coolhaus That Dough Though Ice Cream Sandwich

Coolhaus Farmer’s Market Strawberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

(Spotted by Rachel C at Bristol Market.)

Yasso Coconut Caramel Chocolate Chip Frozen Greek Yogurt Bars

(Spotted by John R at Hannaford.)

ALDI Sundae Shoppe Vanilla Bean Low Fat Ice Cream

ALDI Sundae Shoppe Mint Chip Low Fat Ice Cream

ALDI Sundae Shoppe Chocolate Low Fat Ice Cream

(Spotted by Rob E at ALDI.)

Hakuna Banana Banilla and Choco Choco Chip Non-Dairy Frozen Dessert

Hakuna Banana Cashew Cookie Dough and Banana Spice Non-Dairy Frozen Yogurt

Hakuna Banana Dipped Banilla Non-Dairy Frozen Dessert

(Spotted by Rachel C at Sprouts.)

Thank you to all the photo contributors! If you’re out shopping and see an interesting new product on the shelf, snap a picture of it, and send us an email ([email protected]) with where you found it and “Spotted” in the subject line. Or reply to us (@theimpulsivebuy) on Twitter with the photo, where you spotted it, and the hashtag #spotted. If you do so, you might see your picture in our next Spotted on Shelves post.

Also, if you want to send in photos and are wondering if we’ve already covered something, don’t worry about it. Let us worry about it.

QUICK REVIEW: Milky Way Fudge Minis

Rachel / May 29, 2018 / Reviews

What is it?

A Milky Way with the usual chocolate malt nougat swapped out for chocolate fudge nougat. That’s about it.

How is it?

These are delicious, much the same way a regular Milky Way is. The fudge nougat has a slightly more pronounced cocoa flavor and the texture is a hair denser, the effect of which is 10 percent more chocolateness – not a huge bump. If I was blindfolded and someone handed me these and said “Here’s a Milky Way,” I likely wouldn’t be able to tell it was different.

These made me ask “why?” in a way no other product variation has. It’s too similar to the original. When I bite into a Milky Way Caramel Apple or Midnight, I’m getting a materially different experience. I would give a plain Milky Way a 9, but I’m deducting a point for lack of originality here. They taste good, but a variant should stand apart from the original.

Is there anything else I need to know?

The package makes a bold promise on the stretchiness of the caramel.

I tried to recreate it, but only got this far:

Conclusion:

If you’re a Milky Way fan, just buy a Milky Way. The experience is so close, there’s kind of no point in these existing.

Purchased Price: $2.98
Size: 8.9 oz. bag
Purchased at: Walmart
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (4 pieces) 150 calories, 6 grams of fat, 4.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, less than 5 milligrams of cholesterol, 50 milligrams of sodium, 24 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 20 grams of sugar, 19 grams of added sugars, and 1 gram of protein.