McDonald’s McSkillet Burrito

Marvo 29 Comments

The fast food apocalypse shall soon be upon thee! Flee now to high ground and thou lives may be spared from obesity and being pillaged and robble, robble, robbled by the evil Hamburgler.

I am not a witch, nor a soothsayer, but in the back cover of my hardbound printing of “Fast Food Nation,” there is a message written in what I first thought was blood, but later found out was ketchup, that said, “When the four burritos of the rising sun meet, the fast food apocalypse shall drown the Earth.”

With the introduction of the McDonald’s McSkillet Burrito, I fear the worst is one step closer to being a reality. Hardee’s unleashed their 920-calorie Country Breakfast Burrito earlier this year. Jack in the Box recently brought into this world their Sirloin Steak & Egg Burrito. If Burger King, brings forth a breakfast burrito, I can only presume the fast food apocalypse will follow.

What would a fast food apocalypse be like?

I imagine kings and clowns will battle for supremacy; big, dumb, purple Grimaces will fall from the sky; Jack in the Box antenna balls will come to life and mess with your radio reception or tell you how shitty of a driver you are; Jared Fogle will weigh 425 pounds again; and zombie Colonel Sanders will roam the Earth, eating human flesh and proclaiming that it tastes like chicken. It may seem like a big bad dream that could only be caused by licking a toad or Amy Winehouse’s skin, but if one more breakfast burrito hits the market, the world is doomed…DOOMED I TELL YOU!!!

The possibly world-ending McDonald’s McSkillet Burrito contains cheddar cheese, jack cheese, American cheese, skillet potatoes, chunks of sausage, bell peppers, onions, scrambled eggs, and salsa all wrapped up in a soft tortilla. All of those ingredients equal a decently hefty burrito that could be a part of a complete non-nutritious breakfast. The salsa pretty much dominates the flavor of the burrito, which of course makes it quite spicy and makes me like it a lot. On a scale of one to ten, with one being pussy mild and ten being the burning sensation caused by unprotected sex with Paris Hilton, I would rate its spiciness a six.

I was hoping that the potatoes were crunchy like their hash browns, but unfortunately they weren’t and didn’t really add anything to the burrito. Another problem I had with the McDonald’s McSkillet Burrito was the fact that there weren’t enough “Mc’s” in its name. I think the McDonald’s McSkillet McBurrito has a nice McRing to it. Finally, as hefty as it was, I wish it were huge like a Chipotle burrito (Warning: slightly annoying flash animation, if you click the link), but then again if it was, the fat and sodium content would probably kill me before the fast food apocalypse could.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 burrito – 610 calories, 36 grams of fat, 14 grams of saturated fat, 0.5 grams of trans fat, 410 milligrams of cholesterol, 1390 milligrams of sodium, 44 grams of carbs, 3 grams of dietary fiber, 4 grams of sugar, 27 grams of protein, 20% Vitamin A, 10% Vitamin C, 20% calcium, 25% iron, and -5 minutes of life.)

(Editor’s Note: Thanks to TIB reader Molly for letting me know about the McSkillet Burrito, but if the fast food apocalypse comes, I won’t be glad she did.)

Item: McDonald’s McSkillet Burrito
Price: $3.29 ($2.49 in other places)
Purchased at: McDonald’s
Rating: 4 out of 5
Pros: Good and spicy. Heftier than I thought it would be. Nice variety of ingredients. Kings and clowns killing each other.
Cons: Could be a little bit bigger. Not enough “Mc’s” in its name. Trans fat. Potatoes might’ve been better if crunchy. If you’re not into spice, this might not be nice. Fast food apocalypse. Being robble, robble, robbled.

REVIEW: Trader Joe’s Lobster Ravioli

Ace 13 Comments

As we delve deeper into the ball-numbing coldness of winter, I have noticed that my pants fit a bit tighter and my shirts are suddenly more revealing in the nipple region. This is a terrible, terrible development for pretty much every single person on the planet. I can only assume that this is a direct result of my diet and lack of exercise. Like a hibernating bear, I have decided to forgo almost all physical activity and sleep as if my life cycle depended on it. I can’t even be bothered to walk to the liquor store when it’s less than 60 degrees outside.

Because of all of these things, I have recently decided to try to eat healthier by going to places such as Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s. I used to figure that anything organic from these places would be healthy until I checked the nutritional facts on falafels and cream sauces. As it turns out, even the most ethically grown and sold produce can turn me into a fatass. While this is discouraging, it also forces me to put more thought into what I buy.

I scanned the impeccably clean aisles at Trader Joe’s and weaved through the hipsters and nice gay couples, finally stumbling upon the pasta section. I tried my hardest to ignore the plethora of cheeses that seemed to taunt me and instead focused on the intriguing Lobster Ravioli box. I figured that I couldn’t beat $2.99 for lobster, so I gave it a shot. Even if I could find a deal that beat $2.99, I would not dare eat it out of fear that it would be horrifically contaminated.

After riding my new wave of moral supremacy and self-satisfaction home, I took a closer look at the ingredients. What I saw was promising − lobster was the first ingredient in the filling, followed by ricotta cheese. This nearly knocked me to the floor, because almost everything else I eat is made out of high fructose corn syrup and corn oil. I had almost forgotten what food tasted like.

I followed directions and boiled the ravioli until they floated. After boiling, I found that they were still a bit gummy and dense. Plus, as you can see from the picture, I was saddened, but not surprised, at the lack of lobster chunks. You get plenty of lobster flavor, but none of that firm lobster flesh that my friend so unappetizingly referred to as “muscley.”

Luckily, I am a resourceful and clever man who always keeps a frying pan under his pillow. I sautéed it with some imitation butter and garlic and it made the pasta tender and tasty. I then tried it with Trader Joe’s organic pesto and had myself a fine little lunch. As I took the last bite of my methodically rationed portioned, I felt as though I was indeed a superior person who would soon be able to fit into his clothes once again. That would be well worth the $2.99 I paid for the box. Until then, the world will have to be comfortable with my nakedness.

(Nutritional Facts – 1 cup – 260 calories, 4 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 35 mg of cholesterol, 170 mg sodium, 42 grams of carbs, 2 grams of dietary fiber, 2 grams of sugar, 12 grams of protein, 4% Vitamin A, 2% Vitamin C, 8% Calcium, and 10% Iron)

Item: Trader Joe’s Lobster Ravioli
Price: $2.99
Purchased at: Trader Joe’s
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Made with real food like lobster and ricotta cheese. The feeling of superiority I feel when I shop organically. Great price for a lobster product.
Cons: No chunks of lobster to be found inside the ravioli. Ravioli has to be sautéed in order to taste good. Any part of me being more exposed than it has to be. The laziness I feel whenever winter rolls around. My arrogance when I feel superior because I shop organically.

Pomegranate 7UP

Marvo 33 Comments

Since when has pomegranate ever been festive?

When I think of Christmas, I don’t think about pomegranate, but according to the snowflake covered packaging of the limited-time-only Pomegranate 7UP, it might be the second coming of mistletoe. I can think of many things more festive than pomegranate. People waking up at 3:00 a.m. on Black Friday to wait in line at 4:00 a.m. for a slim chance to get a $399 laptop or $10 DVD player, but when they get there, there’s already fifty people in line wanting the same stuff is more Christmassy than pomegranate.

I don’t know of anyone who adds the pomegranate berry to trees, wreaths, or holiday centerpieces. I can’t think of anyone who uses its juice to either permanently stain all their clothes to holiday readiness or to paint a Santa suit on their skin. There also isn’t anyone who thinks pomegranate makes Rudolph’s nose red or adds color to Santa’s cheeks. So how can pomegranate suddenly be holiday-ish?

When I found out about the Pomegranate 7UP, I didn’t think to myself, “Move over, egg nog, I’m going to get fat off of another beverage this season.” But wait, now that I think about it, how would I get fat off of pomegranate? After all, it’s healthy and full of antioxidants.

Thankfully, the wonderful folks at 7UP have solved this dilemma for me, because according to the ingredients list on its packaging, the Pomegranate 7UP has no pomegranate in it and enough sugar to replace the fat content of egg nog, which will help me if I want to become a shopping mall Santa without the need for a fat suit. I know it says “100% Natural Flavors” on the label, but when there’s no juice in its ingredients to give this soda its flavor, you’ve got to wonder whether it’s as natural as Demi Moore’s face.

There definitely is a pomegranate flavor to it, although it’s kind of light. Its overall flavor is good and not sickly sweet, despite the 31 grams of sugar per cup. However, unless you love the taste of pomegranate, I don’t see any real reason to purchase this variation of 7UP. The whole point of putting pomegranate into something is for its health benefits, but when there’s no pomegranate to be found, it’s like a golddigger sleeping with MC Hammer in 1996 and then finding out that he’s bankrupt.

Oh, how I miss Pepsi Holiday Spice.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 cup – 120 calories, 0 grams of fat, 35 milligrams of sodium, 32 grams of carbs, 31 grams of sugar, 0 grams of protein, 0 grams of caffeine, and 0 grams actual pomegranateness)

Item: Pomegranate 7UP
Price: $1.49 (2-liters)
Purchased at: 7-Eleven
Rating: 3 out of 5
Pros: Tastes good. Not sickly sweet. Pepsi Holiday Spice. Getting a $399 laptop on Black Friday.
Cons: Seems like there’s no actual pomegranate. HFCS. No sweet, sweet caffeine. 31 grams of sugar per cup. Golddiggers. Not getting a $399 laptop on Black Friday.

REVIEW: Otis Spunkmeyer Strawberry Shortcake Muffins

Ace 11 Comments

Otis Spunkmeyer Strawberry Shortcake Muffins

Dear Mr. Otis Spunkmeyer,

I have to tell you that I’m a very big fan. Even though you left the porn industry in the late 80’s, I have continued to follow your work as you awkwardly transitioned from eating muffins to baking them. I assumed that you would have changed your stage name after the career change, but apparently it has not affected your success.

Anyways, I’m writing in to complain about your mini muffins. Don’t get me wrong, they are quite delicious, but they have damn near ruined my life. I like that they are individually wrapped, but this makes it far too easy for me to reach into the box and indulge. Oh, it’s easy for me to say “It’s just one” until I’m in a sugar coma and I slowly choke to death as the wrappers obscure my breathing path. Your chocolate and blueberry ones in particular will almost certainly be the cause of my demise.

Another complaint I have is that the crumbs tend to fall all over the place as I am eating your muffins. You could argue that I shouldn’t be devouring them as I am going 80 on the freeway, but I would tell you that I am a very busy man who has places to be. Alright, maybe I don’t, but it’s still a pain in the ass to try and vacuum your car every time you want a snack. If I were ever to have a hot date, this would be almost as embarrassing as my Spongebob Squarepants floormats.

Finally, the grotesque sight of me licking the paper muffin wrapper and folding it up so I can squeeze the chocolatey innards out with my teeth is something that I don’t need to see. Since the left side of my room is a closet mirror, this is extremely difficult to avoid. The last thing I need to witness is my sorry ass gnawing on what amounts to about a tenth of a cent worth of muffin. I have enough issues as it is. My professors have begun to suspect that I’m stealing their coffee mugs, all of my nights out end up with me walking home naked as a gang of high school kids laugh at me, and the writer’s strike is threatening production of The Office. Nobody knows this, but that’s where 95% of my jokes come from. If my friends were to ever find out that I am an amalgamation of several characters from a sitcom, they would surely leave me to die in a gutter.

As you can see, my complaints thus far have less to do with your product and more to do with my addiction to it. This is why I was very excited to try your new strawberry shortcake muffins. Sadly, they are a bit of a disappointment. If they were anything like your award-winning film Strawberry Shortcake Muffins Volume 6, then they would have been a lot tastier and more sexually arousing. I guess it’s like comparing apples and oranges, though.

I’m going a little off topic; the fruit I’m really here to talk about it strawberry. Your new strawberry muffins look amazing on the box. There are stripes of fruit and pieces of cake on top of the muffin. After realizing that it is basically cake on top of cake, I couldn’t wait to dig in and binge eat the entire box. However, the strawberry “stripes” turned out to be nothing more than drizzles of strawberry-flavored syrup. It’s something fun to introduce to the bedroom, but not something that’s really appetizing. Plus, cake on top of cake is tastier in theory than in practice. Overall, it was an acceptable yet underwhelming strawberry muffin. Have you no shame, Otis Spunkmeyer?

However, you can make it up to me. Attached to this letter is a box of Fleshlights, which I intend to sell at inflated prices on eBay. It would be great if you could autograph and return them, preferably unused.

Sincerely,

Ace

(Nutritional Facts – 1 muffin – 220 calories, 10 grams of fat, 2.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 35 mg of cholesterol, 180mg sodium, 31 grams of carbs, 0 grams of dietary fiber, 18 grams of sugar, 3 grams of protein.)

Item: Otis Spunkmeyer Strawberry Shortcake Muffins
Price: $3.14
Purchased at: Wal-Mart
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Moist muffins. Individually sealed and wrapped for your pleasure. The idea of cake sprinkled on top of cake. Making money off of autographed Fleshlights. Strawberry Shortcake Muffins Volume 6.
Cons: Extremely sweet and artificial tasting. Not made with real fruit. Potential of mini muffin addiction killing me or ruining my potential hot date. The writer’s strike threatening my social life.

REVIEW: Snapple Juice Drinks

Marvo 24 Comments

Fuck! Shit! Goji!

I ♥ profanity — probably a little too fuc…I mean, kiwin’ much. It’s so bad that I think I make dirty sailors blush. I can’t help it because using certain four-letter words seem like the only way I can express what I’m truly feeling. When the cops are about to knock down my door, the words, “Oh, snarf” just doesn’t seem right. Or if I’m ever in the heat of passion, the words, “Oooh, baby. You like the way I fudge you?” are probably the least erotic words I could say in bed.

But as I get older, I realize that I need to cut back on my swearing for the sake of my future children and because I’m slowly replacing every noun I know with the word “shit.”

“Did you see that shit?” or “Can you get a shit of shit from the shit?”

So I’ve tried to quit swearing in numerous ways. The first shit…I mean, goji I tried was using a swear jar, putting a certain amount of money in a jar every time I used profanity and donating that money to a worth cause. That didn’t work very well, but some UNICEF kid got really lucky this past Halloween with his orange box. If the commercials on television are correct, I think I gave him enough shi…I mean, goji to feed a third-world village for a year.

Then I figured if I’m doing it for the children, I should surrounded myself with young children and hang out at Chuck E. Cheese. You would think being around easily impressionable young minds might make me want to hold my tongue, but being around hyperactive, annoying children, who do nothing but cry and complain, had the opposite effect on me. Now those children are not only hyperactive and annoying, they also have a few more words in their vocabulary that I’m sure their parents don’t appreciate and I’ve been banned from Chuck E. Cheese.

So now I’m trying to substitute all my swear words with names of exotic fruits and so far it’s kind of working. Why names of exotic fruits? Because they sound like profanity in foreign languages. Guess which of the following words are names of exotic fruits and which are foreign swear words: salak, gunggong, skila, goji, merde, pajuo, matisia, vlaka, rambai, kuso, rambutan, goumari, noni, salaud, luntao, santol, hako, tassepe, kiwi, culone, jaboticaba, putanginamo.

I fuck up…I mean, I kiwi up once in awhile, but slowly and surely I’m becoming less dependent on profanity. How did I come up with this idea? I have to thank the new Snapple Juice Drinks I’ve been drinking, which come in four flavors, but I only tried the Noni Berry, Kiwi Pear, and Goji Punch. The juice drink label is a little misleading since according to the bottles they each contain between 5-10 percent juice.

Each flavor in the new Snapple Juice Drink line has a health benefit. The low-calorie noni and kiwi flavors help with metabolism, while the not-so-low-calorie goji one aids with immunity. So boys and girls, if you want to kill someone, drink some Snapple Goji Punch before you do it.

Oh wait, the other kiwin’ fighting germs-type of immunity.

The 40 grams of sugar in the Goji Punch might not help with either definition of immunity, since sugar is known to weaken the white blood cells in your body. As for helping with metabolism, it might seem a little more realistic since according to the bottle, studies show that consumption of 300 milligrams of EGCG antioxidants per day with caffeine helps boost metabolism and each bottle contains 30 milligrams of sweet, sweet caffeine and 55 milligrams of EGCG.

As for taste, the Noni Berry flavor tasted like the strawberry-kiwi Vitamin Water; the Kiwi Pear flavor had a strong pear scent, but had an equal balance of pear and kiwi flavor; and the Goji Punch tasted like berry, berry watered down berry vodka. The first two were good despite a very slight artificial sweetener aftertaste, while the goji one was really fuckin’ shitty…I mean, kiwin’ shitty…I mean, fuckin’ gojity…I mean, kiwin’ gojity.

Oh, fuck it.

(Nutrition Facts – Noni Berry & Kiwi Pear – Serving Size: 1 bottle – 20 calories, 0 grams of fat, 70 milligrams of sodium, 2 to 4 grams of carbs, 2 gram of sugar, 0 grams of protein, 30 milligrams of caffeine, 55 milligrams of EGCG, and 50 grams of non-sexy exoticness.)

(Nutrition Facts – Goji Punch – Serving Size: 1 bottle – 180 calories, 0 grams of fat, 60 milligrams of sodium, 40 grams of carbs, 40 grams of sugar, 0 grams of protein, 20% Vitamin A, 20% Vitamin E, and 25 grams of non-sexy exoticness.)

Item: Snapple Juice Drinks
Price: $1.19 each (17.5 ounces)
Purchased at: 7-Eleven
Rating: 3 out of 5
Pros: Despite being low calorie and containing artificial sweeteners, the Noni Berry and Kiwi Pear tasted pretty good. Sweet, sweet caffeine and antioxidants in the noni and kiwi flavors. Using exotic fruit names to help cut back on swearing. Helped a third-world village this Halloween.
Cons: Not much juice in these juice drinks. Goji Punch has a lot of sugar. My inability to hold back my swearing. Being banned from Chuck E. Cheese. You like the way I fudge you?