Tastycake Peanut Butter Kandy Kakes

Brand: Tastykake
Style: Peanut Butter Kandy Kakes
Origin: United States
Type: Snack Cakes
Flavor: Bland angel food cake with a sugary chocolate kick in the behind and a peanut buttery finish
Verdict: Approved!

"Any food with a purposefully misspelled name has to be good," I said to my coworker in the breakroom the other day when presented with an infamous east coast goody by the name of Tastykake.  I had the Peanut Butter Kandy Kake variety, and I'll have to say, all of those excessive K's were definitely brought out in the taste of this sugar-laden treat.  As I type this review, I still have the aftertaste of chemical-laden peanut butter in the back of my throat and my leg won't stop shaking from the sugar rush.  Good stuff!

When I first took a look at the package, I was imaging something similar to a Tagalong (of Girl Scout cookie fame).  However, the taste turned out to be completely different than what I expected.  The cake is a nearly tasteless, fluffy, dry angel food cake, not a white or yellow cake like a Hostess treat.  The chocolate is good, strong and sweet, and the thin layer of peanut butter adds a delicious extra dimension to the flavor. 

Now I'm definitely curious to try some other varieties of Tastykake brand sweets, so I'll definitely be getting some on my next trip east.  I'm not usually into sweets as much as I am salty snacks, but if I saw these in the store and needed a quick junk-food sugar rush, I'd grab one of these.

Purchased somewhere in New Jersey

Lay's India's Magic Masala Chips

Brand: Frito Lay
Style: India's Magic Masala
Origin: India
Type: Potato chips
Flavor: Indian sweet and spicy with a kick
Verdict: Approved!





Ah, how I love friends from faraway places.  Well, Pittsburgh isn't really all that exotic, but my friend there has a source for zany snacks and just sent me a huge box of them for the holidays!  Merry Christmas and Happy Channukah to me!

The first selection I tried from the box was one that came most highly reccommended from my friend: Lay's India's Magic Maslala chips.  They taste somewhat like I imagined they would - like Indian food, but they've got a real kick that I wasn't expecting!  The flavor is more complex than a lot of American styles.  First of all, the potato taste is good, strong, and definitely a better quality than American Lay's.  It's emphasized with a thicker, ridged cut, similar to Ruffles.

The spice on it taste very Indian, and I don't have a cultured enough pallette on Indian food to draw comparisons more than that, unfortunately.  I eat it often, but I just get whatever the special is at my local lunch cart and don't really pay attention to what any of it is called.  I can taste a sweet undertone at first (likely from the 'artificial raisin flavoruring substances' toted on the back of the bag), then the spicy and the salty flavors come in.  It has a slow burn, dying down after the initial shock, then sitting at the back of your tongue for a few minutes.  My nose is even running a little after having a handful of these.

The bag says that they'll make my heart go, 'DHAK DHAK!', but I wouldn't necessarily go that far.  They do make my tongue happy, however, and I'd definitely get these again if I saw them at a market here in town.  Approved!

Purchased in Pittsburgh, PA

Cheetos Giant White Cheddar Jingle Balls

Brand: Frito Lay
Style: Cheetos Giant White Cheddar Jingle Balls
Origin: USA
Type: Cheese Puffs
Flavor: A mild, more bland version of a regular toxic neon-orange cheddar Cheeto
Verdict: Approved, if only for the name


Seasons eatings, my snacktacular friends!  In the spirit of the season, I picked up these guys in an impulse buy, unable to resist eating something called "Jingle Balls."  Yes, I'm perpetually 12 on the inside, it's true.  The sad fact of the matter is, I was actually at the store to purchase one specific item only, yet the magical magnetic forces of the snack aisle reined me in, whispering sweet nothings to me across the store until I decided to peruse the aisle, you know, 'just to look.'  Next thing I know, I've got these things in hand, plus some plain tortilla chips and salsa to warm myself up on these cold winter nights.  My life.


But all of that is neither here nor there, and you're not here to read about my grocery store adventures, you just want to know the results of my snackapades.  Well, first things first, these Jingle Balls look like giant marshmallows, which threw me off initially.  I have this thing  about food that looks one way and tastes another (Pringles being my only exception), so I was a little worried about taking the plunge.  Nevertheless, I swallowed my fears, opened wide, and shoved one in my mouth, as one has to do with these awkwardly-shaped cheese puffs.  I was hoping for something fantastic and amazing to happen in my mouth, but I was rather let down.  Usually I'm a fan of white cheddar flavored things, such as the many varieties of white cheddar popcorn, but this was just bland and uninteresting.  


Honestly, I think Cheetos didn't really think this one through very well.  The thing is, white cheddar is more mild than your run of the mill sharp orange cheddar, so white cheddar flavored snacks need to be either saturated with cheese powder or on a very compelling vehicle to really achieve a good flavor.  These unfortunately, aren't quite cheesy enough for my tastes.  The initial bite is okay, like a mild regular Cheeto, but as you chew, the cheese powder dissolves quickly and you're left with nothing but a film of grease and the taste of mediocre corn puff on your tongue due to the large size of these puffs.


Would I buy these again?  Maybe, because I do like the satisfying feeling of the giant puff melting in my mouth, even if it doesn't taste quite as I'd like it to.  I'd likely purchase the regular flavor though, or the red hot kind, just to get more flavor with that feeling.  Approved, but just barely.


Purchased at Fred Meyer, Portland, OR

Pringles: Restaurant Cravers Cheeseburger

Brand: Pringles
Style: Restaurant Cravers Cheeseburger
Origin: USA
Type: Potato Chips
Flavor: Like a mild BBQ chip, only vaguely cheeseburger-like
Verdict: On the fence.




I can has cheeseburger, but I can also has cheeseburger Pringles! However, I'm pretty sure I'd rather have the real thing (vegetarian, of course). The Restaurant Cravers line of Pringles is one of my favorite new snack lines, but the cheeseburger flavor is definitely my least favorite of the bunch. It's not that they're bad, per se, they're just lacking. With all of the other Cravers flavors, upon the moment of the flavor powder touching my taste buds, I was in snack heaven. These? Not so much.

To start off, the flavor is weak. It tastes like a very mild barbecue chip, instead of an intense flavor like other Pringles. It takes a moment of getting the palate adjusted before you can actually make out some of the individual flavors, such as the grilled meat, the ketchup, and the onions, as opposed to the 7-layer dip flavor where you can instantaneously taste all seven layers.

All in all, I wouldn't buy these, but I'd eat them if they were around. On the fence.

Bonus: Chinese Plum Candy of Doom!

I'm much like a goat, as I've mentioned before, and I'll pretty much eat anything (see Chinese Cherry Abortion Candy). I did not finish this candy. God knows I tried, I tried so hard, but I couldn't do it.

The candy itself isn't so bad, it's just a sugary hard candy. The bad part is the salted plum in the middle. As soon I tasted that, I literally started gagging, and let me tell you, I don't have much of a gag reflex (when it comes to food, get your mind out of the gutter!). The only foods I can think of that trigger my stomach to go in reverse are cottage cheese, Jones Brussels Sprouts soda, and now this. Fail. So, so hard.

Ho-ho-hiatus!

Hey Snackies!

Well feed me garlic and call me Stinky, people actually read this thing!  I had no idea.  Life got a little full of crazy and a little depleted of snacks last summer and kept on keeping on for awhile.  However, I miss writing this blog, so I'm going to do my best to get back into the snack-eating swing of things.

Also, I believe my snackmaster@ieatsnacks.com email address is working again, so feel free to say hi!

-Snackmaster

Alexia: Crunchy Snacks Onion Strips, Savory Seasoned

Brand: Alexia
Style: Savory Seasoned Onion Strips
Origin: USA
Type: Onion Snacks
Flavor: Very similar to a Bloomin' Onion, but without the stupid name.
Verdict: Approved!





Do you like that delicious, heart-stopping appetizer known as a Bloomin' Onion? I know I do, but I also know that I hate steakhouses, and that's where those are usually served. Lucky for me, Alexia came out with this new product line with the amazing, to-the-point name, Crunchy Snacks. They have several different varieties, but today, I chose the Savory Seasoned Onion Strips. Let me tell you, I made the right choice.

They taste just like a crunchy, take-home version of the real deal. They're like onion petals, and they actual onions inside! (Spanish ones at that. I'm not sure why that's special, but the bag assures me it is.) They're seasoned well - a little spicy, a little peppery, a little salty - just enough to toe the line of overwhelming without crossing it.

Now that I've had these, I'm anxious to try the rest of the line! They had jalapeno onion strips, then several flavors of waffle fries (!!!), including ranch, spicy BBQ, and cheddar. If any of you devoted readers out there in Snackland try these out, let me know how they are, please!

Bonus: Chinese Cherry Abortion Candy

I feel nauseous right now. If you'd like to know why, try one of these strange cherry Chinese candies. It looks like a Tearjerker; one of those gumballs with the sour coating on the outside that we used to eat by the pailful as kids, but it's not. It's so, so not.

The outside is actually a medium-sized layer (slightly thinner than a hollow gumball) of barely cherry-flavored, sickly sweet sugar. Okay, a little gross, but I could handle that. However, unlike a gumball, this sucker ain't hollow. No, it's full of actual cherry. Some kind of horrifying, brown, mushy blob that was once a beautiful red cherry. I have no idea what these are or what they're called, as the label is entirely in Chinese, but if a stranger tries to give you one, run far, far away. In fact, run all the way to China and punch the dude that came up with these in the face for me, please!

Onion Strips purchased: Whole Foods, Portland, OR and Chinese candy purchased: Aji Ichiban, NYC

Utz of Hanover: Baked Cheese Curls

Brand: Utz of Hanover
Style: Baked Cheese Curls
Origin: USA
Type: Cheese Puffs
Flavor: Like cheesy manna from heaven! Very similar to the old Planters Cheez Balls.
Verdict: Approved!




In the days of yore, there was once an amazing line of cheese snacks put out by Planters, the peanut people. I'm not sure exactly why they made cheese snacks in addition to nut mixes, but it was the best idea ever. They came in a blue can with a yellow lid, and those cans contained the best cheese snacks know to mankind. There were curls and balls, and my favorite was the balls, because you could have contests to see how many of them you could fit in your mouth at one time (37 is my personal record).

Why, you might ask, am I reopening the wound left after finding out that Planters discontinued this snack line some years ago? Because the Utz Cheese Curls are the closest cheese snack I've found to those Planters ones. They're terrible for you, despite a creepy girl on the bag claiming that they give you a cozy feeling with every bite, but they have that perfect slightly tangy and strong cheese taste that only Planters Cheez Balls could provide for me in the past. The texture isn't quite as pleasing as the balls, it's similar to any cheese puff product, but the taste is out of this world. It makes me sad that I can't purchase these in my hometown, although I'm sure my butt is thankful for that.

An added bonus: Thai Pizza Candy of Love!

My friend that sent me the box o' snacks also included a giant bag of assorted Asian candy. Most of it is in languages I don't speak well or at all, and some isn't even labeled. However, I'm determined to eventually get through all of it and let you all know the best of the best and the worst of the worst.


Today's choice is entitled Thai Pizza Candy of Love. It's a hard candy with one of my favorite wrappers I've ever seen. There's a stereotypical Italian chef declaring this Pizza Candy of Love in English and (what I can only assume is) Thai. It's mango flavored, as indicated by the wrapper and the ingredients list, which informs me that this contains "natural identical flavor (mango)". I'm not sure what that means, but this little pizza-shaped delight is pretty tasty! It has a sweet flavor that is definitely identifiable as mango. The triangular shape is a little weird on the soft palate as it's rather pointy, but that's my only complaint. I'd be interested to try other flavors of this candy and I'm hoping there's more buried in the candy bag.

Puffs purchased: Pittsburgh, PA
Candy purchased: New York, NY