Of course most of us are familiar with Rice Krispie Treats, just like mom used to make (not my mom of course, that would be too normal) packaged as individually wrapped (90 calorie) bars.
It seems kind of convenient that the competitor product, awkwardly named Marshmallow Squares Crispy Rice, is made a company called “Maxi Crisp”. I wonder if they are a company that specializes in crispy products or they chose that name because they knew this was the only product they would make.
I like that instead of Snap, Crackle and Pop they have some kid about to get wailed in the head by a soccer ball. Maxi Crisp’s package is similar with the same size box and blue and white color theme, but how similar in taste are they?
Rice Krispie Treats:
I was surprised how soft these were and yet still held the crispy rice form providing a nice combination of softness and crunch in each bite. These are very sweet and have a strong vanilla flavor. Overall these were delicious and just as good as making them at home.
Marshmallow Squares Crispy Rice:
I noticed the rice in these were packed a little tighter, providing a denser bar. They were noticeably less sweet than the Kellogg version but still delivered the same general taste but milder. Ethan felt there wasn’t enough marshmallow involved but I didn’t mind.
Wrap up:
Kellogg’s wins but just by a little bit. There was something about the intense flavor and gentle texture of the Rice Krispie Treats that earned being called a “treat” instead of a mere “square”. I will say though that Maxi Crisp makes a decent bar and will not disappoint if that’s all that’s available.
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Pretty sick, a rubbery mold of smushed meat that is able to stand upright on it’s own. Another blow to the senses was the canned cat food aroma. In fact, Clyde (our cat) magically appeared in the kitchen thinking he was getting fed.
Same unappetizing effort just to get out of the can. This was a little darker and more uniform in color but had some disturbing fat globules dispersed throughout the “loaf”.
Opening these individually wrapped cookies releases a Twinkie-like aroma, which is artificial but sweet and characteristic of a mass-produced “bakery” treat.
Mrs. F’s cookies were a little bit dryer, although in comparison to Lil’ D’s ultral moist and slightly oily cookies, this wasn’t a surprise. Also the texture and taste were more “oatmealy” and there was more creme that had a bit more vanilla flavor to it. Ethan said these tasted “more honest” and I agreed that these provided at least more of an illusion of eating an actual oatmeal cookie.
Biting into these we discovered that they’re not just soft but chewy. the chocolate coating kind of cracks but is held together by the rather gluey marshmallow, which doesn’t look like much but the amount of marshmallow is perfectly balanced with the chocolate coating and fluffy cookie. We notice these have a chemical/artificial taste to them but do have the chocolate and marshmallow flavor that you expect, it’s just a little weird.
These were amazingly identical, the only difference was that they seemed a teeeeny bit dryer in the cake park but other than that they had the same chewiness and chemical taste.
Sooo sorry for the lack of posting. I won’t get into the details but things have been crazy but I fully intend on keeping up with the snacks. My stupid non-snacking life takes over sometimes.
I could get right to the point and just say gross, no more please but I’ll use a few more adjectives. Ethan described this as “soupy” not in the consistency so much (although it applies somewhat) but the taste was like canned soup. You know that “dead” taste of things that used to be fresh and are transformed into a bland, tasteless, shelf-stable version of it’s former self, like canned spinach, asparagus, etc..
Different but the same. Very slightly better in the way that this tasted more like “normal” tuna salad. Same deal with the texture but we found this less offensive enough to not make a face when we ate it. This also had considerably less carrots and no tomato-like taste.
I thought I’d try a different angle with the drink photos (I’ll go back to the old way), but the A&W looked pretty lighta nd the foam didn’t last more than a few seconds after it was poured. We liked the taste of this, it was very “peppy” to me and Ethan said it had a good, dependable root beer flavor and the sweetness was just right. For me I’d like it to be a little creamier like this mystery tap rootbeer I had in NH but the flavor of A&W is really satisfying.
I was impressed with Dad’s because the foam didn’t completely dissolve even after sitting for an extended amount of time and had a nice deep brown color. We felt this had an interesting aroma, which Ethan described as “herby”. As far as flavor it was flatter than A&W and tasted artificial, which goes to show foam isn’t everything.
Although this cheese and cracker snack combo is offered by a few different brands, these two were on sale, so that’s what I got. 
Mom and I both noticed how butter these crackers were, which we liked. The salt was just enough too and I felt it really complimented the butteriness of the cracker. Mom felt that the cheese had a chemical taste to it while Ethan and I had trouble tasting the cheese at all. It was just there for texture as far as I experienced.
Mom felt the cheese was the same in this with it’s chemical taste. I could taste the cheese a little more, not so much the sharpness of cheddar but it did add a creaminess that Keebler lacked. Ethan said he still didn’t really taste any cheese. The cracker was less buttery and salty but more dense, which mom liked.
I was excited to hear a couple of months ago that Pepsi and Mountain Dew were coming out this summer with “Throwback” versions which contain cane sugar instead of high-fructose corn syrup.
There’s not much to say, especially since we just reviewed Pepsi in the Shasta post so I’ll just say it tastes like Pepsi and for more description see two posts below ?
Surprisingly, there was not too much of a difference. Ethan and I could tell there was no “syrupyness” to it and we did like that there was a little bit of what I’d describe as a “snap” to it. It seemed to taste cleaner in a way and I think throwback was a great idea, but in the end we both felt that the difference in taste probably wasn’t enough for them to continue production of this after the summer.
Before I even tasted this I liked it better because it was so nice to see the old logo again and for me the evaluation could have stopped there since um… I don’t like Dew (have I mentioned that?)
This cheese spread was very fluffy and as titled, very herby and garlicy.
Rondele was even softer and creamier. Mark commented that it was almost “buttery” and Sara felt it had a little sharpness to it like a cheddar. It was interesting that this was both mild and sharp at the same time. I liked that it wasn’t as garlicy and we all agreed it was “herbier” than the Alouette.
As I probably have mentioned before, Ethan is a huge Coke fan and I’m a Pepsi girl, somehow we are happily married, but I knew we would both probably be biased so no big surprise that Ethan enjoyed the Coke and stated it’s a “good, solid cola”. Although he finds that Coke in a can has some sort of faint aftertaste that is not present in bottled Coke. I think Coke is good, I’m not one of those people that act like their world is turned upside down when a server asks them “is Coke okay?”. It’s a decent cola product.
Without thinking about the name I actually thought “this has extra ‘pep’ to it”. Ethan thinks Pepsi is a “semi-tone higher pitch” than Coke. Seems slightly sweeter too. There is just something about Pepsi this is subtly more interesting. I don’t know what it is but I just like it.
Shasta was surprisingly watery compared to the previous two. The cola flavor was much less intense and was a little soapy or something. We kept trying to find adjectives for this but it was just so void of flavor and substance that we just kept looking at each other and srugging our shoulders.