It’s back to school week for all the kiddos out there, and let’s just say it how it is – that sucks. The long, care free, sleepless nights of whimsy and wonder are over and get exchanged for homework, bed times, and social anxiety. But hey – at least we get another new Oreo out of it! Despite the sadness of summer ending, I always secretly kind of liked going back to school, since it meant the days would get short and before I knew it a blanket of spookiness would wash over every store and every child’s imagination. I also not-so-secretly love every opportunity I can get to try a new limited time flavor of cookie, and if this long overdue Peanut Butter and Jelly Oreo comes at the sacrifice of teenagers everywhere having to spend $30 on a new backpack – I’ll take it.

The package smells sweet like artificial berries with a bit of swirling artificial peanut butter to back it up. The creme’s are split evenly down the middle, and by the looks of it the peanut butter half is really trying to flex its protein power over the berry, as the tan creme is oozing out of the side in a show of apparent snack time dominance. On the outside is the classic Golden wafer, and I can’t help but be a little sad it isn’t graham. Even though I’ve never had graham cracker bread, the mashup sounds delectably drool-worthy.

While I really liked and was surprised by the execution of the jelly creme in the Jelly Donut Oreo, I’m not liking it nearly as much here. There’s an odd, slightly off-putting floral note that comes across and registers much closer to perfume than jelly. It isn’t the usual punch-in-the-face sweetness that comes with most artificial berry flavors, but I find it distracting, and ultimately overpowering to the usually very hard to overthrow peanut butter. I really wish Nabisco had gone with grape jelly for this Oreo, but the strangest thing is not only does it not taste like grape, it doesn’t really taste like strawberry or raspberry either. It floats in this weird fake tasting space that really reminds me of flowers and has no notable tartness to balance it out.

The peanut butter creme, when I taste it on its own, is very good. It has a slightly thick and gritty texture with a true roasted peanut flavor that strikes a perfect sweet balance in tandem with the golden wafer. Some of the great nuttiness comes through in the complete bite, but a lot of its more subtle notes get drowned out by the sweeter and surprisingly prominent jelly. From what I recall, this creme is a bit saltier and less sweet than the one most of us are familiar with in a Nutter Butter, and I would love to see a Golden Oreo that features just this creme.

While this Oreo is good, and certainly more interesting than a couple of releases earlier this year, I don’t love it, and I really really wanted to. It was a missed opportunity to not layer two thinner creme’s on top of each other, as no one eats peanut butter and jelly in two divided halves. The cookies are far from disgusting, and I will 100% eat the rest of them, but they unfortunately fall into the category of of PB&J products that don’t quite live up to the great flavor combo of the iconic sandwich, and will need an extra spoonful of PB to really pass my persona; tastebud test.

Rating: 7.5/10
Found at: FoodsCo ($2.99)