To keep up with the times, I’ve been doing more and more short form video reviews. I love writing, I really do, but sadly a lot of people don’t like to read! I’ll admit I’m even guilty myself, I listen to a lot of podcasts and watch hella YouTube. Lucky for me, I also really like shooting and editing video, so it’s another side of me I’ll gladly bring out if the people enjoy it. Below are two reviews from Caffe Panna’s latest Winter Pack, and let me tell you, they’re bangers! If you have any questions I’m more than happy to answer them in the comments below and feel free to reach out on TikTok or Instagram as well! š
flexible dieting
REVIEW: Jeni’s Powdered Jelly Donut
When it comes to donuts the jelly filled variety are near the bottom of my personal tier list. Give me an old fashioned, buttermilk bar, sprinkled cake, custard filled, cruller, chocolate raised, hell, Iāll take even a plain glazed over a jelly filled. But when it comes to ice cream companies that have worked their way into readily available grocery stores? Jeniās is right up there with the elite, cranking out some of the most consistent and top tier pints you can find in an aisle that also carries riced cauliflower. I sadly donāt get to try as many new Jeniās flavors as Iād like, with no local scoop shops in the Bay Area and many of my local Whole Foods not keeping up with the times, but I got lucky with this spring drop and couldnāt deny a fruity frozen donut mashup. Powdered Jelly Donut is vanilla custard with raspberry jelly and brown sugar donut crumble.
This vanilla custard is not what I expected ā it is comPLEX. As usual with Jeniās it is rich, dense, and superbly creamy, but to my palate is is anything but a basic vanilla. I get slightly tangy notes akin to a milder cream cheese base, and a pretty legitimate saltiness comes through as well. Itās an extremely deep and heavy flavor with a potent eggy-ness that gets accented by the more nuanced floral notes of vanilla. In short, itās really good, especially for a pint you can grab at a grocery store ā absolutely top shelf stuff. The custard tempers surprisingly quickly for how premium it tastes, which creates a wonderfully velvety texture when the other components come to their proper temperature.
The raspberry jelly is bright, acidic, and tart with a little bit of a floral undertone. Jeniās website refers to it as āraspberry roseā and while Iām not getting any perfume-y notes thereās definitely a supporting flavor underneath the usual straight ahead slightly sweet and sour berry burst. Out of the freezer the jam is a bit icy, but once tempered properly it has an impressively smooth and jelly-like consistency that plays with the indulgent and rich base really well. If I could make one tweak to it Iād make it a touch sweeter to drive home the donut vibe, but itās a tasty and fascinating swirl in its own right.
As Iāve said on this blog many times before, donuts are exceedingly hard to pull off in ice cream, and the good news bad news here is the ādonut crumbleā doesnāt really resemble donuts at all; but itās awesome. The crumble is really more of a swirl with a soft but gritty consistency similar to cake batter, and reminds me a lot of tres leches cake with its impressively heavy moisture. It has a nice buttery and slightly spiced nutmeg flavor to it that compliments the salty base and tart swirl really well. Thereās a touch of astringency in the finish, which isnāt unpleasant, and actually makes the swirl taste a bit more bread-like than the full on sweetness overload in a cake batter. It was smart of Jeniās to opt for this type of mix-in over actual donut chunks, which would no doubt be much harder to control, I simply would have called it a donut batter swirl. And honestly, that probably would have been something the ice cream enthusiasts would have gone wild for, making this surprisingly complex pint even more desirable.
Rating: 8.5/10
Found at: Whole Foods ($9.99)
REVIEW: Limited Edition Neapolitan Oreo Cookies
It has been a long time since Iāve posted about a new Oreo here. Itās also been a long time since Nabisco has released a notable Oreo to the ice cream community. Iāve eaten all of them, and written about some for The Impulsive Buy, but this rehashing of 2011ās āTriple Double Oreo Neapolitanā needed to be addressed on the skillet. Just in time for yesterdayās national ice cream day, 2022ās Limited Edition Neapolitan Oreo Cookies combine vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry flavored cremes with a waffle cone flavored cookie.
Yes, you read that right, a waffle cone flavored cookie. That is what had me frantically hunting for these the moment they dropped; absolutely teeming with excitement. A waffle cone is such a special flavor ensconced in nostalgic ice cream dates layered with deep orange sunset hues and long shadows from nearby tree branches. I love them, and I almost exclusively enjoy them at my favorite scoop shops. So did they pull it off? Yes, I think they did.
Waffle cone is a hard flavor to pin down, and when I think of what I might taste I think of it as typically going one of two ways ā slightly buttery with vanilla and almond accents similar to a bigger cylindrical fortune cookie, or a little darker with notes of brown sugar and cinnamon; or a combination of the two. Iāve even had waffle cones with notes of lemon, so itās not always a decidedly specific flavor, and as such I wasnāt sure what I was looking for when I bit in. But one thing is for sure, visually ā the criss cross hatches of the waffle cone on one side of the cookie is the perfect touch.Ā
Nabisco went with cinnamon as its choice for waffle cone emulation and it absolutely works. It tastes a lot like a waffle cone from Cold Stone, almost spot on, with a satisfying crunch that really hits home. Had the wafer carried a vanilla flavor it would be too similar to the standard Golden, which is too sweet of a vessel for a triple stack of creme, and as much as I love it, an appropriate amount of almond would have been too subtle to make much of an impact. Iāve had issues in the last couple of years with Oreoās wafer texture being different, not nearly as soft and crumbly, but these are hard and crunchy in a good way, with intention, and it simulates the tough crunch of a waffle cone really well without feeling stale or clunky.
The big bold crunch of the cinnamon-y shell gives way to the satisfying smooth squish of three cremeās and I swear to you Iām not THAT high on scoop shop nostalgia when I sayā¦these actually taste like Neapolitan ice cream. The vanilla is your standard OG Oreo creme, that much like vanilla in a container if Neapolitan, is the background support for the other two. The chocolate is nice and dark with a touch of bitterness and a fudge-y quality, and the strawberry has a classic scoop shop strawberries and cream presence to it ā surprisingly not overwhelmingly artificial and Nesquick-adjacent, with a touch of tart in the finish. I did my best to pick apart the flavors but thatās not what this is about, this is about the entirety of the flavors combined with the crunch and brown sugar cinnamon accents in the cookie. Some bites are more strawberry-heavy or choco-heavy, depending on the balance in the individual cookie, which makes alternating bites unique and even more fun.
Not only do the flavors work but the texture is immaculate as well, it feels delightfully like a mouthful of frosting. Sometimes when too many cremeās get stacked they can come across with a cloying density, but here the cremeās are fresh and soft with an ice cream-like creaminess thatās very sweet but appropriate. I love these cookies, and if you have a soft spot for ice cream dates and grocery store sweets you must toss these in your cart the moment you see them.
Rating: 9.5/10
Found at: Target ($3.99)
REVIEW: Salt & Straw Bottomless Limes!
When Salt & Straw head ice cream maker Tyler Malek opens his coveted creative doors to children under the age of 13 for the Student Inventor Series he doesnāt simply request base and mix-in ideas, he asks them for a story to turn into a flavor. The stories are, as expected, pretty wild andā¦psychedelic; and his ability to turn those concepts into scaleable, sellable, pint-able entires into Salt & Strawās history is nothing short of impressive. There have been times in the past where we, as the consumer, only get the story, or a portion of it, to decipher what the flavor was going to be. This year the stories are all well documented and can be read on Salt & Strawās website, but we also have a more traditional description to help guide which to scoop and which to skip based on personal flavor preferences.Ā
Those descriptions are usually pretty helpful and clear, but this one left me a bit stumped going into it ā and Iām glad I took the risk! Bottomless Limes is described as, āIn celebration of a most mysterious holiday, we ribbon in Key Lime cheesecake with hunks of golden pie crust, crystallized with brown sugar and ginger, and shards of sprinkle-studded chocolate bark.ā
This ice cream is absolutely chaotic, and I love it. Itās not chaotic in the way Chocolate Caramel Potato Chip Cupcake is, where there are tons of sweet and salty components in a sea of brown and black, itās chaotic in the sense that it looks visually perplexing and I canāt really describe whatās going on. What flavor is the base ice cream? I couldnāt tell ya! Itās nearly impossible for me to isolate it without a sprinkle or chocolate shard popping onto the spoon, which, for someone who loves texture, isnāt a problem at all. My best guess for the base is vanilla, but it doesnāt really sing with any particularly classic floral vanilla notes, so Iāll simply scoop on and enjoy its smooth dense texture and premium mouthfeel.
The most prominent flavor that jumps out at me upon tasting, and the one I hoped would be very present, is the golden pie crust. The crust is unmistakably graham cracker, with a beautifully buttery brown sugar and molasses essence that tastes like the foundation of any perfect cheesecake. I donāt feel its gentle grittiness as much as I taste it, and I love how its presence seems to pop up in every other bite. There are occasional bigger chunks of the crust and they have a dense soft chew thatās every bit as wonderful as the real deal on a slice of NYās finest.
Also in every other bite, or nearly every bite, are the variably sized shards of chocolate. Thereās both a darker bittersweet chocolate and more traditionally sugary white, which adds a firm crunch and great sweetness to the delicious sea of controlled madness. There are also super crunchy ball-shaped Christmas-colored sprinkles which bleed into the base for more visually appealing chaos. Itās like an epic technicolored chocolate chip ice cream at its core, and itās so fun to eat.
With a name like āBottomless Limes!ā I expected the flavor to be overly citrusy, but it isnāt, and I really appreciate the balance on display. The key lime cheesecake pops up in big bright green chunks throughout, and once the ice cream is properly tempered it has the perfect smooth and luscious cheesecake texture with bright acidity and tangy depth. There is no mistaking this dense swirl for anything other than cheesecake, and it pairs surprisingly well with the more bitter notes from the chocolate bark. One moment the pint is sweet, then tangy, then cheesy, then crunchy, then creamy ā and it all works. Itās a very heavy ice cream that needs extra time to temper, but once you practice patience you will be rewarded with an amazingly decadent experience.
Once I read the story by 12-year-old Rae and learned that this flavor was inspired by a bottomless pit, this pint made a whole lotta sense. Eating it does remind me of a spiral into chaos, like endlessly falling into the abyss, but itās a very tasty plummet with complex complimentary flavors that come together in tasty execution as brilliantly as they look.
Rating: 9.5/10
Found at: Salt & Straw ($13.00)
REVIEW: The Bar Shack Custom Gourmet Protein Bars
Have you ever wanted to play God? Yeah, me neither, but when given the opportunity itās kind of hard to pass up. As a dude who loves a good protein bar Iāve spent many a moment dreaming up flavors I wished my favorite companies would release, and now, I no longer have to dream, I can officially play protein bar God. The Bar Shack are a new online based company that allows anyone to design their own protein bar, made fresh and shipped straight to their door. So when owner Adam hit me up and asked if I would like to give it a shot I said āHey, call me Jesus!ā.
REVIEW: Kalz Paleo Breakfast Muffins (Banana Chocolate and Tropical Blueberry)
In September of last year I reviewed a new natural protein bar company called Low Kalz. The brand expanded from small snack-size bars to big paleo breakfast muffins available through Etsy, and they sent me a pack of each flavor to sample. The two flavors they turned into muffins just so happened to be my favorites ā Banana Chocolate and Tropical Blueberry. As with the bars the muffins are preservative free and made with few ingredients, most notably almond flour, bananas, and eggs.
REVIEW: Ben & Jerry’s Special Stash Marshmallow Moon
The craft ice cream scene is so hot right now that the innovators and grocery store ice cream game changers are coming out of retirement. Ben & Jerryās, the now Unilever-owned company that created Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and put creative life into the freezer section of your favorite supermarket are beginning to unleash their Special Stash; a super limited run of pints only available online and in small quantities at their scoop shops. The series begins with a third collaboration with Jimmy Fallon, in an apparent ode to MoonPie. Marshmallow Moon is vanilla ice cream with marshmallow and graham swirls and fudge chunks.
Letās start off with the good ā the graham cracker swirl is phenomenal. Itās salty, buttery, and bursting with golden graham flavor that rivals any elementary schoolās snack time dunk contest. Itās the same swirl from Pumpkin Cheesecake and One Love but in much bigger, thicker quantity, which makes it automatically better. The grittiness and slight crunch of the swirl is hands down the best part of this pint and to be honest, kind of its saving grace.
Now, onto the weakest part of the this flavor, and itās a big one ā the base. Ben & Jerryās vanilla ice cream is fine, itās just not really that great, and within the context of this profile it falls pretty flat. Yes, itās rich and creamy, but the vanilla notes arenāt very pronounced and I donāt get any kind of intriguing pop at all. This vanilla ice cream NEEDS big gobs and chunks of mix-ins for it to work, and while it works well in tandem with the graham, it does a major disservice to the marshmallow by being bland and washing out the subtle nuances of the fun and fluffy āmallow. I was very excited to see nice amounts of the marshmallow swirl throughout my pint, but I never got to fully enjoy them. Aside from the textural and temperature differences, it was hard to distinguish the gooey stuff from the base.
The fudge chunks are big and snappy and tasty but ultimately kind of boring. Again, vanilla and chocolate are such standard fair that unless I got a good amount of the graham this just felt like chocolate chip ice cream with really big chips and relatively average vanilla.
I love the idea of Ben & Jerryās doing an ongoing Special Stash series, but this first entry is too safe and an average introduction into something that has a lot more potential than this pint shows. A simple change in base to peanut butter, caramel, malt, or hell, even a vanilla bean with more robust flavor, could have made this a much more solid ice cream. The Special Stash line also comes with a higher price, and at double the cost I usually pay for B&Jās it starts to inch towards the more gourmet small batch stuff. If they want to play that game theyāve gotta put their thinking caps on to push the envelop a little farther and earn my hard earned ice cream dollars.
Rating: 7/10
Found at: Ben & Jerry’s Scoop Shop ($6.50)
REVIEW: Limited Edition Cinnamon Vanilla Lucky Charms
Frosty the Snowman is my dude. Iām not sure if itās normal for kids to latch onto Christmas characters like they would superheros or athletes, but as a youngster I certainly did, and Frosty will forever hold a place in my heart. Every time he came back to life was another chance for a birthday party, and birthdayās mean cake, and cake means fun, and thus, Frosty beats Rudolph. While the latest seasonal release from General Mills may not have an actual Frosty tie-in (Frosty has a button nose and is always smokinā a pipe), it is proudly reppinā one of his relatives, and my internal nostalgia switch began to melt as soon as I saw the swirly blue box for Cinnamon Vanilla Lucky Charms.
Iām gonna cut straight to the chase on this one ā these Lucky Charms are not that spicy. The flavor is nearly identical to the established one kids (and adults?) have been chowing down on since 1964 ā slightly sweetened toasted oats and crunchy dehydrated marshmallows. The key difference here is mostly aesthetic, as the usual array of rainbow colors have been replaced by cool wintery shades of blue and white. Snowmen, snowflakes, and snowballs cheerily swim in milk channeling a cool December day instead of the multicolored ending of a leprechaun hunt.
Iām kind of surprised the cereal pieces donāt have any bite, since the box touts āfrosted cinnamon oat cerealā very proudly, and I get zero cinnamon. That being said, there is a bit of cinna-flair in the marshmallows. When I get a spoonful with three or more winter-clad āmallows I get a sweet hit of cinnamon, but itās very brief, and nowhere near the intensity of Pumpkin Spice Cheerios, Gingerbread Spice Life, or Cinnamon Pebbles. As for the vanilla, I think it goes without saying marshmallows have a vanilla-y flavor automatically, and I donāt detect any more or any less vanilla than I normally would from a box of Charms.
Look, this cereal may not have the big cinnamon flavor that I had hoped for, but I cannot deny that Lucky Charms are still, in fact, magically delicious. The slight presence of spice in the marshmallows takes nothing away from the original recipe, and adds just a touch of holiday whimsy the āmallow-heavy bites. Iām slightly disappointed but Iām charmed by Lucky, and Iām a sucker for anything with cinnamon in it, even if itās just a gentle whisper.
Rating: 8/10
Found at: Target ($2.99)
REVIEW: Baskin Robbins’ Tiramisu
Tiramisu directly translates to ācheer me upā in Italian, and thatās pretty much how I feel about not only tiramisu, but damn near any ice cream I get the privilege of trying. Tiramisu holds a special place in my heart, as itās become a pre-Christmas tradition for my girlfriend and I after a lovely meal of cioppino, and ice cream holds the biggest place in my heart of all foods. Needless to say, my heart feels like itās about to explode with the latest Flavor of the Month from Baskin Robbins. Their take on Tiramisu is tiramisu-flavored ice cream with cake pieces, chocolate flakes, and a decadent chocolate coffee ribbon.
Off the jump the tiramisu base tastes like everything it should. Itās a solid combination of chocolate and coffee that is not at all shy with its strong espresso notes. The texture is incredibly rich and creamy like tiramisuās whipped mascarpone. While it isnāt cheesy persay, I wouldnāt call the actual dessert cheesy either, and the overall profile really works. The bitter coffee flavor is beautifully balanced by the sweetness, and while I was hesitant of a ātiramisu flavoredā ice cream, BR really dialed in the flavors of one of the best Italian desserts.
Amplifying the solid foundation laid by the base is the chocolate coffee ribbon, which adds an even darker, more bitter coffee presence and syrupy sweetness that is divine. It channels the intense depth of the usually soaked lady fingers so well that I actually get a bit of a sharp boozy component coming through that is unexpected for a mainstream scoop.
The semisweet chocolate pieces add some very welcome textural contrast with a nice crunch and solid chocolate flavor. Theyāre evenly dispersed through the ice cream and help bring the much needed chocolate component to achieve a wonderful sweet and bitter balance with the strong coffee flavor.
Cake pieces swimming in rich dairy seems like it would be a perfect substitution for tiramisuās soaked lady fingers and they absolutely are. Soft, chewy, and slightly sweet, the cake pieces hold up their end of the dessert emulation wonderfully. Some of the cake pieces get caught up in the coffee ribbon and the combination of the two flavors reminds me of the cocoa powder dusting on top of a lovely slice of Italyās finest. Such great flavor I was transported straight to a cozy evening in North Beach.
While this may not be a new flavor, itās one executed very well and worthy of its spot in the flavor of the month rotation. Whether youāre a fan of tiramisu, coffee flavored desserts, or just a damn good scoop of ice cream, this is one worth a visit to your local Baskin Robbins.
Rating: 9/10
Found at: Baskin Robbins ($2.99)
REVIEW: Fudge Covered Ritz Crackers
There are some food combinations that arenāt super obvious, but are super delicious. Peanut butter and bananas, strawberries and black pepper, Coca Cola and red wine, pineapple and pizza (controversial, I know, but Iām a fan), etc. Additionally, it can be stated that if you put chocolate on almost anything it becomes instantly better. Welcome to your life the next flavor combination you didnāt know you needed but you really truly do ā Fudge Covered Ritz Crackers.
As a certified graduate of the school of sweet and salty, I must tell you immediately that these are pure fire. They arenāt new, in fact theyāve been around since 2011, but if youāve been sleeping on them you need to wake up and toss a box in your cart the next time youāre perusing the grocery store during the holidays (right now). This is less of a review and more of a call to action ā I want you to understand.
The concept is as simple as can be ā take a standard Ritz cracker and cover it in chocolate fudge. The secret to the success is that Nabisco nailed the ratios of chocolate to cracker and used a decently high quality chocolate coating to seal the deal. The outer fudge layer isnāt thin but it also isnāt so thick that it dominates the entire profile. Thereās a lovely balance of the crumbly buttery texture with pops of saltiness from the Ritz on the inside and creamy sweetness on the outside. The experience is a lot like a chocolate covered graham cracker but much softer, and as a result, undeniable.
While they may not be peppermint or gingerbread or eggnog or anything you might relate to the holidays, Fudge Covered Ritz truly channel the magical feelings of Christmas. Thereās something comforting and nostalgic in the flavor of the cracker that reminds me of staying home from school sick ā hookie or otherwise. The crackerās blanket of nostalgia mixed with a perfect amount of sugary chocolate bliss makes for a product that is so simple yet perfect in every way. Buy them now and snack happy.
Rating: 10/10
Found at: Target ($2.49)
Sean's Skillet 