BIRTHDAY CAKE KIT KAT

                

The second of the three recent "Limited Edition" Kit Kats is the last one I plan on reviewing because, let's face it, between Apple Pie, Birthday Cake and Mint Chocolate, one of those flavors isn't very interesting.  And since I pride myself on daring to try things that most of you are (wisely) probably not going to bother with...such Swedish Fish Oreos and Thanksgiving Dinner Candy Corn...why waste space talking about a flavor we already know and love?

So...birthday cake.  For me, that's a flavor close behind pumpkin spice when it comes to irritating food trends of the past several years.  At least most people can get an idea of what pumpkin spice tastes like from the name alone, even though there is no such thing as pumpkin spice.  But before they started using "birthday cake" to describe a very sugary vanilla taste, it could have meant anything!  In fact, I'd guess that a lot of people's birthday cakes were chocolate.  Or marble.  Or strawberry.

Nowadays birthday cake just means vanilla.  A very sweet vanilla.  A very sweet, sugary vanilla with rainbow-colored sprinkles.  And there's nothing wrong with that flavor, even if I think the name is misplaced.

If you are used to the chocolate covered crisp wafers of a standard Kit Kat, this flavor (as with Applie Pie) will come as a big shock to the system.  But whereas Apple Pie tasted more like a scented candle, Birthday Cake Kit Kats taste much like another famous snack.  Does anyone remember circus cookies?  They were coated with a too-sweet pink and white frosting, with rainbow sprinkles, but still had a satisfying crunch underneath.  Now, the Kit Kat doesn't exactly have as much of a crunch as the circus cookies did, but the taste is remarkably similar.    

In the end, I'm going with an average score for this one.  It is far to sweet to enjoy, but a piece here or there (frozen, especially) might do the trick if you are a fan of vanilla...I mean, birthday cake...and/or circus cookies that won't turn your teeth and tongue pink.

RATING:        3 / 5

  

 

APPLE PIE KIT KAT

Of all the junk food I review, Kit Kat has the widest variety of flavors...yes, even more than Oreo or Pop Tarts.  Unfortunately, the vast majority of these varieties are never seen outside of Japan, so your only hope of trying one is to find them at World Market (or pester a co-worker to bring them back the next time he travels to Tokyo, as I used to do!).

So while the Japanese have their Green Tea, Edamame and Soy Sauce Kit Kats, Americans are stuck with milk chocolate, dark chocolate, and white chocolate.  Fortunately, every now and then the powers that be at Nestle decide to throw us a bone and release a limited edition flavor on these shores.  None of them end up becoming permanent flavors, though, no matter how seemingly innocuous they might be...such as mint (dark chocolate), orange or strawberry (both white chocolate).  

I doubt that the limited edition Apple Pie Kit Kat is in any danger of becoming a permanent flavor here, however.  I do like the bright yellow wrapper (as opposed to the standard red), the apple scent and the very first bite...but that's where my likes end.

The Apple Pie flavor showed promise, because the heart of a Kit Kat is a crispy wafer which could at least potentially mimic the crust of a pie.  But it doesn't seem that the wafer tastes any different than usual--instead, the waxy white chocolate coating is the source of the flavor.  And while at least they didn't make the mistake of using milk or dark chocolate, the apple flavoring just doesn't go very well with white chocolate.  If eating the Dove White Chocolate Caramel Apple candy from last fall was akin to chewing on an apple-scented candle, eating this Apple Pie Kit Kat is akin to munching on potpourri...inside of apple-scented candle.

It seems to me that Nestle, as with a lot of manufacturers of irresponsible calorie junk foods, are only focused on the new flavor they plan to introduce...without ever considering if that flavor works well with the texture of the underlying product.  And that really does make a difference.  Licorice, for example, might be great as a stand-alone candy (or even an ice cream, in small doses), but would it work as an Oreo cookie?  Or as a Twinkie?  Not at all.  When the texture works, as with the apple pie Oreo cookie, the artificial flavor gets more of a free pass.  When it doesn't, as with this Kit Kat, it only draws more attention to how artificial the flavor really is. 

RATING:   2 / 5

HOSTESS S'MORES CUPCAKES

It really seems as though Hostess isn't trying very hard these days.  A lot of their "limited edition" snacks are the same year after year, and even when they dare to try something new, they don't seem to give it their best effort.  It's almost as if someone in their lab realizes at the last possible moment that a coffee-flavored Twinkie might actually taste terrible, so they give the order to "water it down" and make it taste mostly like a regular Twinkie with only the slightest possible hint of coffee.

Unfortunately, the S'mores Cupcakes are more of the same.  

As the name would suggest, these cupcakes attempt to mimic the flavor of that classic campfire treat consisting of Graham crackers, Hershey chocolate bars and toasted marshmallows.  Three ingredients seems like a lot bar to me, but Hostess only delivers on one of the three--the chocolate, which is the easiest to duplicate.  Hostess already has chocolate cupcakes and yellow cupcakes both with chocolate frosting, so it isn't as if they had to re-tool the factory on this one.

The cake isn't the same as their standard yellow cupcake...at least, not visually.  It's tan colored, looking very much like a spice flavor (which they've done before).  Taste-wise?  If you close your eyes, you'll think you are eating the regular regular golden cupcakes.  Perhaps a Graham cracker-flavored cake would have been too difficult, but why couldn't they have just diluted their pumpkin spice cake?  At least it would have been the same color, and within the "realm" of flavor.  But, no...strike one.

Finally, we have the cream...sorry, creme..filling.  A truly wasted opportunity, as it's just the standard cupcake creme filling.  Why didn't they partner with Smuckers or Kraft or someone else to use marshmallow topping as the center of these cupcakes?  Just the slightest marshmallow flavor or the smallest change in consistency would have satisfied me, but no.  So, strike two.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but a S'mores without a marshmallow or a Graham cracker is just...chocolate, right?  These cupcakes taste identical to the golden cupcakes already on the store shelves which is fine, since I like those, but I call "false advertising" as they taste nothing like the name promises.

Oh, and by the way, these S'mores cupcakes are a Wal-Mart exclusive.  Wal-Mart has become my newest go-to for a lot of odd junk food varieties which cannot be found anywhere else, but I think that has less to do with the idea of Wal-Mart being a great place for "limited editions" and more with Wal-Mart being a great place to dump failed products that no one wants.

RATING:    3 / 5

(as a Golden cupcake. As as S'mores cupcake, it's more like 1/3!)