REVIEW: Kellogg’s Original Cinnabon Pancakes

/ / Reviews / 17 Comments

Kellogg's Original Cinnabon Pancakes

Imagine a world without Cinnabon.

Walking through the malls of America would be less odoriferous. There wouldn’t be anything sweet to cleanse the nasal palate with to get rid of the old person smell wafting from Sears, the youthful scents seeping out of Abercrombie & Fitch, the testosterone pouring out of GNC and the smell of death coming from Radio Shack.

A world without Cinnabon would also be a world without the recent influx of Cinnabon-branded products, like Cinnabon Snack Bars, Cinnabon Cereal, Cinnabon Lip Balm and these Kellogg’s Original Cinnabon Pancakes.

Oh, what a world that would be!

If you’re expecting these Cinnabon-branded pancakes to taste anything close to Cinnabon’s shopping mall-famous cinnamon rolls, you will be disappointed, like I am whenever I’m told I can’t sit on Santa’s lap at the mall because “I’m a grown man” or because “It looks like I have crabs because I scratch myself in the neither region too much.”

Kellogg's Original Cinnabon Pancakes Naked

While there’s cinnamon baked into each four-inch pancake and spots of white frosting injected into the breakfast disk, they do nothing to make it taste like the cloyingly sweet cinnamon rolls. The cinnamon, which isn’t Cinnabon’s Makara Cinnamon, is noticeable and allows the pancake to be eaten without syrup. But when syrup is added, the cinnamon is easily covered up. As for the frosting, it was like a stripper on stage; I could see it, but couldn’t taste it.

Even though I’m not impressed with the Original Cinnabon Pancakes, I did come up with a way to make them better — turn them into breakfast sandwich buns, a la McGriddles.

Kellogg's Original Cinnabon Pancakes Taco

However, I couldn’t find at my local Safeway a large breakfast sausage patty that would fit nicely in between two of these pancakes. I thought about asking a stock clerk for help, but they were all men and I thought it would be weird asking them if they had bigger sausages.

So instead I bought smaller breakfast patties, microwaved them, cut them in half, tessellated the halves on top of a microwaved pancake and then folded the pancake over to create a breakfast taco that had the right balance of sweet and salty.

Yeah! Suck it, Bobby Flay! The secret ingredient iz deez nutz!

I’m sorry about that unnecessary outburst. I’m just surprised I came up with a breakfast dish that’s slightly more complicated than my last great breakfast idea, which just involved mixing Cocoa Puffs with Cocoa Pebbles and pouring chocolate soy milk over it. And it’s been awhile since I’ve used the phrase “deez nutz” in a review.

Overall, the Kellogg’s Original Cinnabon Pancakes were mediocre frozen pancakes. The cinnamon flavor was decent, but I really wish I could taste the frosting that was also injected into it. They’re also quite thin, making them easy to cut through and to fold over to create a pancake taco shell, but not really filling for a grown man.

They almost make me wish for a world without Cinnabon.

(Nutrition Facts – 3 pancakes – 270 calories, 70 calories from fat, 8 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 15 milligrams of cholesterol, 480 milligrams of sodium, 50 milligrams of potassium, 45 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 16 grams of sugar, 28 grams of other carbohydrates, 5 grams of protein and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)
Item: Kellogg’s Original Cinnabon Pancakes
Price: $2.00 (on sale)
Size: 12 pancakes
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: Noticeable cinnamon flavor. Can be prepared in either the microwave or oven. Makes an great breakfast sandwich bun or breakfast taco shell. Contains eight vitamins and minerals. A world without Cinnabon.
Cons: Doesn’t taste like anything from Cinnabon. Injected frosting isn’t noticeable. The term “injected frosting.” Too thin to be satisfying for a grown man. A grown man not being able to sit on Santa’s lap. Syrup kills cinnamon flavor. A world without Cinnabon.

REVIEW: Frosted Ice Creme Sandwich Pop-Tarts

/ / Reviews / 23 Comments

Ice Creme Sandwich Pop-Tarts

According to the Kellogg’s Ice Creme Sandwich Pop-Tarts box, they have “25% Less Sugar Than Leading Toaster Pastries.” But if I’m not mistaken, aren’t Pop-Tarts the leading toaster pastry?

Or did I get sucked through a wormhole and end up in an alternate universe where Pillsbury Toaster Strudels are the leading toaster pastry and The Situation is a fat nobody from New Jersey who got his nickname because the person who enters the bathroom after him will end up in a bad situation?

Wait, let me tolerate MTV and TMZ to find out if I went through a wormhole.

Nope, still in the same universe where The Situation has six-pack abs, Snookie is still orange, there’s a particular hot tub in New Jersey that surprisingly can transmit STDs and Pop-Tarts are the leading toaster pastry.

But if I were in an alternate universe where Toaster Strudels were the ruling toaster pastry, the statement “25% Less Sugar Than Leading Toaster Pastries” wouldn’t be true, because most Toaster Strudels have nine grams of sugar, while these Ice Creme Sandwich Pop-Tarts have 11 grams.

So it seems Kellogg’s is admitting, in a slightly misleading way, that most of their Pop-Tarts are, as Def Leppard likes to say, sticky sweet. But at least these Ice Cream Sandwich Pop-Tarts have 25 percent less sugar than other Pop-Tarts, which have 15-17 grams of sugar. Although unfrosted Pop-Tarts, which I’m surprised still exist, have around 13 grams.

Ice Creme Sandwich Pop-Tarts Innards

Twenty-five percent less sugar is fine and dandy, if you’re a mother trying to prevent your child from getting hyper or turning into The Situation from an alternate universe, but having less sugar makes the Ice Cream Sandwich Pop-Tarts the most insipid flavor Kellogg’s has ever offered, and that includes unfrosted Pop-Tarts and Vanilla Milkshake Pop-Tarts.

These Pop-Tarts had the potential to be really good because I loves me some ice cream sandwiches, but the vanilla filling wasn’t filled with vanilla and the chocolate crust was chocolame. I tried them every way possible, as if I broke out the Kama Sutra of Pop-Tarts eating. But no matter how I tried them, they were still disappointing. Maybe if they artificially flavored them a bit more they would be enjoyable, but with the way they are now I’d really like these Ice Cream Sandwich Pop-Tarts to melt away.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 pastry/48 grams – 190 calories, 45 calories from fat, 5 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 2 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 180 milligrams of sodium, 33 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 11 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)

Item: Frosted Ice Creme Sandwich Pop-Tarts
Price: $3.79
Size: 8 pack
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 2 out of 10
Pros: 25 percent less sugar than the leading toaster pastry, i.e. Pop-Tarts. Contains vitamins and minerals. Use high fructose corn syrup. Kama Sutra.
Cons: Worst Pop-Tart flavor ever. Vanilla filling wasn’t filled with vanilla. Chocolate crust was chocolame. TMZ. MTV. The water in the Jersey Shore hot tub. Entering the bathroom after The Situation from an alternate universe uses it.

REVIEW: Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts

/ / Reviews / 24 Comments

Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts

The Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts are one of the few Pop-Tarts flavors that make sense, unlike any Pop-Tarts flavor that include the words “creme” or “milkshake.”

The Pop-Tarts’ crust represents the crust of the pie. The orange pumpkin filling represents the pumpkin in the pie. The white frosting represents the whipped cream dollop on top of the pie. And the fall-colored sprinkles represent excessive Thanksgiving feasting. Because just like getting up for a third helping of turkey and gravy, they’re completely unnecessary and probably aren’t good for you.

Seriously, I’ve never seen anyone put sprinkles on a pumpkin pie’s whipped cream dollop. Sprinkles over the frosting on top of a cupcake…yes. Sprinkles on top of a banana split…yes. Sprinkles dumped into my mouth so I can spit out rainbows…yes. Sprinkles to represent clown pubic hair stubble on a whipped cream bikini bottom…yes. But never on top of whipped cream on a pumpkin pie.

Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts Innards

Despite the use of sprinkles, Kellogg’s was able to produce a Pop-Tarts filling that tastes like pumpkin pie, thanks to the use of pumpkin, cinnamon, high fructose corn syrup and, possibly, Black Magic. To be honest, it’s really scary they were able to do so, since most Pop-Tarts don’t really taste like the flavor they’re attempting to emulate.

But I guess that’s just the power of Black Magic.

Because of its familiar pumpkin pie flavor, I have to say I enjoyed the Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts, and they’re definitely somewhere on my Top 10 List of Favorite Pop-Tarts Flavors. It’s too bad they’re a limited edition, but I hope they bring them back next Fall — without the unnecessary sprinkles.

But if you do happen to get your hands on a box or two of the Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts, might I suggest sharing them with friends, just like the Pilgrims and Wampanoag Indians shared fowl, beans, nuts and communicable diseases during the first Thanksgiving.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 pastry/50 grams – 200 calories, 45 grams from fat, 5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 2 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 1 gram of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 170 milligrams of sodium, 35 grams of carbohydrates, less that 1 gram of fiber, 16 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)

Item: Limited Edition Frosted Pumpkin Pie Pop-Tarts
Price: $3.50
Size: 12 pastries
Purchased at: Giant Eagle
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Pop-Tarts filling tastes like pumpkin pie. One of my top 10 favorite Pop-Tarts. Using Black Magic to create Pop-Tarts. One of the few Pop-Tarts that tastes like what its emulating. Decent source of vitamins and minerals. Comes in a 12 count box. Spitting out rainbows.
Cons: Sprinkles were unnecessary. High fructose corn syrup. Limited edition flavor. Hard to find. Using Black Magic for evil. Communicable diseases. A third helping of Thanksgiving dinner. Clown pubic hair stubble.

REVIEW: Kellogg’s Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola

/ / Reviews / 14 Comments

Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola

The Kellogg’s Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola was inevitable, which is unfortunate. If you break it down, you’ve got two food innovations (I use the term semi-sarcastically) that came together in a perfect storm of potential horror.

On the one hand, you’ve got the gourmet pizza movement, which cropped up a few decades ago. Based entirely on shit someone told me with no empirical evidence, Wolfgang Puck made the first gourmet pizza, so you can blame him for shit like cream cheese smoked salmon pizza and foie gras pizza and god knows what else. I also blame, again, with very little evidence, California Pizza Kitchen for bringing gourmet pizza to the masses, with creations like cheeseburger pizza and Pear & Gorgonzola pizza. Don’t get me wrong, I love me some gourmet pizza and non-traditional toppings. One of the little local pizza joints in my town has a $10 large unlimited topping offer that I abuse on a regular basis to create my own monstrosities. White pizza with a butter parmesan crust with double green olives, feta, onion, tomatoes and artichoke hearts, anyone? I wouldn’t be surprised if they take that deal off the table because I’m single-handedly putting them out of business.

The other part of this equation is the recent explosion of breakfast frozen food products. I don’t know when this started – maybe it’s been around for quite a while and I just never noticed – but I seem to remember a time when, if you wanted a breakfast frozen food, you grabbed yourself a box of Eggo waffles and shut the fuck up about it. Now you’ve got crazy options, from sausage Mcmuffins to bowls with all your shit thrown together to…whatever in God’s name this is.

My point, quite obviously by now, is that Eggo took these two concepts, herded them into a small pen, watched them do the nasty, and what came out a couple minutes later (food gestates quickly) was the Eggo Real Fruit Pizza. They wiped off the amniotic maple syrup and disgusting globs of strawberry jam and said, “I think we’ve got something here.” Kind of like how my friends think their newborn babies are cute, and I think they look like horrible aliens.

I hadn’t noticed this before, but there’s a strange purple sauce-like substance underneath the toppings. Ugh, is that supposed to be yogurt? I am not looking forward to having hot yogurt in my mouth. I’m also not comfortable with that sentence.

The instructions are simple: unwrap the pizza, flip the box over that it was resting in, set it on the silver circle on the back of the container, and throw it in the microwave for a minute to 1 1/2 minutes. I split the difference, and stuck it in there for 1 1/4 minutes. It was still a little cold in the middle, so I stuck it in for the extra 15, but my microwave is also a piece of shit, so bare that in mind. Waiting a minute and a half for a quick breakfast when you’re on the go is a little impressive. It takes me longer to smear cream cheese on a bagel. I have some pretty strict rules about cream cheese.

Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola

It actually smells pretty good coming out of the microwave. It smells like a bowl of oatmeal that has berries and granola in it – warm and inviting, something you’d want to eat on a cold, snowy day. Unfortunately it’s 106 and humid right now where I live, but I’ll close my eyes and use my imagination.

There’s obviously blueberries going on, scattered about the top of the pizza, shriveled up as they tend to do when cooked. They’re distributed nicely, but I would have liked to have seen a few more of them.

I don’t see any other recognizable berries, but there’s some red glop haphazardly strewn over the top. I took some off and tasted it by itself, and it tastes like they took some raspberries and turned them into a puree. It’s definitely real raspberries; it’s got that delicious tartness of the berry and I even got some seeds stuck in my teeth, which is the one thing that annoys me about raspberries. But I welcome them here, since they offer proof of real berry, unless Eggo spent millions of dollars attempting to create a facsimile of raspberry seeds to fool consumers. Probably a lot easier just to throw some berries in a blender and hold true to their claims of “real fruit.”

The dreaded yogurt sauce was nothing to fear after all. It’s very thin, and when I tasted it on its own, it had the faint flavor of mixed berry yogurt, but it was very mild and inoffensive. The granola is spread generously on one side of the pizza, but tapers out until there’s barely any on the other side.

I was truly surprised to see that the crust wasn’t actually a waffle. If I’d look more closely at the box, I might have figured it out, but my mind associates “Eggo” with “waffles” so decisively that I just assumed that would be the case. Instead, the dough of this “pizza” seems to be made out of wheat. It looks like a thin crust pizza crust, except darker. Unfortunately, it’s tasteless, soggy and way too chewy. I’m not even really sure what to call it. Wheat…pizza crust…thing. Except it tastes more like a bland PowerBar than a pizza crust.

There seem to be two fundamental problems with the Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola: sogginess and poor topping distribution. The crust and the granola were both way too soggy. Perhaps it would have turned out better if I’d cooked it in the oven, but if you’re eating fruit pizza for breakfast, you either don’t have time to wait for the oven to preheat, you’re a college student who doesn’t even own an oven or you’re young enough that you’re not allowed to use the oven.

As far as the toppings go, the mysterious purple sauce was thin to the point where in some places, you could see bare patches of crust. The raspberry puree, which I think is the best part of this item, is strewn halfheartedly across the pizza, globbed up in some places and simply nonexistent in others. The granola is piled high on one half the pizza, but peters out into scattered flakes.

I have to say, I expected this whole “fruit pizza” thing to be a horror show. Instead, it just left me disappointed. If done correctly, it would have been quite tasty. A less chewy, less soggy, more flavorful crust, coated thickly with the delicious raspberry puree, a generous layer of crispy granola, and piled high with blueberries, would have actually been something that I’d consider spending 1 1/2 minutes nuking in the morning for a quick breakfast. Unfortunately, that’s not what the Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola really is, so I think I’ll just stick with real pizza for breakfast. That box of double green olives, feta, and everything else pizza that’s been sitting out on the counter all night looks pretty good right now.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 individual-size pizza (5.3 ounces) — 390 calories, 110 calories from fat, 13 grams of total fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 3 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 2.5 grams of monounsaturated fat, 15 milligrams of cholesterol, 390 milligrams of sodium, , 62 grams of total carbohydrates, 4 grams of dietary fiber, 17 grams of sugars, 10 grams of protein, 0% vitamin A, 6% calcium, 0% vitamin C and 8% iron.)

Item: Kellogg’s Eggo Real Fruit Pizza Mixed Berry Granola
Price: $1.67 (on sale; normally $3.29)
Size: 1 individual-size pizza (5.3 ounces)
Purchased at: Albertson’s
Rating: 4 out of 10
Pros: Raspberry puree was delicious. Taking advantage of unlimited topping deals. Quick and easy to make. Purple sauce was not scary.
Cons: Soggy, tasteless crust and soggy granola. “Hot yogurt in my mouth” making me uneasy. Uneven and sloppily applied toppings. Just the idea of fruit pizza making me shudder. 46 percent of total fat was saturated fat on what appears on the surface to be a healthy food item.

REVIEW: Frosted Wild! Grape Pop-Tarts

/ / Reviews / 11 Comments

An exclamation point is used to show excitement, pain, anger and, depending on the amount used, the degree of your LOL. Of those options, I’m not sure what the exclamation point in the Frosted Wild! Grape Pop-Tarts is trying to express. Maybe it’s the pain and/or anger of the grapes who are disappointed they were used in a filling for a toaster pastry instead of a fine Merlot wine from Napa Valley.

Or the unnecessary punctuation could be trying to show some excitement. Although, even though an exclamation point looks like an erection, there’s nothing really thrilling about grape Pop-Tarts. The only punctuations I feel best describe this latest Pop-Tarts flavor is a colon, following by a hyphen and then a vertical bar.

As you can see on the box, each Pop-Tart is baked with real fruit…oh, I’m sorry…Real Fruit! But this means absolutely nothing if you’re trying to consume your recommended daily servings of fruit since the filling is made up of only 10 percent fruit. Also, like all Pop-Tarts, each one is fortified with sad amounts of vitamins and minerals. These pitiful amounts are as satisfying as trying to masturbate to pictures of Amish women because only around 10 percent of their skin is showing.

If you’re expected the Frosted Wild! Grape Pop-Tarts to be healthier than, let’s say Chocolate Banana Split Pop-Tarts, because it contains a little fruit, you will be disappointed. But honestly, just by looking at it, it’s easy to see it’s not the most healthiest item you can have as part of a complete breakfast. Try to name me any product with purple frosting and a radioactive green-colored drizzle that is healthy.

I’ve tried a lot of different Pop-Tart flavors in my lifetime and I have to say the Wild! Grape flavor is probably near the bottom of my favorite Pop-Tart flavors list, although I did like it. The grape flavor is a familiar one that I’ve tasted with either a grape candy or juice and it’s not overly sweet like some of the dessert flavored Pop-Tarts. It’s decent tasting, but if I want a fruit flavored Pop-Tart I’d prefer the frosted strawberry or blueberry ones. But if I want to be masochistic, deprive myself of sugary goodness and avoid unnecessary punctuation marks, I’ll purchase unfrosted Pop-Tarts.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 pastry – 200 calories, 5 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 170 milligrams of sodium, 36 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 17 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein, 10% vitamin A, 10% iron, 10% thiamin, 10% riboflavin, 10% niacin, 10% vitamin B6 and 8% folic acid.)

Item: Frosted Wild! Grape Pop-Tarts
Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Size: 8 pastries
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tastes decent toasted, straight out of the box or frozen. No trans fat. Using an exclamation point to express excitement. Exclamation point is an erect phallic punctuation.
Cons: Not one of my favorite flavors. Unnecessary use of an exclamation point. Contains high fructose corn syrup. Poor amounts of vitamins, minerals and fruit. Purple frosting and radioactive green drizzle is a little offputting. Trying to masturbate to pictures of heavily clothed Amish women. 😐

Scroll to Top