More Permanence

Heinz has pulled off another surprising move by making their limited time product Jalapeño Ketchup a permanent product! (Renamed from "Real Jalapeño.")

If you're wondering if it's worth picking up, you can find my review of it here.

Thomas' Cinnamon Vanilla English Muffins

In our house we blow through Thomas' low-calorie English muffins, so it isn't often that their seasonal varieties evade my eye in the store.  In fact, Thomas' has had quite a few ephemeral muffins recently that I've failed to review here, due to laziness.  Hopefully they'll be back next winter so I can nab'em.

Here's a food industry secret: you know that smell that surrounds every Cinnabon or Auntie Annie's that you've ever passed?  It's almost always a combination of cinnamon and vanilla.  You'll realize that as you reach for this package in the store or walk by the stuff in your own  house.  The smell is powerful, and it has a large radius of influence.

How does it taste?  Not as good as it smells.  However you prepare them, these muffins will mostly convey cinnamon, but not vanilla.  The cinnamon is strong and earthy, but the vanilla is faint and subdued.  As you take a bite, your nose will pick it up more vanilla than while chewing, because of its aromatic volatility.

In the end, it's really good, but I'm not sure it's better than any other permanent cinnamon muffin from Thomas'.


Thomas' Cinnamon Vanilla English muffins:- Good
Original Thomas' English muffins(for comparison):- Good

Milky Way French Vanilla and Caramel

It's a pleasant surprise seeing Milky Way experiment a bit.  The last time they mixed it up that I can remember was a few years ago when they implemented the now-permanent Milky Way Simply Caramel, which is an incredible product.

Anyway, French vanilla sounded like an interesting angle for a chocolate bar.  Wikipedia tells me that "French vanilla" is distinguished from normal vanilla flavoring by conventionally (not technically) containing a stronger vanilla flavor, or instead a custard flavor, since French ice cream was historically in the style of frozen custard.  For products that do not contain custard, like this one, Wiki says that caramel or butterscotch are sometimes added.

As you sink your teeth in, you can tell that something isn't quite as expected.  The vanilla is indeed strong; a perfume of it fills your mouth as you chew.  As you get further, it becomes clear that something is added to the vanilla nougat to make it feel richer.  My bet is on butter flavoring.  This isn't the first time I've seen butter used as an attempt to mimic other flavors.

In the end, it's just not quite right.  You literally can't taste the caramel or chocolate in each bite, and instead you're left with a mix of vanilla and butter.  I supposed it's not bad for a change, but I can't see myself reaching for one of these ever again.


Milky Way French Vanilla and Caramel:- Passable
Original Milky Way (for comparison):- Good

Pop-Tarts Chocolate Vanilla Creme

Pop-Tarts were introduced in 1964, making 2014 the brand's 50th Anniversary.  They've introduced two limited time flavors for this occasion.

I'll start the first "Birthday Edition" Pop-Tarts review by saying that ephemeral Pop-Tarts are usually pretty remarkable, if not notable, at least.  These buck that trend.  What's worse, this flavor is supposedly a flashback to a successful past variety of Pop-Tarts.  Why they brought these back, I don't know.

The company forgot to put any flavor along with the sugar in this product.  The chocolate pastry is only vaguely reminiscent of chocolate, with plenty of their full-time products hitting a higher mark in this category.  The creme is supposedly vanilla creme, but it doesn't taste like it.  Its sweetness is on par, of course, and if I try hard, I can detect the slightest notes of powdered milk or powdered cream.  That's it.  No vanilla.

Oddly, this product doesn't improve when toasted and warm, like most Pop-Tarts do.  I just don't get what they were trying to do here.


Pop-Tarts Chocolate Vanilla Creme:- Passable
Original Pop-Tarts S'mores(for comparison):- Great