Pac-Man and Krispy Kreme have a new collaboration, and even though they're more flash than substance, I still had to check them out. (Sorry for any rough typing, I cut my hand making dinner and I am struggling to type well as it heals.)
There isn't a grand story behind it, or any kind of core memory, I just really like Pac-Man. I have a plug n' play joystick game that I still use (it also has Dig-Dug), a vintage T-shirt from the 80's that is hanging on by a thread, a vintage paper tablecloth, and a promotional Baby Pac-Man cup from the 7-Eleven 1983 series that I grew up using to give our dog, Coco, a bath. It's a simple game where you eat dots, and sometimes fruit or ghosts, and it makes me happy.
Let's see what these doughnuts have to offer...
We have three different flavors, a specialty collectable box, and cups of "dots." I opted for just the three themed doughnuts this time around (although the box was VERY tempting.)
We have a strawberry themed filled doughnut, a game board doughnut with fondant accents filled with chocolate creme, and a classic with yellow icing and marshmallow fondant Pac-Man.
First up, the strawberry creme-filled doughnut. Visually, it's mimicking one game's collectable fruits. (Strawberry is level 2, level 1 is cherries). The cherries are probably more iconic, but I am guessing they went with the strawberry because the shape is easier to replicate in doughnut-form, and it's probably a flavor they already had on hand.
This is a classic doughnut base, covered with red and green icing and round white sprinkles, filled with a pale pink strawberry-creme. It's cute, but a little messy looking.
Taste-wise, the dough is light and airy, melting in your mouth, but the filling is very disappointing. It's whipped, and sweet, but it doesn't bring much strawberry flavoring to the table. It tastes like a tablespoon of strawberry pie filling was used to flavor a huge batch of standard creme icing. I'm not a fan of creme fillings, I prefer fruit or jam, so this might be more of a personal preference thing. For me, this gets a 2/5. Too sweet and sugary, not enough strawberry.
Next up, chocolate.
This design mimics the gameboard, with yellow dots, blue maze-lines and a black-ish background topped with a marshmallow fondant line-up of Blinky, Inky, Pinky and Clyde. It is adorable, and I love it. Taking a bite, the icing had a thicker consistency, which I prefer. More like the stuff you'd find on a black and white cookie than a typical doughnut. It's sweet, shockingly didn't turn my mouth black or dark blue, and has a chocolate creme filling.
Sadly, the filling on this one was another dud. It's mildly chocolatey, kind of more milk chocolate than a classic cocoa, but it's more sweet than anything else. It gets another 2/5 in terms of taste, but I'll bump it up to a 3/5 for being so damn cute. Visually it's my favorite of the trio.
Lastly, we have a classic with some bells and whistles.
An original glazed topped with yellow icing, sprinkles, and a marshmallow fondant Pac-Man. The doughnut it great, because it's a classic glazed, and you can never go wrong with a classic glazed, but the sugary icing doesn't bring anything to the table. This is cloyingly sweet. Almost throat burningly so. I found myself scraping the yellow stuff off and letting my dogs lick it off my fingers as a little treat, but I do love the doughnut base, and the marshmallow fondant is actually quite nice, so this gets another 3/5.
I love the visuals and thoughts behind this collab, but I wish they had leaned more into fruit fillings than creme based ones. If this had strawberry fruit filling and literally any other fruity filling, they would have been more to my liking. But if you love tons of icing and creme, you'll adore these. I'm still glad I got them and -maybe- I'll have to grab a box before they disappear just for completionism sake.
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