Candy Salad Controversy - Mike & Ike Red, White and Blue

Mike & Ike Red White & Blue 

Probably should have reviewed this on Memorial Day, but better late than never. 

I think the Candy Salad trend has come to an end. In case you're not chronically online (like me) it was when a group of people get together and they each bring a bag of candy to share with the group. All the candies are combined in a large vessel, usually a bowl, and then redistributed to the group Pick-a-Mix style for snacking. 

I thought this trend was a lot of fun, and I plan on doing it with my little cousins at our next sleepover, but it also sparked controversy. Everything from people hating on the unhealthy amount of sugar consumption (fair) to critiquing candy contributions. 

While preferences will always differ, there are a few faux pas that I agree with:

The Blue Chill - Blueberry Lavender Kombucha

Blue Chill Blueberry Lavender Kombucha 

Aldi dropped the 'bucha-ball. I think it's safe to say they've discontinued their trio of standard flavors, so now, other than Blood Orange, they don't offer any unique flavors. Not even rotating seasonal ones. (At least not consistently.) 

Lidl on the other hand is always offering something new. I really loved their last flavor, so I went back to stock up, but it's switched over to summer. Which apparently means blueberry lavender.

A Frugal Indulgence for a Millennial Marie Antoinette - Aldi Spring Assortment Macarons

Aldi Spring Macarons

There is a clear difference between freshly-made bakery macarons and mass produced frozen ones BUT that doesn't mean frozen macarons are bad. They're just different. 

Pros of frozen macarons: more affordable, are readily available in stores like Aldi, Walmart, Lidl, etc., keep for a long time but are quick to thaw for snacking.

Cons of frozen macarons: Their stability means they aren't as decadent or delicate as freshly made, and they tend to come in boring flavors. If you'd seen one box of frozen macrons, you've  seen them all. 

Until now that is. Aldi is opening their frozen macaron section up to seasonal flavors, like this spring box. I hope this is the start of a trend and we see more, maybe even limited edition, flavors in the future. So, what's in this spring mix and how does it compare to the normal year-round one? 

Pinkies up! It's Tea-Time - 3 different teas (Lidl & Aldi)

Tea Time

Long story short, I like tea, but my ex was obsessed. He would steep bags of green tea, peppermint tea, jasmine tea, and black tea, all mixed up, for hours at a time. Tea snobs would probably have a heart attack looking at the concoctions he made, but, I enabled him. (My bad.) Especially during the pandemic. 

He went through tea so quickly that last March, when things started shutting down, I stocked up. People probably thought I had a bunker somewhere, but with his heavy usage of about 12 bags a day, what I bought would have been about 2 months worth. Imagine a large kitchen drawer filled with peppermint and green tea bags. Not long after that, he was gone. And here I am, STILL drinking peppermint tea over a year later. (Because I'm stubborn and hate wasting things.)  

I am so sick of peppermint tea. So let's shake things up with some fruity summer flavors from Lidl and Aldi.   

Waffle Blues (Not Blue Waffle.)

Blueberry Waffle Organic Cotton Candy - Target

I still have a few Eastery-y products to review, so I might as well knock them out now while everything is still available (and likely on clearance.)

First up, this Blueberry Waffle Cotton Candy I picked up at Target! 

Halloween-Themed Fruit Roll-Ups for Dinner

Franken Berry and Boo Berry Fruit Roll-Ups  - CVS

I'm alive! My day job opened it's doors a few weeks ago, and although things aren't quite the same as they once were, I'm adjusting to my "new normal," rather well.  

During my quarantine at home I made tons of fancy meals, 7 loaves of bread, at least a dozen batches of cookies, 3 pot roasts, and a lackluster copycat recipe of Auntie Anne's cinnamon sugar pretzels. Plus, I wrote, like, two food reviews. Whoops.

I thought having all that time at home would have allowed me to be more productive on this blog, but when everyone was trying to work from home, and do their college courses/exams from home, and the dogs were antagonized by the insane amount of delivery men outside...I had a really hard time sitting down and thinking clearly. I baked, wrangled the dogs, or did laundry and stuff around the house instead. Like cleaning out our snack cabinets, and low and behold, the very last of the Halloween-themed Fruit Roll-ups were there, waiting to be uncovered. 

Let's eat them for dinner.

Code Blue!

Blueberry Gobbler Big Gay Ice Cream - Wawa

My first foray into Big Gay Ice Cream didn't quite live up to my expectations, but this flavor? You had me at blueberry balsamic swirls! 

I already covered the packaging in my past post so let's skip the pleasantries and get right into the review! 

Blueberries, Butts & Bubblegum

Lotte Fruity Bubble Gum Dispensers - Asian Food Markets 

Sometimes it's the subtle things that win me over. Sure this has cool packaging, but one little detail is all it took for me to toss this into my cart. Notice anything different between these two flavors?  

On the right, we have little gum-ghosts blowing bubbles shaped like blueberries, which just so happens to match the flavor of the candy inside. The peach gum-ghosts? They're blowing normal balloon-shaped bubbles. Why is that? Because if they were blowing up peaches it'd look like they were blowing up pink-hued bubble-butts...or worse. Part of me wishes they hadn't of caught that (the evil part), but my graphic design background wants to commend their design-team and their foresight. 

As it turns out, everything about this packaging is incredibly thoughtful. 

The name is Red, it looks Purple, but it tastes like Blue

Redbull Limited Edition Blueberry - Target $2.09

I tried to find a classy way to work in a blue-bulls joke into the post title...but I failed. 

While I'm out grabbing groceries and doing other boring adult stuff, I like to grab a little treat for my boyfriend. Sometimes it's candy, sometimes it's food, but nine times out of ten, it's a random flavor of Redbull. One of his go-to pick-me-up products. 

We've tried a lot of flavors over the years, but never blueberry, which is rarely ever seen on its own. (Normally it's paired with trendier fruits like acai, or lumped in with red-berries.) Will this taste like real fruit? Or will it taste like blue? We shall see...

A Tall, Cold, Glass of...Vinegar?

Hong Cho - H-mart (Came with a FREE reusable bottle!)

I love vinegar! In my early 20's I had intense stress-related stomach issues that put me out of commission for several months, and the cure? Vinegar! (And less stress. I love vinegar, but let's not be click-bait-y. It's not a cure all!) 

It's popular to use vinegar for pickling, sauces, and dressings, but I straight up drink it! I'm sure that sounds weird to most people, but I'm not alone! 

Blueberry Pancake Swirl Bread - Walmart

Blueberry Pancake Swirl Bread - Walmart

Limited Edition breads usually don't interest me.

Every single month Thomas's releases something seasonal, and even though they all sound yummy, I usually pass them by. Until now. When I was looking for some new Twinkies this limited edition flavor caught my eye. My boyfriend loves blueberries, and his daughter loves French toast, so this was too perfect a product to pass up.

America POP flavored gum - Walmart

America POP flavored gum - Walmart 

'Merica Pop, that you can't stop
I know you chew this 'Merica pop
This must be, GUM

I graduated high school when "Dirty Pop" by *Nsync was on the radio, and now Justin Timberlake is voicing a blue CG troll. Life is weird.

Happy Fourth of July my fellow Americans! It's time for a holiday/seasonally appropriate review! In the past I've reviewed America themed Skittles and  Red White & Blue Tic-Tacs, but this year we've got America Pop gum from Juicy Fruit.

I had to buy a three pack just to try this flavor, so fingers crossed it's good!

Meltyblend Strawberry & Blueberry Chocolates

Meltyblend Strawberry & Blueberry Chocolates - Asian Food Markets $3.49 each

I know updating has been pretty sporadic while I finish up all this house-buying-business, but today I've got 2 reviews mashed up into one!

We've got Meiji's Meltyblend in, not one, but two fancy fruity flavors: strawberry, and blueberry!

Blueberry Lemon and Strawberry Shortcake Toll House Cookies

Toll House Limited Edition Cookies - Walmart $2.50 (each)

I don't buy grocery store cookies very often, because I'm a cookie snob.

As you can tell by this blog...I eat a lot of pre-made junk food, but I also like cooking and baking. If you follow me on Instagram, you see a lot of the stuff that I cook in my kitchen that isn't quite blog-worthy, but I take a lot of pride in making my baked goods from scratch in my own kitchen. So when it comes to things like pre-made cookies you just break apart and bake, I critique things really harshly because nothing tastes as good as real cookies baked from scratch at home, but, there are some exceptions...

4 Flavors of Fit & Active Fruit Bars - Aldi

4 Flavors of Fit & Active Fruit Bars - Aldi (Clearance .99 cents each)

I love food. I love cooking food, finding new foods, photographing food, eating food. Food makes me irrationally happy, and it's why I started a food blog, but every day I scroll through my Instagram feed and I see tons of people eating meal replacement bars, protein puddings, pro-gurts (protein yogurt), and other things that just look like soylent-protein-power-monstrosities. If it makes other people happy I'm all for it. I'm not knocking their lifestyle (especially since they seem far healthier and more active than I am) but eating that stuff would be torture for me. It takes all the fun and texture out of food!

Along with my lifelong love of food, I'm also a frugal shopper. I love a good deal, so when I saw that these Fit & Active bars were on sale at Aldi for only .99 cents a box, I thought this could be my version of a meal replacement bar. I typically don't eat breakfast, and I don't eat lunch until 1-2PM, so eating one of these for breakfast is probably a good idea, right? Then again, will a "healthy" fruit bar that only cost me .20 cents each taste good?

Fruity Pocky - Amazon

Fruity Pocky - Amazon

I leave for the Summer Fancy Food Show in New York TOMORROW! Am I prepared? Well...

Professional food blogger business cards? Check! My fancy new Media Kit (which took me all night to finish)? Check! Clothes and luggage packed? ....kind of? Food reviews queue up for YouTube and the blog? . . . .

I still have a LOT to do before I leave, but I'm doing my best to knock all of that out today, plus this way I can take care of a few more products in my food stash. Win win! For today's post I have some fancy Pocky I bought online. I usually refrain from buying food stuff on Amazon because it never arrives in one piece. Even though the seller packaged these with lots of bubble wrap and FRAGILE stickers...the strawberry box is still a little worse for wear. But hey, even if it's in pieces it'd still edible! Let's see if these fancy foreign Pocky taste any different than the Japanese versions.

Blueberry Pie Oreos -Target

Blueberry Pie Oreos -Target

Welp, here we are. Another limited edition Oreo to review.

I was originally going to skip this one on purpose because I thought it was going to be boring. Remember when I had those Blueberry Ice Cream Oreos from China? Those had a mentholated effect to recreate the coolness of ice cream mixed into the cookie. After trying those I didn't feel the need to taste America's version...until all my other foodie friends gave it a try and rated it so highly. Could I have been wrong? Was this cookie not a flop after all? I guess we'll see!

Bluesberry Smash - 7-Eleven

Bluesberry Smash - 7-Eleven

The last flavor I reviewed was a bust, but I still love you Jones, and I know you can do better. Here we are again with another flavor from this line-up to hopefully redeem this brand that I know and love. 

Writing that last review broke my heart, but it had to be done. That tropical soda was awful and I wasn't the only one to think so. My sister and my boyfriend both hated it as well, but maybe that was the dud in the flavor line-up. There's no way all 5 flavors could be a bust, right? I decided to give these another shot, and this one is blue, which means it's automatically cooler and 1000% more awesome.  

Blueberry Quinoa BarkThins - Target

Blueberry Quinoa BarkThins - Target 

Is quinoa still healthy if it's coated in chocolate? No? Well this is dark chocolate, and there's blueberries in there too, so I'm going to call this health food anyway. Plus it was on the clearance rack, so I saved money on it to boot! Win-win!

Whenever I'm at Target I look at the clearance grocery section because...I'm cheap! (Hey, don't judge! I'm a daily food blogger with a full time job, a delicate injury-prone Pomeranian, and a smashed car to deal with. I gotta pinch those pennies!) That little clearance shelf is home to all kinds of unique goodies, I got those avocado oil chips, that amazing India-style meal kit, and a few pumpkin spiced items. Every single one of those products were great, and I got them for less than their original price. So just because it's on clearance, doesn't mean it's not worth checking out. Let's see if this is another successful clearance rack venture!

Blueberry Ice Cream Oreos: YouTube Review

One of my friends grabbed me a package of these Oreos from China...

but that was a few months ago. Let's hope these aren't expired!