Timbits In Thailand

I'm a Canadian through and through, I'm so Canadian that I believe it is my duty to visit each and every Tim Horton's that I can. Whenever I travel to any country that has a Tim Horton's I'm sure to check in and pick up a donut or a few Timbits. There are probably a few people reading this that didn't know that Tim Horton's had spread out globally, and maybe even a few of you have no idea what Tim Horton's is at all. For those who are completely unfamiliar, Tim Horton's is an iconic donut and coffee shop in Canada. If you ever visit any city in all of Canada, chances are they have a Tim Horton's. Chances are also good that the locals either love the place, or love to complain about how it's gone downhill and not worth visiting.

For those familiar with Tim Horton's, but didn't know that they're global then you might be a little surprised. I've visited a few Tim Horton's locations in my life, including UAE and China. The one thing I can say about all of the international locations I've visited is they each take the theme and make it their own. UAE is probably the most similar to a regular Tim Horton's, with a few custom creations. China is more like a Canadian themed restaurant, with less focus on the donuts. Thailand is probably closer to the Tim Horton's from Canada, but it's still a little more Canadian themed restaurant like. They offer a few of the classic Tim Horton's treats, but many of their treats are just a little different. I've decided that the best way to show you is by picking up a box of assorted Timbits and rating each one. Allison and I picked up 10 Timbits and got 5 different flavours. We'll start with the standards, then move our way to the more unique.

Chocolate Glazed - The nice thing about this donut was that it was pretty much exactly the same as the Canadian equivalent. I'm happy they offer a few of the classics so Canadians can feel a little taste of home, and locals can taste a little Canadian authenticity. Allison was particularly happy because this is her go to Timbit.

Strawberry Snow - While this goes by a different name than I remember, the Strawberry Snow is basically just a strawberry powdered Timbit. This isn't a donut I'd seen much on my recent stay in Canada, but I do remember them from when I was a kid. The "snow" name is also clever as many people in South East Asia have never actually seen snow and see Canada as a beautiful white land during the winter.

Chocolate Snow - While the concept is the same as the Strawberry Snow, I don't have any memories of there being a chocolate powdered donut at Tim Horton's in the past. Let me know if I'm wrong, but this seems like a different variation. It's also a variation  I think people would really enjoy in Canada (this is going to be a theme from here on out).

Chocolate Truffle - This Timbit now holds the title for the most decadent Timbit I've ever eaten. What you have is a chocolate Timbit, covered in a dark chocolate coating, which then has real chocolate curls on the outside. It was the more rich Timbit I've ever tasted in my life. I feel like this would probably be a really popular Timbit in Canada with one problem. I feel like Tim Horton's would lose money selling this in Canada because it's obviously made with good quality chocolate (expensive) and you pretty much just have to eat one Timbit and you're full.

Maple Coffee - If I could somehow transport a Timbit to you through the internet, this would be the one I send. This Timbit is pretty much the poster child for flavours of Tim Horton's, a Canadian coffee chain. It's a vanilla Timbit with maple icing that's then liberally dusted with coffer crunchy bits (maybe even some real coffee). While I'm not a huge fan of coffee myself, I can't deny that the flavours worked, and created something that just made me feel patriotic at every bite.

These were my 5 Timbits. I've mentioned before, but now that I'm living in South East Asia again, I feel like I'll be visiting Bangkok a few times over the next few years. It's a comfortable place for me, and the fact that there's a Tim Horton's only makes it more comfortable.

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Obviously You Should Get Treats and Beasts Right Now

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Sweet, It's a Potato

I feel like the sweet potato is one of the most underused ingredients in snacks, at least in North America. In parts of Asia the sweet potato is so common that you might even see it more often than regular potatoes. I think the thing that makes it unique is the fact that it really works well in both savory and sweet applications. The flavour is on the sweet side, but not so sweet that it doesn't work with a bit of salt. I've seen sweet potatoes as jams, cookie and chocolate fillings, coated in sugar, and as we see in today's new review, chips.

Check out my latest sweet potato snack review.

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A Snickers by any Other Name

I'm never really sure how this works, I think Snicker's bars are called Marathon bars in the UK, but a while back there was also a Marathon bar made by Snickers in North America.  I'd like to see all three versions of this bar in the same place at the same time.

Don't get confused, relax and pick up a copy of my comic book called Snack Facts.

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No Better Book to Read Right Now Than Treats and Beasts

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Milk Chocolate By Definition

I find that the definition of milk chocolate is a little complicated to nail down. Many dark chocolates contain milk, white chocolate also often contains milk. One might even argue that some white chocolates contain more milk than milk chocolates. Some milk chocolates are very cocoa forward, in fact I would argue that most milk chocolates, should be called chocolate with milk. This Milka bar that I reviewed this week is probably one of the best examples of a chocolate bar that really celebrates the milk part of milk chocolate. 

Check out the full review right here.

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Do The Twist

 You can watch them put the twist into Twizzlers.

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Chocolate Spread From Myanmar - Is It Better Than Nutella Part 1

 

I'm a big fan of chocolate spreads. While I was brought up on Nutella, I don't know if it's truly the best on out there. It's probably the most famous of them all, and I've written about it many times on this blog. Nutella has become so popular that many people refer to all chocolate spreads as "Nutella". A few times on this blog I've also pointed out some alternatives to Nutella, some better and some not so great. The thing that most people don't realize is that there are many chocolate spreads that are different than Nutella. In particular some great chocolate spreads that don't use the same ingredients, like some with no hazelnuts at all.

Today for example I tried a really interesting chocolate spread from Myanmar. As you can see by the giant sticker on the jar, they're very proud of the fact that it's made locally. I learned recently that Myanmar actually grows their own cocoa beans, and there's a budding chocolate business here. Interestingly, because it's such a small crop in Myanmar, most of the chocolate products made with Myanamar chocolate are made by local companies. The great thing about these local companies is that they really think about the ingredients they use. This chocolate spread for example contains few ingredients, and doesn't use palm oil at all. I'm also pretty certain there's no nuts added to it either, so unlike Nutella it's just a chocolate spread and not a chocolate hazelnut spread.

The best way I can describe this spread is that it's a coconut oil spread with a chocolate flavour. It took me a little while to get used to the coconut oil flavour, as it's a lot more powerful than a palm oil, but after a little while I really started to enjoy it. It's not as sweet tasting as Nutella, but it is very unique. While I don't know if I like it more than Nutella, I love that it's around and that they offer something so different. I would recommend that anyone with the means to give it a try, even if just to have something different.

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Now You're Cooking with Junk Fud on the Road

 In this episode of Junk Fud on the Road, Allison and Chris talk about cooking while on the road.

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Many Fun Creatures in Treats and Beasts

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I Don't Really Like Coffee

 

When I was younger, even a teenager, I hated coffee. Today I can drink it if it's offered, to be polite, but I would never choose it. I'd prefer tea any day, and hot chocolate every day. I feel the same way about most coffee candies too. While I'll eat them, it's rare for me to hunt them out. When I do appreciate them, I tend to look for ways that it doesn't really taste like coffee. It could be that it's nice and creamy, or in some cases it kind of tastes like chocolate.

Check out this coffee review, that I bought kind of by accident.

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Tarantino Knows His Food

 I love to see how pop culture and food work together. Many artists use food to help tell their story.

If you want to check out my story, pick up a copy of Treats and Beasts right now.

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Rip Into What?

 I've always thought of a Slim Jim as being a very masculine snack. There's a lot of ripping going on. Today I try to look at the Slim Jim objectively, and find out how weird it actually is.

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Look At Treats and Beasts

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I Expect A Lot Of Complaints About This Review

I have to be honest, I'm not even sure if a Slim Jim qualifies to be reviewed on this site, so don't send me any messages complaining. I'm going to keep it up for now, but who knows, maybe I'll pull it off later because I just don't feel like a stick of meat is candy. I will argue that if we take the food category of meat, and look at where Slim Jim's fit, I think one could say that the Slim Jim is the candy of the meat world.

Read this new review, it might not stay online forever.

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Making Bubble Gum

 Apparently the song we used to sing in grade school about how bubble gum was made is completely false.

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A Look Back At My Reviews In 2022

For the first time ever, I've decided to compile some statistics about all of the candy reviews that I posted in 2022. All together I managed to post 71 new reviews on candycritic.org. That's not bad considering my goal is to make sure that I post at least one new review a week. It's very good when one considers that there was an entire month when I could not post any new reviews due to technical problems.

I've already posted a video with a list of the highest rated and lowest rated candies I've reviewed this year, but below are some interesting bonus statistics about all the candy I discovered in 2022:

The brand I reviewed most: Hershey's with 8 reviews. It makes sense since we managed to visit the US twice this year, including one fairly long road trip.

Place I got my candy this year: More than half of the candies I reviewed were from North America. This is likely because I was back in Canada for most of the year, as well as the above mentioned visits to the US.

Most common type of candy I reviewed: Candy bars were the most common type of candy I reviewed this year with 19 candy bar reviews added.

I ate mostly Kit Kat bars this year: I reviewed 5 Kit Kat bars this year, a big part of that was the discovery of a new Asian grocery store in Ottawa that had a decent selection of Japanese Kit Kat bars.

I feel like it was a great year for candy, and with my recent relocation to South East Asia and the fact that travel is starting to open up again, I really feel like 2023 is going to be an interesting year for candy reviews on candycritic.org. Let me know if there are any treats you'd like to see featured for review, even if you're the company that makes them.

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Kicking Things Off With Treats and Beasts

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Is a Buckeye Supposed to be a Buck's Eye?

I keep wanting to tell myself that this treat I just reviewed has nothing to do with hunting. More to the point, that it has nothing to do with scooping the eyeball out of a dead animals head. It's funny, but if this was sold as a Halloween candy, with the whole scooping an eyeball out of an animal, I'd be okay with it. I'm not against hunting, I do realize where meat comes from, but I feel like scooping out an animals eye is a little gross for a theme for a candy. I know that there is also an American university called the Buckeyes, but I don't know where that came from either. I just can't get over at how much a buckeye candy can actually look like a buck's eye without using too much imagination.

Check out my family friendly review of these buckeyes without any mention of scooping animals eyes out.

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Popcorn Popping

 This is a great video to not only watch popcorn pop, but you might learn a little something about popcorn as well.

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Jump For Joy, It's Treats And Beasts!

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A Week's Worth Of Squish

All this week I'm featuring gummy candies from a Canadian candy maker called Squish. They specialize in gummy candies, which is something I would have never thought I would ever see. When I was a kid the concept of a candy only store was rare, unless it was a fancy chocolate shop. Then as a teenager the candy store started to creep up in popularity, until the retro candy store started to become fairly common all over the place. Today it seems we might be heading into a new era, where we don't just have candy stores, but stores dedicated to one particular kind of candy. As a kid this would have totally blown my mind.

Check out the first Squish candy review, it's pretty amazing.

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Don't Throw This Snowball!

 Are Snowballs (the cake) a winter treat?

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Bangkok Snacking

 We recently got back from a quick trip to Thailand, and boy are my arms tired. That's a really lame joke, and not very relatable to my trip. It would be more appropriate to say that our stomachs are totally stuffed instead of our arms being tired because we filled up on all kinds of great food. What you have to know about this trip before you continue reading is two things. First of all we have been to Bangkok many times, we've lived in South East Asia for several years in the past, and we're living there now. The second thing you should know is something I just said, we live in South East Asia right now. What that means is we're not really going crazy over the South East Asianess of this adventure. We can get street food, great hot pot and all kinds of rice and noodle dishes where we live. In some ways we go to a big city like Bangkok to get a little big city life as well as western food. So don't complain that we did South East Asia poorly on this adventure because we pretty much live it every single day.

As I said, this is a quick journal highlighting some of the things we ate on this adventure. I feel like this is an interesting representation of Thai eating from the perspective of people who lives in South East Asia, and haven't seen a McDonalds in months.

Needless to say, the first thing we ate when we got into the airport was McDonalds. It was nothing special, just a way to get that craving out of the way and eat something quickly before the long cab ride to our hotel. Those of you who have visited Bangkok before know that you need to be prepared for a long cab ride from the airport and fueling up (along with a bathroom break) is essential.

The next morning... McDonalds again (this will be a reoccurring theme). We had a busy day planned and we just wanted to get breakfast quick and we all know that McDonalds breakfast is a travelers dream. The cool thing about this particular breakfast at McDonalds is that I managed to sample one of the Thailand McDonalds exclusives the McPatongko. It's basically a crispy deep fried donut that comes with a condensed milk dipping sauce. Happy that I tried it, but didn't feel the need to get them again.

When we visit Thailand, there are certain places we always like to get food. We'll often go back again and again until we're kind of sick of it, or at the very least until we no longer feel like we'll regret not going one more time. Something you learn traveling in certain parts of the world is that some foods are more dangerous than others when it come to food born illness. Most seasoned travelers will tell you that meat it not the true danger, ice cubes and lettuce are the silent killers. Because we live in South East Asia, in a place that could be a danger for food born illness, we don't often get to enjoy a good salad. The great news is that we know a place in Thailand that not only offers a clean safe salad, but the salads they make are excellent. This place is known as Jones's Salad, and I feel like we ate there at least 3 times on this adventure, and we certain stopped there on our first day.

For those of you looking for something a little more South East Asian, this is your time to shine. Another one of my always first day must have foods is mango sticky rice, bought off of the street. I have two vendors that I always frequent, and they've never disappointed. Mango sticky rice will always be the first and last dessert I get on any trip to Bangkok. Sometimes I'll get one or two in between as well, I believe I've even had a trip where I got a serving of this amazing dessert each and every day of my stay. As a person who loves sweets, I can easily tell you that a well made mango sticky rice is the best dessert on offer in the entirety of Thailand, maybe even in all of South East Asia.

Our next stop in Bangkok makes the least sense of them all, Tim Horton's. Sure we lived in Canada just a few months ago, but for some reason I just can't stop in a city with a Tim Horton's without seeing what they have on offer. For those of you that don't know, Tim Horton's has had great success with locations all over Asia. I love the idea of seeing how these international locations differ and how they're the same as the classic Canadian shops. I'd like to tell you all about that right here, but you'll have to wait a little while as I'm currently writing a blog dedicated to my experience eating Timbits in Thailand.

For one of our lunches we decided to get some Japanese tonkatsu. It was a fine meal, however the interesting part of it was the decorations. The entire restaurant was filled with fun tonkatsu characters all dressed up for Christmas. I found the fact that little pigs were celebrating the holiday season right next to breaded pork cutlets to be a little weird, but that's mostly because I was raised to disassociate my food from the animal. In most Asian cities it's celebrated.

The one thing Allison can't resist when we go to Thailand is Sao Ping. Once again, all of you out there who think that we overdo western food in Thailand, you'll enjoy this. Sao Ping is a fried bean based cake that's a very common street food. They have various fillings and can even have differing ingredients in the cake, but they all have a similar texture and always taste great warm. I've seen them for sale in a few bakeries and grocery stores, but I always feel like the street version is the best. This is probably because of their very short shelf life. While they taste fine a little old, they're so much better fresh off of the heat.

One thing that seems to be constantly growing in all parts of Asia is ice tea. Milk tea, boba tea, and fruit teas run rampant at every corner. There are combinations of these teas, speciality version and over the top dessert ice teas available everywhere. I decided to jump into this trend head first and tried something called a Dirty Nutella Milk Tea. It consisted of a chocolate milk tea, chocolate sauce, many generous scoops of Nutella at the bottom, and oddly marshmallow used like boba balls. The marshmallows were the strangest part, but kind of fun to hunt down throughout the drink. Getting the occasional mouth full of Nutella was fun, but also pretty heavy. While I did enjoy this sweet treat, it left me more thirsty than when I started.

For our last meal we decided to sit down to some shabu shabu. The great thing about shabu shabu is it allows everyone to get a lot of whatever they want. We of coarse stuffed ourselves silly, but I didn't pass up the free scoop of ice cream for dessert.

Given the fact that I just stuffed my face with a great deal of meat a vegetables, I thought I'd give the charcoal ice cream a taste. It made sense since charcoal is known to help with an upset stomach, and it's ice cream, so it'll make it fun too. It actually tasted pretty good, but I can't say it did much to settle my stomach considering the amount we ate.

My final treat, you guessed it, McDonalds. This time I blame the fact that I had 45 minutes between the time we checked out of the hotel to the time we needed to get picked up for our cab ride back to the airport. I did however manage to get another Thailand signature dessert. It's the pineapple pie a la mode. There are so many great things about this dessert that make me wonder why all McDonalds can't have this. First of all the pie is deep fried, unless the filling of a McDonalds pie is ultra unique, I really only go for the deep fried pies. Secondly the pineapple is a fun filling, maybe not something I'd always order, but once in a while it's supper tasty. Finally, putting it in ice cream is a brilliant move. I'm sure if they don't actually offer this at your local McDonalds you could probably just get a sundae and put your pie in it, but I'm kind of lazy, so I've never done that before.

Seeing as we're back in Asia for a few years, I seriously doubt this will be my last stop in Bangkok. I might write another recap, but frankly most of my trips to Bangkok look a lot like this one. 

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This Video Will Make You Feel Regular... or plain... or original

 I've always wondered how candy companies define the words "regular, plain or original". I feel like every treat has its own idea of what this should mean. While I have a few ideas about how some snacks label their basic treat, there are always a few weird ones that don't fit into the mold.

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Indeed This Treats And Beasts Is Fun To Read

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I Don't Like Barbecue

I don't mind the real thing, pork and beef slow cooked over a barbecue pit, but I've never been able to really enjoy barbecue flavoured snacks. I think it has something to do with fake smoke flavouring. I don't mind if something has a real smoky flavour, but that liquid smoke (or any fake smoke) flavour just doesn't cut it for me. In my time as the Candy Critic I've attempt to train myself to appreciated certain flavours like licorice and marshmallows, but I feel like barbeque chips might be one that I just don't bother trying to appreciate. I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything just because I don't really dig fake smoke flavouring.

Check out the full review of these barbecue chips, and find out why they didn't do that badly.

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Santa Losing Weight

 I don't really understand the logic of this commercial. It appears that Santa just spent Christmas Eve delivering presents but also eating too much food. He complains about eating too much, but then goes on to eat a candy bar. He also seems a little foul mouthed, but maybe that's just a misinterpretation.

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A Long Time Cactus Coming

When I first tasted Cactus Candy more than 15 years ago, I never thought I'd get to taste it again. I'm glad I did, and I might even try and pick it up again some time in the future.

You can check out the full review here.

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Holy Cow This Treats and Beasts Is Great!

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Spice Might Kill You

I feel like the word "spice" is a difficult word to define. The word has always meant two things to me. Spice for me can either be defining something that has some heat, or it can also just mean something that has herbs and spices added to change the flavour of something. While the heat element could be seen as something that changes the flavour of something, it has something else about it too. More recently, spice in both senses of the word tend to mean an extreme flavour addition, be it spicy or not. It's as if some "spicing" of foods doesn't deserve to be called spice, only if the spice is more powerful than every other flavour in the food. This new review is a key example of "spice" in the extreme.

Check out this treat that does not go light on the spice.

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Christmas Traditions

There are certain traditions that I have, including watching this adorable M&M's commercial.

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The Advent of Calendars

Every year I go to the store and stare dumbfounded at the Christmas items. My first thought is often, September seems a little early to be selling Christmas items, but that’s followed by my indecision trying to pick out my advent calendar for the Christmas season. The advent calendar is probably the first Christmas treat I think about for the holidays. It seems like the only holiday treat you can buy well before Christmas, mostly because you actually start eating it on December 1st.

So there I am, staring at the vast selection of cardboard walls filled with 24 doors hiding surprises behind each. The question is, which one should I get? For the sake of argument, and to keep this blog on brand, let’s eliminate any non-candy themed advent calendar. I’m not saying that they’re inauthentic or better or worse than the candy themed advent calendars. I just feel like they’re in a category all their own. The question I want to focus on is which of the candy filled advent calendars should I get.

While the selection is huge, one thing I’ve noticed is that almost all of them seem to have a chocolate theme. It’s pretty rare (if not impossible) to find an advent calendar filled with hard candy or gum. There’s also three basic categories I find with advent calendars. There’s the inexpensive basic chocolate calendars, calendars filled with popular candy bars, and calendars filled with fine chocolates. The prices of these different categories also have a huge range. First let’s look at each category, then try and figure out what’s best.

To me, the most traditional form of advent calendars are the simple chocolate ones. At the very least, these are the kind that I used to get as a kid. I’m not sure if the candy bar calendars and fancy calendars came out later in my life, or if my parents kept them away from me so they wouldn’t have to spend that much money. In general the quality of the chocolate is not great. Sometimes it’s downright awful (as I’m experiencing right now). The kinds/sizes of the chocolate in these simple advent calendars tends to be pretty basic, on occasion they have a bigger chocolate for the last one. Shapes can also vary in variety, however I often find that these simpler calendars have some pretty festive shapes and designs. The biggest advantage of these advent calendars is the price. If you’re looking for the fun of opening a door every day, maybe to a fun little shape, but you don’t care about the chocolate, these are for you.

The next category is the candy bar calendars. These are advent calendars filled with a name brand candy like Kit Kat or Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups. I feel like these have come about more recently as advent calendars have become more popular. The size of the treat in these can also vary, but most of the time you have snack or mini sized versions of the classic treat, with a full sized treat as your last. Theme wise it can sometimes be a little weak as the focus is on the candy being recognizable and not festive. Although this is changing a bit over the last few years with many candy brands releasing special holiday themed versions of their treats. The price of these is one of the differences between these and the simple advent calendars. You can find these candy bar calendars going for 10 times the price of the basic simple calendars. These will give you the treats you want/like, but you’re paying for it and you might be disappointed with the size of each treat.

The final category of advent calendar is filled with fine chocolates. The quality of these treats guarantees you’ll enjoy eating each and every chocolate. Theme wise they can really vary, in some cases they can be truly festive, sometimes they just hint at the holidays, while other times they’re more concerned with making pretty chocolates over the festive spirit. These treats will often make your mouth very excited about opening each door, but it’s at a cost as they’re never cheap. I’ve seen some of these calendars go for over 100 dollars.

Which calendar you buy really depends on what experience you want, and if you’re willing to pay for it. In general, I tend to go for the simple cheap chocolate calendars. I feel like part of it is out of nostalgia, but also what I’m looking for. There’s something fun about opening a little door each morning, seeing a little festive designed treat, and getting just a little sweet chocolate taste. If I want something fancy or name brand, I feel like I’d be better off just buying that treat separately. I will say that on occasion I’ve been very disappointed with the quality of the treats in these simple calendars, however I’ve also been surprised at how good some of them are too. 

I feel like the ceremony of the advent calendar is much more important than the treat itself. While it’s always nice to get something tasty, it’s not so important to me that it would ruin the yearly tradition of opening up little doors every day in December even if the chocolate isn’t that great.

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Good Golly, It's Treats and Beasts

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Drink Your Gum

I think there's a subtle art to the candy crossover. Not every company can pull it off. Those who do pull it off fall into one of two categories. Either you spend a lot of time crafting the perfect crossover, balancing the flavours and textures of the original in order to try cross them over with a different kind of treat. The other are those who have a treat that just naturally works with other treats. Kool-Aid has a lot of options when it comes crossing over since they have simple yet iconic flavours. I'm hoping this is only the first step towards more Kool-Aid themed treats in the future.

Check out the first of 3 Kool-Aid gum reviews that I'm posting this week.

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Ring My Bell

 Every year I watch this commercial and every year it makes me smile.

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Finally You Can Get A Copy Of Treats and Beasts

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A Simple Grocery Store Bulk Candy

I want to give a little bit of context to this candy. It's Ukrainian and was purchased (and consumed) before the events that happened there. More relevant to this story, it was purchased at an average grocery store in the bulk candy bins. The bulk candy bins are a place that most of us, myself included, often pass up unless we're looking to get a certain amount of a treat we love. However, when traveling it's rare that I stop at bulk bins in grocery stores, and I'm not really sure why. This amazing chocolate treat is a perfect example of why I should stop doing this, because this turned out to be one of the best chocolate's I've ever eaten in my life.

Read more about this amazing chocolate treat, found in a bulk bin.

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Blow You a Kiss

 With a name like Kiss, you'd think that the process of making them would be much more magical. Not enough pixy dust and magic wands in my opinion.

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Cereal Innovation or Waste of Packaging

 I recently came across a new cereal. It's likely not new to the world, but it's very new to me. It grabbed my attention because it offered some new fruity flavours that I'd never had in a cereal before, papaya and pineapple. The package implies that the fruit is also real, which makes sense given how common these fruits are where this cereal is made, which is Myanmar. The panda is also very cute, so  since I needed something for breakfast, this seemed like the perfect fit.

Upon opening the box I was even more confused/surprised by what was inside. It's not often that the format of how cereal is delivered is surprising to me. Rather than give you one giant bag of cereal, they've portioned the cereal into 5 separate bags. Better still they've separated the fruit and portioned that into another 5 separate bags. I wasn't sure if this was a brilliant idea at first, or an extreme waste of packaging. My first guess was that they split the cereal into separate packages to help it stay fresh and keep bugs out. South East Asia (where this cereal sells) is known for being very humid and also having a lot of bugs. Both of these are due to the constant warm weather in the area, so it makes sense as a way to keep your cereal fresh.

I took my single portion of cereal and I was truly excited by the cute little packages.

The writing on the bags of cereal was a little weird.

The cereal portion was a little strange. I was expecting something like corn flakes, but instead got what looking like tiny little squashed circles. They also had some kind of sweet coating on the outside. Frankly I would have been satisfied with just these, but there was more.

I opened up my little bag of dried pineapple and papaya and they were nicely chopped into tiny little cubes. I definitely felt like the ratio of cereal to fruit was pretty good. Too much of either would have ruined this cereal experience. Adding the milk however proved to me another reason why one might break this cereal into individual portions in particularly with the fruit.

The second I added my milk, all of the fruit sunk to the bottom. It made me think that the same would have happened in the box, had it not been portioned out in little separate bags. I had to dig down to the bottom of the bowl for each bite, however my bowl had a perfect proportion of cereal and fruit. I'll be honest, I wasn't totally blown away with the flavour of this cereal, it was fine. The little disks did stay very crunchy in the milk however, almost too crunchy as they didn't seem to let any of the milk penetrate at all. There are a few other cereals made by this company, and I think I'll probably attempt to try them all. 

At a certain age you don't really expect to be surprised at the way cereal is packaged, but as it turns out, you never know.

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A List of Things You Should Get

 In this special episode of Junk Fud on the Road, Chris asks Allison about all of her must have treats, snacks and meals in all of the countries they've visited before.

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Everything You Need To Know About Treats and Beasts

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Kit Kats Till Thursday

I recently got my hands on 4 new flavours of Kit Kat bars from Japan, and I've decided that I'd review them all this week. The plan is to eat one every day till Thursday. I'm always amazed at all the variety of Kit Kat flavours out of Japan, and even more surprised when I discover a "new" flavour that seems like it should have already been a flavour. This first variety is the perfect example. It seems like cheesecake and Kit Kat bars would make for an obvious team up. So obvious that I'm surprised that we haven't even seen cheesecake Kit Kat bars in North America already, after all, there are plenty of Kit Kat flavoured cheesecakes out there already.

Check out my full Kit Kat cheesecake review right now.

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Ice Cream Makes Everyone Happy

 This is pretty close to how I react when I hear the music from an ice cream truck. Too bad they make me pay for mine.

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Don't Miss Out On Treats and Beasts

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Custom Kit Kat Bars

 Check out this new episode of 10 Second Kitchen where you get to watch them make custom Kit Kat bars.

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Almost The Original, But Not Exactly

 

This candy made me think once again about the power of authenticity. I always find that authenticity in food, particular candy, is a strange battle. Just because a company did not invent a particular candy, doesn't mean that their version is less superior... right? The problem with this argument is that the original companies often do make the more superior version of most treats. I've had hundreds of variations of classic treats, but most of the time the original seems to be the better one. My only guess is that the original company has a reputation to uphold. The copycat companies can always move onto the next popular snack and make a copy of it instead, while the original company needs that treat to be the best it can be.

Check out my latest review where I taste a generic copy of a classic candy.

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The Origin of Your Twinkie

I was always under the impression that Twinkies were just born.

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