I'm In Love! With a Burger!

The best part of going to California is being able to go to IN-N-OUT BURGER .  Anyone who eats burgers and has not tasted a burger from here hasn't lived.  I give this a 10/10 on the burger/snack/food you shouldn't eat-but-eat scale.  100% pure beef, no preservatives, no additives, THOUSAND ISLAND DRESSING! The fries are cut inside the restaurant from fresh potatoes, as well.  They even have a "secret-menu" which consists of grilled cheese sandwich, "Animal Style", 3x3 or 4x4 burger.  Delicious. 

Oh Boy! Oberto 100 Calorie Jerky Bites

My old lady bought me these when she was picking up "let's not make babies" pills at the pharmacy yesterday. I didn't know what to expect. I've had some of the 100 cal packs before but they were all pretty lackluster. But whatever those are like cookies and crackers and both of those suck ass without lard&sugar/salt respectively. But this is meat so all bets are off.

The first thing that stood out was that there was not a lot of meat in the tiny pack and as a man who eats meat I like my portions like I like my wars on terrorism: unnecessarily huge.

The next thing I noticed was that there was no smell. I know for some people this will be a plus but those people can go suck themselves off. How are my coworkers and neighbors supposed to know how manly I am if they can't smell my beef? Answer: I will have to punch them in face and scream it into their sobbing idiot faces.

My list of petty complaints doesn't end there. All the pieces in my bag were really tiny, like beef flakes instead of thick chunks like I was expecting. I know they're "Bites" and not "Strips" but a bite means splitting the food with your teeth. It refers to the action taken just before chewing. If I can take a handful and head straight to chewing, bypassing biting all together, they should not be called "Bites".

Now for the taste test. It wasn't as spicy or salty as I would've liked but then again I was expecting it to be a little on the bland side. It did however taste like meat which was a pleasant surprise. I sort of half expected it to taste like a shoebox but it was decent. The texture was nice too; thick and tough without feeling like you're eating through a tire.

All in all it's a good enough snack for the healthy-eater set. Low cal, low sodium, low carbs, high protein. In spite of my many complaints I actually did enjoy it a lot and felt less like a dirtbag rapist than I usually do when I eat dried meats. I will definitely eat this again and not just because there are still 7 packs left in the box.

With that said though, I can't give this the Burly-Man-Meat-Eater Seal of Approval, it's just not trashy enough. The fact that this won't fukcing ruin your heart and various arteries worked against it in my rating. It's unfortunate but that the way the beef strips dry.

Tonic Water

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

"Yuubari Melon cream and whipped cream Lunchpack"

i still remember when i first discovered Lunchpack. in japan it sucks being vegetarian. everything has like bacon, or ham or fish. but then i discovered these bad boys. the first one i had was the peanut butter sandwich. total lunch time savior. at a convience store a veg dude has like 4 choices. konbu Onigiri(sweet seaweed rice ball), Umeboshi Onigiri(sour plum rice ball), egg salad sandwich, or Lunchpack. for like a buck fifty you get 2 sandwiches with no crust in a lunch pack. occasionally you can get new favors acceptable for veg dudes.

this time that flavor is yuubari melon cream and whipped cream. a yuubari melon is a glorified cantaloupe from hokkaido japan. shit tastes the same but costs way more. the melon cream was basically a cantaloupe flavored pudding. combined with the light puffy fake whipped cream. this sandwich set is pretty good. i would say its more of a dessert sandwich than a lunch sandwich. im not sure if id cop again but i will recommend it to others to try.

this gets a sabbath rating of Rat Salad

Chocolate Milk!

This isn't so much a specific review as it is a general appreciation of the wonder that is Chocolate Milk. I have no idea who came up with the brilliant idea of taking a bland beverage that previously only existed to make your cereal less boring, and mixing it with the best thing that ever existed: chocolate. Before its creation, you could be eating a nutella sandwich with a chocolate bar, and after your chocolate pudding dessert you could get a little thirsty but not want to ruin the vibe with an otherwise fine beverage (coke, ginger ale, apple juice). You were fucked. But now, thanks to the mysterious genius behind it, you had the option of LIQUID CHOCOLATE. Insane. Life was never quite the same.

This brings me to my first reason why chocolate milk rules. You can drink it with ANYTHING. As a matter of fact I am eating a three cheese macaroni as I'm typing this, and I'm having a delicious Parmalat chocolate milk with it. Great combo. If anyone ever tries to tell you it's bad to drink chocolate milk with certain foods, you have my permission to slap them across the face. With a shovel.

Besides blending perfectly with every food in the world, you can chocolate milk ANY TIME. If I just woke up, I do not want to drink a coke. In fact I am willing to admit I am too much of a pussy to drink anything carbonated in the morning. Chocolate milk though... wakes you right up with that sugar rush. It's like the morning kicks you in the nuts, but in a pleasant manner. Sure you can drink coffee (if you're a loser), but can you drink coffee an hour before bedtime? No. Can you chug down a quart of chocolate milk? Fuck yea you can. It works in the morning, in the evening, for lunch, it even makes an awesome afternoon snack. Could you drink an apple juice at 3 pm and feel full until dinner? Maybe if you're a girl. Not me. I need that thick, near-disgusting fulfillment to hold me over.

Being an avid chocolate milk drinker, I sometimes forget that not everyone is a sweet dude like myself. There are some haters, and they always say the same two lines:

"It's not healthy". Says who? Nutritionists, apparently: "Nutritionists have criticized chocolate milk for its high sugar content. However, a study published in 2006 indicated that chocolate milk aids in recovery when taken after intense athletic workouts. The study authors believe this to be due to its ratio of carbohydrates to protein, among other nutritional properties". There you go, asshole. Why don't you go drink some vitamin water (haha!) while I become a huge beefcake just from drinking the best tasting drink on the planet. Anyways, "The study was small in scale and partially funded by the dairy industry, but the results may warrant further study". See, everyone knows that the dairy industry is always right, so I win. I think one time they said that Nick Lachey is an asshole, and boy were they ever right.

The second 'argument' is that it's for 5 year-olds. Even the canadian dairy industry is against me on this one: "In a recent study done in schoolboards across Canada, chocolate milk was the most popular drink among children between the ages of five and ten". Well guess what, 5 year olds know their shit, man. Their minds are not yet occupied with distractions such as money, getting laid, sports, or the Cro-Mags. They know three things: toys, sugary beverages, and the fact that girls smell. Don't fuck with them. They know, and they say chocolate milk is the illest. Who are you to disagree? You were once 5, and you were probably way cooler then. Now you're into reading the newspaper and the stock market. Pussy.

I love chocolate milk so much that I don't even notice the brands. It's like pizza, if it's bad it's still good. I will drink 'em all. Thick, thin, creamy, chocolate soy milk, fake milkshake (aka melted ice cream in a box, aka delicious). Bring it on. Let me level with you, I love chocolate so much that I will consume it in any way I can. I don't care in which medium, and I don't care if some brands' milk is a little softer than the other. Just give me my chocolate already.

Finally, there is one minor setback to the party that is chocolate milk: it goes bad. If you happen to step into some miserable cornerstore where no one awesome ever goes, and thus no one ever buys chocolate milk, you might get dicked into buying a stale chocolate milk. But it's the risk that makes life truly worth living, isn't it? Only a real man would blindly chug a box of possibly sour milk, because he knows the risk is never greater than the cause. Chocolate milk separates the men from the boys. The 5 year-old with the chocolate milk in his hand is a thousand times the man you are, with your safe little drink that could never go bad. Go on, be safe. Be well. Drink a light beverage with your meal. And we will go and drink chocolate milk, and live like kings. Kings.

Big Chocolate Carl.

Big Chocolate Carl sounds like an old pr0n. I think its supposed to be curl but they have that mustachioed mascot dude so I call them carls. It makes them taste better. and as a double added bonus the name Carl makes me think of aqua teen hunger force(south bronx paradise baby). carls in general rule, these are no exception. its a tiny bag and there are only liky 10-12 in there but that is good. forced portion control! if not i would end up eating a million of these. plus peep the ill frog mascot on the package.
so these are chocolate carls covered in dark chocolate. fuck milk chocolate. i think ill only fuck with milk chocolate if its like a hersheys kiss or something. a carl is a crispy/crunchy puff snack. like a cheese doodle but not like a cheese doodle at all(ha!) i think actually im gonna cop these at lunch time for a round 2.

on a Sabbath scale i give these a rating of "Children of the Grave".

Cool Ranch Doritos

I don't remember when I had my first taste of this tangy ranch delicacy, but I know I was probably incredibly young and I probably had them in Vermont as they weren't available in my neighborhood for a really long time. Even now I can find it around but it's completely hit or miss.

I've always had a particular affinity for Doritos; the fake cheese taste, the gum destroying crunch, the neon orange fingers... It was magic to a kid like me. But then you try a new spin on this old standard and it fucking tosses you on your head. It still constantly blows my mind that Cool Ranch Doritos are so similar to regular Doritos and yet so completely fucking different. It's like when you read a classic Superman story and then you read Superman: Red Son (an "Elseworlds" type story about Superman's rocket landing in Russia instead of the Midwest); it has the bulk of the same elements but with a few "Oh Goddamns" tossed in. Note: Superman: Red Son is the gold standard for modern superhero storytelling.

The beauty of Cool Ranch Doritos is that you still get all the same key shit as you do with regular Doritos; the delicious fake taste, the gum destroying crunch, the neon fingers (sort of an ecru as opposed to orange) but you also get a tangy new twist. It's that tangy explosion that makes the difference. It lends itself extremely well to providing you with a full and complete flavor. With regular Doritos the flavor is limited to the orange dust caked on the outside of the chip but the tangy is like a virus; it embeds itself into the inner workings of the chip so even if you were one of those gross kids who has to lick the fucking taste off of everything before eating it, you're still left with a flavourful chip.

Good:
-Delicious taste that is unlike anything found in nature
-Crispy as fuck (unless you get a stale bag which happens altogether too often around Montreal)
-Still stains your fingers but the white is easier to get out when you stain your pants (you will)
-Has been around long enough so you can jock it without feeling like a trend jumper (I'm looking your direction Sweet Chili Heat worshipers)
-Doesn't smell as strong as regular Doritos so when your whole mouth and face stink like junk food for the rest of the day (which they will) it will be a ton more tolerable

Bad:
-If you don't like Doritos then you won't like these and you're an idiot
-If you like and expect traditional (re: real) ranch flavour you're in the wrong place
-Intense flavor can overpower light-sodas so you're best to stick with Coke or Mr.Pibb over Sprite or Fresca. Exception: Mountain Dew


In conclusion the good clearly outweighs the bad and if you think the bad things are "bad" then you are a pussy who drinks Fresca and does not like his tortillas flavoured to the Nth degree.
Any time I'm headed to the States this is always at the top of my "shit to stock up on so my cupboards have no room for real food" list.
For those of you that aren't already hip to the greatness that is Cool Ranch Doritos, cop a bag and lose yourself in it's delicious synthetic flavours.

P.S. In other countries these are called Cool American Doritos