Birthday Cake Oreos
Before you say it, we know. We haven't done a Taste Test in more than a year. We were busy, y'know? Believe me, some fun stuff came across our desks (Did you try those Cinnamon M&Ms? Delicious!), but they fell by the wayside amid all kinds of other fun stuff here at AVHQ. But today, we make it up to you, dear readers—except for you dear readers who only like it when we sample disgusting stuff. Dave Chang is in China, friends. (That sounds racist, but it's just a fact.)
Onward and upward to the inspiration for Taste Test's return: Birthday Cake Oreos. As I'm typing this, I haven't tasted one yet, but going in, I'm pretty sure these will work for me. First of all, plain Oreos are pretty un-fuck-with-able, and second, I love artificial birthday-cake-flavored stuff, from the Cold Stone Creamery flavor to actual cake batter. I will take my chances with salmonella.
Nabisco doesn't go crazy with the Oreo flavors—they introduce a limited-edition one every year or so, and they're usually pretty subtle and delicious. We've Taste Tested Banana Split Crème and Strawberry Milkshake Creme, but we passed on the DQ Blizzard Crème. (We also tried Chinese Oreos, but that's a whole different thing.) So kudos to Nabisco for not barfing up a new flavor every couple of months. And now, in honor of Oreo's 100th birthday, Birthday Cake Oreos.
Taste: My reaction: as expected. These are delicious, and I could probably eat the whole bag (which, it should be noted, contains only 20 cookies) by myself. The super-sweet smell hits first, and it pretty much nails birthday-cake frosting. (I guess that's not too different than the usual Oreo cream, but sweeter and somehow more yellow-smelling. No, I'm not on drugs.) The wafer seems slightly harder and crunchier than a standard Oreo, perhaps because they're imprinted with "Oreo 100" and thus don't have the same crinkly texture as normal Oreos.
The filling has little sprinkles in it, though they're really just for show—they don't crunch or offer any flavor that I can detect. But they do visually communicate "THIS IS A BIRTHDAY CAKE! HAVE SOME FUN, ASSHOLE!"
So, in addition to being the hero who walked around the office with fancy limited-edition Oreos (though credit should go to Chicago city editor Marah Eakin, who brought them in), I got to enjoy these delicious cookies. If excessive fat and calories were good for you and made your body slim and muscular, I would eat Birthday Cake Oreos every day. As it stands, I may one day eat another one or two, if somebody brings a bag into the office.
Reaction among my colleagues was less enthusiastic. Most people seemed to like them, though some cookie snobs couldn't see past the gimmick to the delicious taste. See if I get you any for your birthday!
Oh: We'll have more frequent Taste Tests soon, especially if somebody gets us some of those Girl Scout Nestle Crunch combo bars. What was the big deal on all the blogs yesterday? We reported about those way back in October! They weren't ready yet, but HEY NESTLÉ, WHENEVER YOU WANT TO SEND US SOME, WE'LL GLADLY TRY THEM OUT.
Office Reactions:
• "This Oreo tastes a lot like being stoned. Get stoned, open the fridge, find the frosting, shove something chocolatey in the frosting, and consume. Delicious."
• "They somehow taste even more artificial than original Oreos, which isn't aided by the crunchiness of the sprinkles in the cream. They even smell artificial."
• "All they did was make me want a funfetti cupcake, which would be far better than this."
• "Mostly I'm confused by these cookies. I like Oreos and I like cake frosting. And it's not that they taste bad together, they just don't taste right together. I'd happily eat some more, but given the choice, I'd stick with a classic Oreo."
• "It smells more like birthday cake than it tastes like birthday cake. However, the aftertaste—which lingers for a surprisingly long time—gets the rich, buttery hint of a crappy yellow cake mix just right. So: Way to invent a cookie that achieves its goal only before and after you eat it, Oreo."
• "I'm not sure I want to bite into this. It smells like sheet cake. Like a cheap grocery-store sheet cake, the kind where the frosting is basically sugarized lard."
• "So the little tiny sprinkles in the filling have kind of a nice texture, and they're colorful, but mostly this tastes like someone poured yellow-cake extract all over a normal Oreo. You know, because yellow-cake extract is totally a real thing."
• "Tastes about as much like cake as an Oreo can. It's okay, I guess."
• "Oreos are basically the McDonald's of the cookie world: There's no content there, but it's vaguely satisfying and you know exactly what you're getting. Now you're just getting it with sprinkles."
• "Limited Edition?! Where will fat slobs turn for cookies with frosting in 2013?"
• "It smells kind of like birthday cake, but it mostly tastes like a normal Oreo."
• "The filling is softer than a normal Oreo, more frosting-like, so I'll give it that. I imagine the filling has something extra added to make it capable of housing semi-dissolved sprinkles. The sprinkles add to the texture difference from a normal Oreo, but overall the cookie is pretty much the same. And there's nothing wrong with that. I can eat an entire row of Oreos in one sitting, and I would totally say the same for these."
• "True to its name, the Birthday Cake Oreo takes like frosting and even has sprinkles. All it's missing is candle wax and my kid's spittle."
• "When I turn 100, I hope someone fills me with frosting."
Where to get them: We got ours at a local grocery store; these should be generally available wherever mass-market cookies are sold.