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The Onion AV Club has posted and new inventory article called The Criterion Collection of junk food: 19 snacks and sodas we wish were still on the market. It got me thinking about a lot of things that I remember that I can't find anymore. They mention several products that are near misses as far as I was concerned. Nutty Wheat Thins, whatever, I miss Big Wheat Thins. Sweet Baby Jays, those were good, but Jay Calypso Crunch is more sorely missed. They even bring up Holiday Spice Pepsi, that brew was horrible, but the Summer flavor Pepsi had out in '06 was damn tasty.
Before I run down some of my personal "I miss this junk food!" I feel the need to make comments about some of theirs.
4. Gatorgum
Dayv used to love this stuff. Gatorade Gum = Awesome! Now they say that it "available until the early ’80s" but that can't be right, we had it in the mid 90's. Was Peoria just special? Or did they have so much backlog that a lot of places still just had it around. Either way, it was delicious!
8. Hershey’s Cookies ’N’ Mint
Apparently this is brought back every now and again, except it's a much thicker bar. I think I'd pass it up as I just can't imagine it being as good as I thought they were back in the day. I would seriously eat 1 or 2 of these a week in high school.
10. Peanut Butter Boppers
This was my lunch time treat about once a week. They were fantastic, and I've yet to find any other type of peanut butter that comes close to that chalky, yet awesome consistency. I have to admit that if it wasn't for the ad I'm sure it would've been harder to place. Who are the ad wizards that came up with this one?
11. PB Max
Now this time I didn't even need the insanely memorable and prone to mentaly time traveling comercial to recall this tasty snack. PB Max was just fan-damn-tastic. These were a very rare treat. They may've been expensive or my parents didn't like them so they just didn't have them around much or something. I could eat a whole car full of these, in fact, this is the only thing on the list I'd rally for to bring back and I'd convince them not to change the very dated and rad packaging.
15. Ice Cream Cones Cereal
Another item on the list that I'd've never had if it not been for my little brother Dayv. I swear he more than likely ate this every morning for the entire production run. We had it so often that our mom collected the requisite number of UPC codes and sent away for 2 Ice Cream Cones Cereal watches for us. To this very day me and Dayv will talk about things eat that remind us of the vanilla flavored variety of this cereal.
17. Hydrox
I'm only commenting on this to point out how terrible Hydrox cookies are and no right thinking person should ever miss them. They are like reject Oreos even if they pre-date Oreos by a few years. You miss Hydrox? Let some Oreos get stale then dust them with some finely ground table salt. Boom, Hydrox! Or at least that's what I remember from the one time I had them.
18. Surge
I was always partial to Surge. It tasted good to me in the way that Mountain Dew tasted horrible to me. I remember sitting at the newly rebranded Carl's Jr. in East Peoria w/ Randy Toy waiting for our burgers and constantly refilling my cup with more and more Surge. I heard that Vault had a similar flavor, but with all the that caffeine and other energy drink-ness, well, I think I'm just too old for all that now.
19. Mr. Phipps Pretzel Chips
Until reading this I had no idea that Mr. Phipps Pretzel Chips had been discontinued. This is truly sad and I mourn their loss.
So what, junk foods and (mostly) drinks do you most miss Mr. Jose? Just keep reading and I'll tell you!
- Pineapple Upside Down Cake Jones Soda
Hands down, right after the Green Apple and the Vanilla Creme Sodas that Jones makes, this is the best thing they've ever came up with. I've had other pineapple sodas and they can't touch this! (I still have yet to try the Japanese pineapple soda Allison found for me though.) It was pineapple sweet and yet had something extra to it, maybe brown sugar or something. Dayv can also attest to it's awesomeness as I believe it was only he and I that drank ACME comics out of it's stock.
- Original recipe Mr. Pibb
I still can't believe they went and messed it up! I was a bit of a late adopter to Mr. Pibb, sure, it was around off and on growing up, but we were a Dr. Pepper family dammit! My best buddy Wasson switched me on to the Pibb and a few years later they go and wreck it! Really! Pibb Xtra is just terrible terrible terrible! I still have fond memories of the original and am sad for loss of it from my tastes buds just about every time I'm looking for something to drink at a 7-11 or gas station. I swear the letters X, T, R and A are just mocking me! In an odd move, after the Pibb recipe change it's arch rival Dr. Pepper created Dr. Pepper: Red Fusion that was much closer to the original Mr. Pibb flavor. It is also now unavailable. (The world is mocking me!)
- Nerds Cereal
This is another shared memory of breakfast foods with my brother Dayv and I. I think we only ever got it twice before we couldn't find it anymore. It was totally even divided up into 2 different flavors and 2 different slots to hold the cereal. It was awesome and I'm positive not one bit good for us either. It's hard to understand why my parents would buy us orange and cherry flavored cereal, except to shut us up. That doesn't work as I don't remember even seeing this in the store. So either Dayv did all the begging or my Mom was even cooler than I gave her credit for back then.
- RC Edge
Forget all your posing with Jolt, RC Edge was the soda with the most caffeine allowed in it by law. Did it taste good? Come on, did regular RC Cola ever taste good? So yeah, it was mainly used a caffeine delivery device for me in the early 2000's because of the fact that it was only a quarter for a 12oz can from the machine out in front of the comic shop.
- Pepsi Blue
I'll cop to the fact that I never had this stuff plain. It was the main ingredient in Schwa's "Manhattan Black Out" drink. Maybe toss some whiskey and bitters into any liquid and it becomes ambrosia, but I'll hold steady to the fact that it was a good mixer and therefore had to be tasty and should be missed.
- Mountain Dew : Livewire
The orange variety of Mountain Dew following closely on the heels of Code Red but officially branded as limited edition. After the initial Summer it was released it came back the next Summer but that was the last I saw of it. It had more of an orange cream flavor to it. I'm sure I could mix some Stewart's Orange Creme Soda with some Mountain Dew and get an approximate flavor, but who wants to do all that work.
- Orbitz
It was a soda that had wax candy floating in it! A SODA THAT HAD WAX CANDY FLOATING IN IT! SODA WITH FLOATING CANDY! Basically, it was the greatest thing ever.
- Bonkers
It was a chewy candy that was double layered. The outside layer was of a normal candy consistency, like a Starburst, but the inner layer was super soft, more like a gum. Goodness was it tasty! They had a few different fruit flavors (grape was the best) and chocolate (it was gross). Whenever I think of candy that I miss from my childhood Bonkers are always at the top of my list.
- Diet Cherry Chocolate Dr. Pepper
By far the only diet soda that was ever worth a damn.
And snacks and sodas that I just can't get anymore due to living in LA.
- Kitchen Cooked Potato Chips regular and Louisiana Hot
The original Kitchen Cooked chips were the Potato Chips that I grew up on. The best compliment that I ever heard for them was from my old pal Holoyda from Madison, WI "They taste like fried chicken skin!" OK, granted, he was saying what he thought was wrong with them, but he was wrong, damn wrong, Kitchen Cooked totally rock! A few years before I moved to LA they introduced the Louisiana Hot variety, talk about a new twist on an old favorite. I can't even begin to tell you about the flavor as I didn't have it for long and it's been 3 years, but I'd love to have more.
- Ski Soda
The best thing about this Mountain-Dew-a-like was that it was made with actual lemons and oranges. The second best thing used to be that they kept their 70's designed logo well in to the '90s. I've found out that they changed it well after I was able to find it in the rural areas surrounding St. Louis. I swear a can of Ski was one of the many highlights from my road trip with Randy Toy and Molly Miller to Columbia MO. to see Big Bad Voodoo Daddy. It was so damn good! Other highlights included meeting Tracey Draksler, watching Tracey's VHS of the State, the Chic's Do-It Center and the Elvis Is Alive Museum.
- Cheerwine Soda
A more almondy Dr. Pepper from North Carolina. Based on just being stupid I ordered a case of this to the apartment I shared with Forrest K. I was instantly hooked. I've only had a few stray cans since then that I've found at specialty beverage shops, but any time I see it I just HAVE to go for it.
- Faygo Red Pop
This was MY DRINK in junior high and HS, right next to Cherry Coke. We got Red Pop a lot more often due to Faygo being a really cheap brand along the lines of Shasta. It was kinda like a strawberry soda, but oh so much more complex. If I wanted a strawberry soda I'd grab a Crush, but when I wanted a something else red, sweet and carbonated it was time for Red Pop. More than the flavor I think I was attracted to the fact that it was called "Red Pop" as if it was a flavor. It just sounds so insane and hilarious that I couldn't help but love it!
- Nehi Peach
Peach sodas always taste fantastic and no one does it better than Nehi. Vess really gives them a run for their money, especially when I could get a 3 liter bottle for 99 cents, but Nehi always wins. The other flavors are good, namely the grape, but Nehi will always be peach for me. I don't think I've even had a peach soda in the last 4 years. There's something very very disturbingly wrong with that assessment.
- Candy Corn Jones Soda
OK, this is more of a time issue but every year I patiently wait for Halloween to come around so that I can pick up a 4 pack of this. And I usually go back to the Target for some more. I also save one can for as long as I can hold out. I finally drank my last can from 2008 on my birthday this year. Mmm mmm!
Before I run down some of my personal "I miss this junk food!" I feel the need to make comments about some of theirs.
4. Gatorgum
Dayv used to love this stuff. Gatorade Gum = Awesome! Now they say that it "available until the early ’80s" but that can't be right, we had it in the mid 90's. Was Peoria just special? Or did they have so much backlog that a lot of places still just had it around. Either way, it was delicious!
8. Hershey’s Cookies ’N’ Mint
Apparently this is brought back every now and again, except it's a much thicker bar. I think I'd pass it up as I just can't imagine it being as good as I thought they were back in the day. I would seriously eat 1 or 2 of these a week in high school.
10. Peanut Butter Boppers
This was my lunch time treat about once a week. They were fantastic, and I've yet to find any other type of peanut butter that comes close to that chalky, yet awesome consistency. I have to admit that if it wasn't for the ad I'm sure it would've been harder to place. Who are the ad wizards that came up with this one?
11. PB Max
Now this time I didn't even need the insanely memorable and prone to mentaly time traveling comercial to recall this tasty snack. PB Max was just fan-damn-tastic. These were a very rare treat. They may've been expensive or my parents didn't like them so they just didn't have them around much or something. I could eat a whole car full of these, in fact, this is the only thing on the list I'd rally for to bring back and I'd convince them not to change the very dated and rad packaging.
15. Ice Cream Cones Cereal
Another item on the list that I'd've never had if it not been for my little brother Dayv. I swear he more than likely ate this every morning for the entire production run. We had it so often that our mom collected the requisite number of UPC codes and sent away for 2 Ice Cream Cones Cereal watches for us. To this very day me and Dayv will talk about things eat that remind us of the vanilla flavored variety of this cereal.
17. Hydrox
I'm only commenting on this to point out how terrible Hydrox cookies are and no right thinking person should ever miss them. They are like reject Oreos even if they pre-date Oreos by a few years. You miss Hydrox? Let some Oreos get stale then dust them with some finely ground table salt. Boom, Hydrox! Or at least that's what I remember from the one time I had them.
18. Surge
I was always partial to Surge. It tasted good to me in the way that Mountain Dew tasted horrible to me. I remember sitting at the newly rebranded Carl's Jr. in East Peoria w/ Randy Toy waiting for our burgers and constantly refilling my cup with more and more Surge. I heard that Vault had a similar flavor, but with all the that caffeine and other energy drink-ness, well, I think I'm just too old for all that now.
19. Mr. Phipps Pretzel Chips
Until reading this I had no idea that Mr. Phipps Pretzel Chips had been discontinued. This is truly sad and I mourn their loss.
So what, junk foods and (mostly) drinks do you most miss Mr. Jose? Just keep reading and I'll tell you!
- Pineapple Upside Down Cake Jones Soda
Hands down, right after the Green Apple and the Vanilla Creme Sodas that Jones makes, this is the best thing they've ever came up with. I've had other pineapple sodas and they can't touch this! (I still have yet to try the Japanese pineapple soda Allison found for me though.) It was pineapple sweet and yet had something extra to it, maybe brown sugar or something. Dayv can also attest to it's awesomeness as I believe it was only he and I that drank ACME comics out of it's stock.
- Original recipe Mr. Pibb
I still can't believe they went and messed it up! I was a bit of a late adopter to Mr. Pibb, sure, it was around off and on growing up, but we were a Dr. Pepper family dammit! My best buddy Wasson switched me on to the Pibb and a few years later they go and wreck it! Really! Pibb Xtra is just terrible terrible terrible! I still have fond memories of the original and am sad for loss of it from my tastes buds just about every time I'm looking for something to drink at a 7-11 or gas station. I swear the letters X, T, R and A are just mocking me! In an odd move, after the Pibb recipe change it's arch rival Dr. Pepper created Dr. Pepper: Red Fusion that was much closer to the original Mr. Pibb flavor. It is also now unavailable. (The world is mocking me!)
- Nerds Cereal
This is another shared memory of breakfast foods with my brother Dayv and I. I think we only ever got it twice before we couldn't find it anymore. It was totally even divided up into 2 different flavors and 2 different slots to hold the cereal. It was awesome and I'm positive not one bit good for us either. It's hard to understand why my parents would buy us orange and cherry flavored cereal, except to shut us up. That doesn't work as I don't remember even seeing this in the store. So either Dayv did all the begging or my Mom was even cooler than I gave her credit for back then.
- RC Edge
Forget all your posing with Jolt, RC Edge was the soda with the most caffeine allowed in it by law. Did it taste good? Come on, did regular RC Cola ever taste good? So yeah, it was mainly used a caffeine delivery device for me in the early 2000's because of the fact that it was only a quarter for a 12oz can from the machine out in front of the comic shop.
- Pepsi Blue
I'll cop to the fact that I never had this stuff plain. It was the main ingredient in Schwa's "Manhattan Black Out" drink. Maybe toss some whiskey and bitters into any liquid and it becomes ambrosia, but I'll hold steady to the fact that it was a good mixer and therefore had to be tasty and should be missed.
- Mountain Dew : Livewire
The orange variety of Mountain Dew following closely on the heels of Code Red but officially branded as limited edition. After the initial Summer it was released it came back the next Summer but that was the last I saw of it. It had more of an orange cream flavor to it. I'm sure I could mix some Stewart's Orange Creme Soda with some Mountain Dew and get an approximate flavor, but who wants to do all that work.
- Orbitz
It was a soda that had wax candy floating in it! A SODA THAT HAD WAX CANDY FLOATING IN IT! SODA WITH FLOATING CANDY! Basically, it was the greatest thing ever.
- Bonkers
It was a chewy candy that was double layered. The outside layer was of a normal candy consistency, like a Starburst, but the inner layer was super soft, more like a gum. Goodness was it tasty! They had a few different fruit flavors (grape was the best) and chocolate (it was gross). Whenever I think of candy that I miss from my childhood Bonkers are always at the top of my list.
- Diet Cherry Chocolate Dr. Pepper
By far the only diet soda that was ever worth a damn.
And snacks and sodas that I just can't get anymore due to living in LA.
- Kitchen Cooked Potato Chips regular and Louisiana Hot
The original Kitchen Cooked chips were the Potato Chips that I grew up on. The best compliment that I ever heard for them was from my old pal Holoyda from Madison, WI "They taste like fried chicken skin!" OK, granted, he was saying what he thought was wrong with them, but he was wrong, damn wrong, Kitchen Cooked totally rock! A few years before I moved to LA they introduced the Louisiana Hot variety, talk about a new twist on an old favorite. I can't even begin to tell you about the flavor as I didn't have it for long and it's been 3 years, but I'd love to have more.
- Ski Soda
The best thing about this Mountain-Dew-a-like was that it was made with actual lemons and oranges. The second best thing used to be that they kept their 70's designed logo well in to the '90s. I've found out that they changed it well after I was able to find it in the rural areas surrounding St. Louis. I swear a can of Ski was one of the many highlights from my road trip with Randy Toy and Molly Miller to Columbia MO. to see Big Bad Voodoo Daddy. It was so damn good! Other highlights included meeting Tracey Draksler, watching Tracey's VHS of the State, the Chic's Do-It Center and the Elvis Is Alive Museum.
- Cheerwine Soda
A more almondy Dr. Pepper from North Carolina. Based on just being stupid I ordered a case of this to the apartment I shared with Forrest K. I was instantly hooked. I've only had a few stray cans since then that I've found at specialty beverage shops, but any time I see it I just HAVE to go for it.
- Faygo Red Pop
This was MY DRINK in junior high and HS, right next to Cherry Coke. We got Red Pop a lot more often due to Faygo being a really cheap brand along the lines of Shasta. It was kinda like a strawberry soda, but oh so much more complex. If I wanted a strawberry soda I'd grab a Crush, but when I wanted a something else red, sweet and carbonated it was time for Red Pop. More than the flavor I think I was attracted to the fact that it was called "Red Pop" as if it was a flavor. It just sounds so insane and hilarious that I couldn't help but love it!
- Nehi Peach
Peach sodas always taste fantastic and no one does it better than Nehi. Vess really gives them a run for their money, especially when I could get a 3 liter bottle for 99 cents, but Nehi always wins. The other flavors are good, namely the grape, but Nehi will always be peach for me. I don't think I've even had a peach soda in the last 4 years. There's something very very disturbingly wrong with that assessment.
- Candy Corn Jones Soda
OK, this is more of a time issue but every year I patiently wait for Halloween to come around so that I can pick up a 4 pack of this. And I usually go back to the Target for some more. I also save one can for as long as I can hold out. I finally drank my last can from 2008 on my birthday this year. Mmm mmm!
You may ask yourself "radjose, you're totally 31 now! How'd that happen?" Well, it's easy. Time doesn't stop. It keeps going, and it's been going that long. You may respond "that's a retarded answer! I demand to know what you did for said birthday!" To that I'd respond that I did some awesome things.
It was pretty awesome. Even better was that Allison got a whole group of people to surprise me and and meet us there! It was fantastic. I can't even tell you how much it rock I would. Suffice to say, every birthday I have w/o pirates, dinners or adventures just isn't going to rock as hard. After that a bunch of the crew went over to a bar called Cup's for further drinking and pool playing.
