Ben and Jerry's Ice Cream. Carb Karma Chocolate, Carb Karma Half Baked, and Carb Karma Vanilla Swiss Almond; Light Vanilla, Light Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough and Light Chocolate Mint & Cookies. $3.59 per pint.
Bonnie: Ben & Jerry's guarantees that these new ice creams will satisfy your "mind, belly and soul." Who are they kidding? Eating Carb Karma ice cream is not a euphoric experience. These tasteless, oddly textured frozen desserts are more of a "Where's the sink? I need to spit!" experience.
The new Light ones, though, have half the fat of both regular Ben & Jerry's and the Carb Karmas and also taste better. Light Chocolate Mint & Cookies is the best, with an abundance of add-ins that mask the light ice cream's taste.
To me, Ben & Jerry's Carb Karma is certain proof (along with the ludicrous introduction of Pedigree low-carb dog food) that the carb-crazed pendulum has passed beyond ridiculous and will therefore soon start back toward normalcy. After all, I could never before have imagined spitting out Ben & Jerry's!
Carolyn: Every one of Ben and Jerry's summer 2004 introductions has a health angle. If that isn't enough to put you in a bad mood, one bite of the Carb Karma Vanilla Swiss Almond or Half Baked flavors will. Both are half-baked all right, but not in the sense of combining several flavors, as Ben & Jerry's intended. It's in the sense that the folks at B&J's would think anyone would want to eat an ice cream that tastes this much like unflavored fat, no matter how much tasty candy or nuts it contains.
For reasons I can't explain, the plain Carb Karma Chocolate tastes fine. Dieters would still be much better off with Ben & Jerry's Light. It's basically premium ice cream with a name you can feel self-righteous about. If you must have low-carb ice cream, Breyers CarbSmart line is much better than Carb Karma.
Old Bay Seasoning. Lemon & Herb and Garlic & Herb. $1.99 per 2-ounce can.
Bonnie: The makers of Old Bay Seasoning say consumers traditionally add garlic and lemon when they prepare seafood with Old Bay Seasoning. These Old Bay Seasonings with garlic and herb, and lemon and herb, are the company's response to that. I have only one question for the R&D folks at Old Bay: Why not a garlic-lemon version?
Although salt is a major ingredient in Old Bay, these two new ones have slightly less per portion than the original seasoning. Either is fine for use on any seafood. Although I use the traditional Old Bay with crab, I prefer to add my own quantities of salt, pepper and fresh lemon juice with other seafood.
Carolyn: The question isn't why Old Bay didn't come out with a new garlic and lemon seasoning, Bonnie. The question is: Why make new varieties of Old Bay that don't taste like Old Bay?
This Old Bay Lemon & Herb tastes weakly of lemon. The Garlic & Herb tastes strongly (and quite pleasingly) of garlic. But neither displays any of Old Bay's characteristic dark, peppery spice.
This is evidently a misguided case of spice-maker McCormick using its Old Bay brand name to unload some dehydrated garlic and lemon.
Hershey's 1 Gram Sugar Carb Bars. Chocolate Candy With Soy Crisps, Chocolate Candy With Almonds and Chocolate Candy. $1.19 to $1.49 per 1.1-ounce bar.
Bonnie: The labels of these low-carb Hershey bars boast of "1 gram sugar." That's because Hershey has changed some of the sugars to sugar alcohols and added artificial sweeteners and the fiber inulin to finagle the sugar and carbohydrate numbers. Hershey is among the manufacturers that purport that neither sugar alcohols nor fiber affects blood-sugar levels and therefore don't count when watching carbohydrates. Well, calories do count. And so does taste. In this case, Hershey seems to have forgotten that people eat chocolate because it tastes good.
Carolyn: I never thought I'd see the day when a mainstream candy company like Hershey would openly sell a candy bar containing soy crisps. Have they no pride in their heritage of at least medium-quality candy and no shame about betraying it with the presence of health-food ingredients? Apparently all is being sacrificed in the name of cashing in on the carb craze.
The Nestle Crunch/soy crisps masquerade aside, these are basically just sugar-free candy under a different name. As with Hershey's Sugar Free candies, there is a huge hole in the taste of this chocolate in all but the plain bar, where the hole is only medium-sized. Knowing how naked this bar was going to be, Hershey's must have worked harder on its formulation. Either that, or the soy crisp's presence in a candy bar is even worse than the thought of them being there. (Although that doesn't explain why the one with the real — if tiny — pieces of almond also tastes so bad.)
Bonnie Tandy Leblang is a registered dietitian and professional speaker. Carolyn Wyman is a junk-food fanatic and author of "Jell-O: A Biography" (Harvest/Harcourt). Each week they critique three new food items. © Universal Press Syndicate