Kettle Bakes Pita Chips. Salt-Kissed, and Salt & Pepper. $3.29 per 6-ounce bag.
Bonnie: In the past decade, commercially made pita chips have become a popular snack food. They're generally lower in fat and calories than potato chips, and lower in sodium (though higher in fat) than pretzels. Kettle Bakes Pita Chips fit that description.
Athenos Pita Chips, which we recently reviewed, contain more fat and sodium than Kettle Bakes Pita Chips and are packed with additives that Kettle Chips don't have. That's why I recommend Kettle over Athenos.
Kettle Bakes Pita Chips are not bad-tasting for a commercial chip. My homemade chips, from whole wheat pita bread, are tastier and offer the benefits of whole grains. Athenos offers a whole wheat chip, but it contains a hefty 5 grams of fat per 11-chip serving and lots of sodium. Neither of these Kettle Pita Chips is made using whole wheat flour. The labels list "wheat flour," but that's not a whole grain. The word "whole" would need to precede "wheat" for that to be the case.
Carolyn: Kettle Bakes Pita Chips is a rare case of a natural food company product being tastier than the mainstream competition. We reviewed Kraft's Athenos Pita Chips only a couple of weeks back and the Garlic version, in particular, is quite good. But these Kettle Bakes are better, mainly because of their thinner, more potato chip-like texture and addictive saltiness.
I couldn't imagine eating more than a few of the chunky and bland Athenos Original Pita Chips without a dip, for instance, whereas I had to stop myself from finishing the bag of Kettle Bakes Pita Chips in one sitting. And if that isn't the true test of a snack, I don't know what is.
Kellogg's Organic Cereals. Rice Krispies, Frosted Mini-Wheats, and Raisin Bran. $3.69 per 10-ounce to 15.3-ounce box.
Bonnie: You can now eat Kellogg's Rice Krispies, Frosted Mini-Wheats and Raisin Bran and feel good about how you're helping the environment.
These new organic versions of popular Kellogg's cereals contain no pesticides, artificial preservatives or artificial ingredients, which makes you wonder what's in your non-organic cereal bowl. Best of all, these have neither HFCS (high-fructose corn syrup) nor BHT (a preservative added to the packaging).
Although I do recommend these, I have a couple of caveats. First, the taste and texture are different from the non-organic versions. The flakes in the Organic Raisin Bran, for instance, are harder and don't soften as quickly in milk. Also, Organic Rice Krispies contains 40 percent less iron than the regular.
The iron enrichment qualifies regular Rice Krispies for inclusion in the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) supplemental nutrition program. I ask Kellogg's: Why not also enrich the Organic Rice Krispies and the more nutritious Raisin Bran (regular and organic) so that those cereals could also be available to WIC participants? (And you know, Kellogg's, there's nothing in the organic rules to prevent you from doing this.)
Carolyn: Rice Krispies has joined my list of most unlikely organic foods (right after Pam vegetable oil spray). After all, Snap!, Crackle! and Pop! wear a baker's hat, a stocking cap and a military hat, respectively, not a forest ranger cap. Perhaps it's because Rice Krispies was the easiest of Kellogg's cereal portfolio to make organic. Certainly it's the cereal that seems most unaffected by organic sourcing. The taste, texture and sounds of Organic Rice Krispies are virtually identical to regular.
As Bonnie suggests, Organic Raisin Bran and Organic Frosted Mini-Wheats have slightly different textures and tastes. Organic Raisin Bran is a little more grainy and tough. The Mini-Wheats variety tastes less sugary and therefore much closer to Life cereal, if Life had the heft of shredded wheat.
Keebler Sandies Shortbread Fudge Drops. $3.59 per 9.5-ounce package.
Bonnie: Keebler followed the dark chocolate new-product phenomenon with the introduction of its popular Sandies cookies with a fudge center.
Until now, Chocolate Chip & Pecan were the only chocolate Sandies option. The new Fudge Drops are small, with two equaling one standard-sized Sandie in terms of nutrition and size. The Fudge Drops, though, contain no trans fats. The other varieties still do, something I'm sure Keebler will soon change. If Keebler is making changes, I also suggest making the packaging resealable and making the cookies taste better. As they are now, these are mediocre, not at all worth their 140 calories, 7 grams of total fat and 3.5 grams of saturated fat per four mini-cookie serving.
Carolyn: For a big commercial brand, Sandies Shortbread cookies are surprisingly rich and delicious. I particularly like the Cinnamon Swirl and Chocolate Chip & Pecan varieties. That's why I eagerly ripped opened this bag of new Sandies Shortbread Fudge Drops.
My previous experience with Sandies and the picture on the package had me imagining mini Sandies with a well of rich, delicious chocolate on the upscale order of Pepperidge Farm. But these are crushingly more like low-brow Keebler Fudge Shoppe. The cookie base tastes and bites like a cheap sugar cookie rather than shortbread and is topped with an equally cheap-tasting chocolate.
Bonnie Tandy Leblang is a registered dietitian and professional speaker. Carolyn Wyman is a junk-food fanatic and author of "Better Than Homemade: Amazing Foods That Changed the Way We Eat" (Quirk). Each week they critique three new food items. For previous columns, visit www.supermarketsampler.com. © Universal Press Syndicate