Chocolate Therapy Is One Of Ben & Jerry's Perfect Pints!

The Good: Amazing flavor, Reasonably priced for the quality, Good ingredients
The Bad: Nothing!
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream is an amazing flavor from the venerable brand!


It takes a lot for me to give a product a perfect (10/10) rating. In my body of works, there are a number of products and works that achieve that position, but whenever I consider a 10/10 rating, I actually spend some time after believing the product might be perfect trying to find any flaws that might rob it of that rating. But some products, of course, hold up to the scrutiny. Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream absolutely holds up.

Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream is an amazing flavor of ice cream from Ben & Jerry's and is one of the perfect flavors from the Vermont-based ice cream company.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream is a fairly chunky ice cream with an obvious additive. The chocolate cookie bits are present in virtually every bite. Though the packaging says there is a chocolate pudding swirl, I could not find one (visually) in the ice cream.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other, comparable, ice creams. Ben & Jerry's ice cream is made of decent ingredients, which does set it apart from many other ice creams. And given the quality of the ice cream flavor, the Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream is worth the price!

Ease Of Preparation

The Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream is a loaded ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream!

Taste

The Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Therapy ice cream smells strongly of chocolate. The cacao aroma is powerful even when the ice cream is frozen. As the ice cream nears its melting point, it becomes more aromatic and the smell of the chocolate is both distinct and powerful.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy ice cream tastes strongly of chocolate. The Chocolate Therapy is possibly the closest chocolate ice cream to a dark chocolate ice cream I've yet tasted from Ben & Jerry's. The chocolate flavor is rich and potent without being overly bitter and dry. The Chocolate Therapy ice cream manages to be sweetened by the chocolate cookie pieces without losing any of the strong, dark chocolate ice cream flavor.

This ice cream leaves a slightly dry, marginally sweet aftertaste in the mouth, though that aftertaste does not endure very long.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream is a fairly heavy ice cream with a heavy additive (the cookie pieces are pretty solid in this ice cream). The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 250 calories, 130 of which are from fat. The fourteen grams of fat represent 22% of the RDA of fat, with 40% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 8 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 45 mg of cholesterol (that’s 15% of the RDA!) and 60 mg of Sodium (3% RDA). The only other real nutrients are four grams of protein, 15% RDA of Iron and 10% of the RDA of Calcium in the Chocolate Therapy Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar, there is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Chocolate Therapy Ben & Jerry’s is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There is no allergy warning on the pint.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months; the pint I just opened would not have expired until October 22, 2018, though I'm sure it won't last that long in my household based on its quality!

The Chocolate Therapy ice cream is fairly dark in color and it leaves stains on both light and dark colored fabrics. If the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Chocolate Therapy ice cream is truly amazing; every bite, every lick is powerful in its chocolate flavor, making it a satisfying ice cream for anyone who loves chocolate!

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Urban Bourbon Ice Cream
Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream
Limited Edition Cotton Candy

10/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Alternating Between Delightful And Gross, Ben & Jerry's Urban Bourbon Ice Cream Is Unpleasant.

The Good: Good ingredients, A few bites out of the pint, Fair trade certified
The Bad: Awful sour flavor for most of the pint, Low on nutritional value, More expensive than other ice creams.
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Urban Bourbon Ice Cream is a solid failure from Ben & Jerry's.


Not long ago, I went on a working vacation and after the first night of the show I was working, I excitedly stopped by one of my favorite grocery stores (which has not made it to Michigan, so I was excited to revisit the chain while on my trip) and decided to treat myself. Given that my hotel room had a freezer, I decided to indulge and get a couple of pints of Ben & Jerry's ice cream (they were on sale). In addition to picking up one of my favorite flavors of Ben & Jerry's ice cream, I decided to get a new-to-me flavor. I went with the Ben & Jerry's Urban Bourbon.

Ben & Jerry's Urban Bourbon ice cream sounded wonderful to me as it was billed as burnt caramel ice cream with almonds, fudge flakes and bourbon caramel swirls. After only a few bites, I abandoned the new flavor in favor of the other pint and when I went back to the pint a day later, I discovered it was no better than on the first pass. Ben & Jerry's Urban Bourbon ice cream is mostly sour and unpleasant, making it a real flop for the venerable ice cream company.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Urban Bourbon Ice Cream is a mostly smooth ice cream with the nuts and fudge chips so broken up that they do not impede the spoon or scoop when consuming the ice cream. The caramel swirl is fairly heavy in the Urban Bourbon ice cream.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s Urban Bourbon ice cream is an expensive ice cream, despite how this flavor is unique to Ben & Jerry's.

Ease Of Preparation

The Urban Bourbon Ice Cream is a light ice cream that is dominated by its caramel swirl. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Urban Bourbon Ice Cream!

Taste

Urban Bourbon ice cream smells very mild. It was only after I had gotten about a quarter of the way through the pint and the ice cream began to move toward its melting point that it became at all aromatic. Even then, there was only the very faintest scent of caramel to the ice cream.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Urban Bourbon ice cream is very sour. Almost every bite - with or without the caramel swirl - was sour with a bitter bite reminiscent of alcohol, which seems to be the very embodiment of the bourbon flavor in the ice cream. Out of the whole pint, only a bite or two did not taste sour . . . and those bites only tasted milky and muted. The fudge bits and nuts do not have the flavor ability to compete with the overwhelmingly sour and bitter flavor of the bourbon-laced ice cream.

This ice cream has a fairly strong aftertaste, which is sour and lasts in the mouth for about five minutes.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Urban Bourbon Ice Cream is a fairly sour ice cream. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 300 calories, 150 of which are from fat. The seventeen grams of fat include 9 grams of saturated fat in the Urban Bourbon ice cream. One serving has 60 mg of cholesterol and 70 mg of Sodium (3% RDA). The 33 grams of carbohydrates per serving are offset by a single gram of dietary fiber, making this not a heart-healthy ice cream. The only other real nutrients are five grams of protein in the Urban Bourbon Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Urban Bourbon has decent ingredients, though. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar, there is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list for the Urban Bourbon ice cream. There are no allergy warnings on the pint, but anyone with allergies for eggs, milk, and/or nuts will want to avoid this ice cream.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months.

The Urban Bourbon ice cream is fairly light and it would be surprising if it left stains outside of light fabrics, though the caramel will certainly stain. As a dairy-based food, though, when the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Urban Bourbon ice cream was disappointing outside a few bites in the pint, making it virtually inedible and unpleasant for consumers.

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream
Pistachio Pistachio Ice cream
Limited Edition Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream

2.5/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Each On Their Own: Ben & Jerry's Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream Does Not Blend Well!

The Good: Each of the individual flavors are good, Good ingredients
The Bad: Low nutritional value, None of the flavors blend with the others; the cheesecake flavor is completely overwhelmed
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream is interesting, but not at all one that manages to be something that holds together well.


After trying several of the Ben & Jerry's Core ice creams, I finally have a real opinion on the product line as a whole. The Ben & Jerry's Core ice creams are an interesting idea, but too many of them try to pack in way too much stuff. Having picked up a pint of Ben & Jerry's Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core, this idea was nailed home to me when I discovered than none of the three main elements - cookies & cream ice cream, chocolate ice cream, and cheesecake center - worked together. Each of the elements are good on their own, but the flavors add up to nothing new and special together. There is too much going on, ineffectively, in the Ben & Jerry's Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, Core flavors of ice cream are ice cream flavors that have, essentially, the “topping” of the ice cream in the pint, presented as a cylinder going through the center. So, for example, in the Caramel Sutra Core, if one looks at the top of it, there is a circle in the center of caramel (it is actually a column that goes straight down to the bottom of the pint) surrounded by ice cream. It’s a neat concept and the Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core has two flavors of ice cream all around a center of plain cheesecake.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream is a smooth ice cream on the chocolate side and appropriately chunky on the cookie side with the cookies and cream ice cream. The cheesecake core is more subtle than some of the other cores and it is not as plentiful as the core in some other Ben & Jerry's Core flavors.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an mid-range ice cream, especially compared to other ice creams and while the Core concept is unique to Ben & Jerry’s, it is not such an incredible execution of the concept as to justify the inflated ice cream price.

Ease Of Preparation

The Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream is a fairly loaded ice cream, where the core additive fails to blend with either of the two ice creams in the mix. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream! No matter how one tries to consume it - blended together or with each of its independent elements, it is in no way extraordinary.

Taste

Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream has virtually no aroma to it. The ice cream has no clear scent to it; this is a surprisingly non-effervescent, even as it nears its melting point.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream is an ineffective blend of chocolate, cookies & cream ice cream and a very mild frozen cheesecake core center. Each of the flavors in the Ben & Jerry's Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core are good on their own, but none of them gel together or compliment one another. The cheesecake center is entirely overwhelmed by the cookie flavor in the cookies & cream ice cream and it does not have a chance at asserting itself near the chocolate ice cream. The flavors are good on their own, but none of them work with one another to make anything more than the sum of their parts.

The Ben & Jerry’s Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream has no real aftertaste to it. The chocolate ice cream is a bit dry and so are the cookies in the cookies & cream portion of the ice cream, but the dryness does not last in the mouth for very long after the last of the ice cream is consumed.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream is a fairly dark ice cream with a noticeable additive and it is not at all healthy, though it does use decent ingredients. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 270 calories, 140 of which are from fat. The fifteen grams of fat represent 23% of the RDA of fat, with 50% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 10 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 65 mg of cholesterol (that’s 20% of the RDA!) and 65 mg of Sodium (3% RDA). The only other real nutrients are four grams of protein, 10% of the RDA of Calcium and Vitamin A in the Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, liquid sugar and Skim milk! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There are no allergy warnings on the pint.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months (the pint I purchased three weeks ago would have lasted until May 24, 2018, had I not gobbled it down well before then).

The Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream is very dark, especially on the chocolate side, for both the chocolate ice cream and cookie portions. Consult a fabric guide for getting the dairy or cookie components out of whatever you get it on. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

Ben & Jerry's Cookies & Cream Cheesecake Core ice cream is all right, but it basically proves the idea that sometimes less is more.

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream
That's My Jam Core Ice Cream
What A Cluster Ice Cream

5/10

For other ice cream reviews, please visit my Ice Cream Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core Is Interesting And Worth Trying!

The Good: Flavorful and true to the chocolate and brownie flavors, Good ingredients
The Bad: Low nutritional value, Vanilla ice cream flavor barely asserts itself
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream is delightful, even if it could have been executed just as well without the vanilla ice cream.


Every now and then, I encounter an ice cream flavor that tries to be too much. With the Ben & Jerry's Core flavors, I have not had that issue much at all, but with the Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core ice cream, it certainly has an issue. Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core is a chocolate and vanilla-based ice cream with chocolate brownie batter and brownie chunks and the chocolate elements are so potent that they overwhelm the vanilla ice cream. The Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core would be just as good with just chocolate ice cream; the vanilla ice cream pretty much just takes up space. Despite that, it's still a very good ice cream.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, Core flavors of ice cream are ice cream flavors that have, essentially, the “topping” of the ice cream in the pint, presented as a cylinder going through the center. So, for example, in the Caramel Sutra Core, if one looks at the top of it, there is a circle in the center of caramel (it is actually a column that goes straight down to the bottom of the pint) surrounded by ice cream. It’s a neat concept and the Brownie Batter Core has two flavors of ice cream with bits of brownie blobs all around a center of brownie batter.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream is a smooth ice cream on the vanilla bean side and the caramel side is grainy, which is accented by the dry cookie pieces. The cookie core is obvious and not as plentiful as the core in some other Ben & Jerry's Core flavors.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an mid-range ice cream, especially compared to other ice creams and while the Core concept is unique to Ben & Jerry’s, it is not such an incredible execution of the concept as to justify the inflated ice cream price.

Ease Of Preparation

The Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream is a mildly loaded ice cream, where the core additive blends with one of the two ice creams in the mix. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream! No matter how one tries to consume it - blended together or with each of its independent elements, it is in no way extraordinary.

Taste

Brownie Batter Core ice cream smells delightfully chocolatey, just like fresh-baked brownies. The aroma is powerful and clear, instantly insinuating the flavors that one will consume.

On the flavor front, Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core ice cream is a delightful mix of chocolate and vanilla ice cream . . . both of which are instantly overpowered by the flavor of the chocolate sauce and brownie batter chunks within the ice cream. The vanilla flavored ice cream has no chance to assert itself opposite the powerful chocolate additives. The brownie flavors are distinct and clear and present in every bite.

The Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core ice cream has a faint sweet, slightly dry aftertaste to it. The aftertaste is neither overwhelming or enduring; the flavor lasts in the mouth for only a few minutes after the last of the ice cream is consumed.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream is a fairly dark ice cream with a noticeable additive and it is not at all healthy, though it does use decent ingredients. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 270 calories, 130 of which are from fat. The fourteen grams of fat represent 22% of the RDA of fat, with 40% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 8 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 60 mg of cholesterol (that’s 20% of the RDA!) and 65 mg of Sodium (3% RDA). The only other real nutrients are four grams of protein, 10% of the RDA of Calcium and Vitamin A in the Brownie Batter Core Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, liquid sugar and Skim milk! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Brownie Batter Core Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There are no allergy warnings on the pint.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months (the pint I purchased last week would have lasted until April 2018, had I not gobbled it down well before then).

The Brownie Batter Core ice cream is very dark, for both the chocolate ice cream and brownie flavors. Consult a fabric guide for getting the dairy or brownie components out of whatever you get it on. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Brownie Batter Core ice cream is flavorful and good, even with the vanilla ice cream in it.

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream
Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream
Ben & Jerry's New York Super Fudge Chunk

7/10

For other ice cream reviews, please visit my Ice Cream Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Dry Cinnamon Mediocrity: Ben & Jerry's Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream Underwhelms!

The Good: Inoffensive flavor, Good ingredients
The Bad: Low nutritional value, Not a strong flavor or a good mix of flavors, Very dry aftertaste
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream is mediocre and unsatisfying, making for one of the few Core fails from Ben & Jerry's.


My local grocery store has had a pretty awesome sale on Ben & Jerry's ice cream for the last week and that has led me to try some new and new-to-me ice creams. One of the new flavors my grocery store began to stock that I was intrigued by was the Ben & Jerry's Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream. I have generally enjoyed the various Core ice cream flavors, so the idea of one with - essentially - a cinnamon cookie core was interesting to me.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, Core flavors of ice cream are ice cream flavors that have, essentially, the “topping” of the ice cream in the pint, presented as a cylinder going through the center. So, for example, in the Caramel Sutra Core, if one looks at the top of it, there is a circle in the center of caramel (it is actually a column that goes straight down to the bottom of the pint) surrounded by ice cream. It’s a neat concept and the Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core has two flavors of ice cream swirled around bits of cinnamon cookie blobs.

Unfortunately, the Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core is a less-remarkable representation of the Core concept and the dryness of this ice cream flavor makes it off-putting.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream is a smooth ice cream on the vanilla bean side and the caramel side is grainy, which is accented by the dry cookie pieces. The cookie core is obvious and not as plentiful as the core in some other Ben & Jerry's Core flavors.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an mid-range ice cream, especially compared to other ice creams and while the Core concept is unique to Ben & Jerry’s, it is not such an incredible execution of the concept as to justify the inflated ice cream price.

Ease Of Preparation

The Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream is a mildly loaded ice cream, where the core additive blends with one of the two ice creams in the mix. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream! No matter how one tries to consume it - blended together or with each of its independent elements, it is in no way extraordinary.

Taste

Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream has almost no aroma to it. This is an ice cream that has virtually no scent to it, even as it nears its melting point.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream is very dry. The caramel ice cream is not overly sweet and the vanilla ice cream is essentially vanilla bean, but a very mild form of it. The dry, sugary flavor of the caramel ice cream is bland and seems to absorb the flavor of the cookie additive. The cookie is strongly cinnamon flavor and that makes more than half of the Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream just taste dry.

Unfortunately, the Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream is not just dry and somewhat indistinct in its primary flavoring; the aftertaste is strongly dry. The net result is an ice cream that is more dry than sweet and not at all satisfying in its flavor.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream is a fairly light ice cream with a noticeable additive and it is not at all healthy, though it does use decent ingredients. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 290 calories, 170 of which are from fat. The nineteen grams of fat represent 29% of the RDA of fat, with 50% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 9 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 65 mg of cholesterol (that’s 22% of the RDA!) and 90 mg of Sodium (4% RDA). The only other real nutrients are four grams of protein, 10% of the RDA of Calcium and 8% of the RDA of Vitamin A in the Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and water! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There are no allergy warnings on the pint.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months (the pint I purchased last week would have lasted until November 2017, had I not had to gobble it down for review and enjoyment!).

The Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream is fairly light in color, for both the vanilla and caramel ice cream flavors. Consult a fabric guide for getting the dairy or cookie components out of whatever you get it on. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core ice cream is a rare, mediocre outing from Ben & Jerry's, dominated as it is by cinnamon flavoring. The Spectacular Speculoos Cookie Core is dry and the aftertaste is one of the more enduring and dry ones from any Ben & Jerry's ice cream.

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Ben & Jerry's Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch ice cream
Blueberry Vanilla Graham Greek Frozen Yogurt
Coffee Caramel Buzz ice cream

3.5/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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A Perfect Ice Cream: Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream Hits The Mark!

The Good: Wonderful embodiment of both promised flavors, Not terrible on the nutrition front, Fair trade certified, Good ingredients
The Bad: None!
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream is a wonderful ice cream that lives up to all it promises, making for a perfect ice cream!


When it comes to ice cream, there are very few ice creams that I can find that truly find the balance between all of their promised flavors. Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch ice cream is one such ice cream. My wife, who has been on a ketogenic diet for the past year, had to alter her diet because of her heart and one of the things she has allowed herself is the occasional desert. After a year of only low-carb ice cream, I gave her a taste of the Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch ice cream and she took the container away from me and claimed that it was the best ice cream she had had in her entire life. While this might not be the best ice cream I have ever had, it is a flavor I could find no faults with. Ben & Jerry's got it absolutely right with the Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch!

There are very few ice creams that have a base and additives that are different, complimentary and in even proportion, but the Ben & Jerry's Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream manages to get that absolutely right with its coffee flavored ice cream and toffee pieces!

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream is a mostly smooth ice cream with hard toffee bits mixed throughout it. The toffee pieces range from 1/4" squares to almost inch long pieces. Some of the toffee pieces in the Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch are naked, hard toffee, while others have a slight coating of chocolate on them. None of the pieces are too big to be unruly and there is enough toffee in the pint container to get bits of toffee in almost every bite.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other coffee ice creams. This is made of decent ingredients, which does set it apart from many other coffee ice creams.

Ease Of Preparation

The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream is a lightly loaded ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream!

Taste

The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch smells strongly of coffee. The coffee scent is sweet and alluring, very clear to anyone who likes sweet coffee flavored drinks.

In the mouth, the Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch is dry and sweet, exactly like one might hope for from a coffee flavored ice cream. The flavor finishes with the buttery toffee flavor, infused by the pieces of toffee bar embedded in the ice cream. The two flavors synergize perfectly to create a sweet, buttery finish to the initially robust chocolate flavor. The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch is the perfect execution of all it hopes to be.

The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch has a mildly sweet aftertaste that does not last very long in the mouth after the last of the ice cream is consumed!

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream is a fairly light ice cream with a hard additive (the hard toffee bits). The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 300 calories, 180 of which are from fat. The twenty grams of fat represent 31% of the RDA of fat, with 65% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 13 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 75 mg of cholesterol (that’s 25% of the RDA!) and 45 mg of Sodium (2% RDA). The only other real nutrients are four grams of protein and 10% of the RDA of Calcium and 10% of the RDA of Vitamin A in the Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch Ben & Jerry’s is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There is an allergy warning for wheat, peanuts and tree nuts and it is fair trade certified.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months.

The Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch ice cream is fairly light, but dark enough that it will stain, especially light fabrics. As well, when the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Coffee Toffee Bar Crunch ice cream is perfect and well worth hunting down for anyone who loves coffee flavored ice cream and candy bits!

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream
Limited Batch Candy Bar Pie
Banana Peanut Butter Greek Frozen Yogurt

10/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Not Selling Me On The Execution, Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream Underwhelms!

The Good: Good ingredients, Not terrible on the nutrition front, Fair trade certified
The Bad: Exceptionally weak flavor, More expensive than other ice creams.
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream is about as good as a pistachio ice cream might be, but it's enough to prove to me that I don't love pistachio ice cream.


As summer comes to an end, my local grocery store has begun a clearance sale on a ton of different ice creams. Among them was Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio ice cream. I’m a huge fan of pistachios. I love salted pistachios; I have been wowed by some flavors of pistachios. But the truth is, I have never been enamored with pistachio ice cream. Pistachio ice cream has, in my experience, been only a faint recreation of pistachio flavor. So, when I encountered Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio ice cream, my thought was that if anyone could make a decent pistachio ice cream, it would be Ben & Jerry's.

And they came close, I suppose. Ben & Jerry's Pistachio Pistachio ice cream is as mild as other pistachio ice creams, with more vibrantly flavorful pistachios embedded in it.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream is a mostly smooth ice cream with full pistachio nuts embedded in it. There are no other additives other than the nuts in this ice cream.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, before it went on clearance, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other pistachio ice creams. Given how pistachio ice cream is a weird staple ice cream most places, perhaps what is most remarkable about Ben & Jerry's Pistachio Pistachio ice cream is that it is not artificially colored green.

Ease Of Preparation

The Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream is a light ice cream that is loaded with pistachios. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream!

Taste

Pistachio Pistachio ice cream smells like cream and pistachio nuts. The aroma is exactly what one expects for pistachios, thanks to pistachio pudding. The aroma of this ice cream, though, is enough like actual pistachio nuts that those who love pistachios are likely to recognize the scent.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio ice cream tastes like sweet cream with a buttery sub-flavor. The ice cream itself is sweet and milky, combined with a faint buttery quality. Nearer the embedded pistachio nuts, the Pistachio Pistachio ice cream is appropriately nutty. The pistachio nuts taste like pistachio nuts and add texture to the ice cream without overwhelming it on the flavor front.

This ice cream has a fairly sweet aftertaste, which lingers in the mouth for several minutes after the last of it is consumed. The pistachio nuts are so coated in ice cream that, at best, they leave their buttery flavor in the mouth, as opposed to drying out the mouth.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream is a fairly light ice cream with a strong, nutty additive. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 280 calories, 170 of which are from fat. The nineteen grams of fat represent 29% of the RDA of fat, with 50% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 10 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 80 mg of cholesterol (that’s 27% of the RDA!) and 65 mg of Sodium (3% RDA). The only other real nutrients are six grams of protein and 15% of the RDA of Calcium and 10% of the RDA of Vitamin A in the Pistachio Pistachio Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Pistachio Pistachio Ben & Jerry’s is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There are no allergy warnings, but anyone with allergies for eggs, milk, and/or nuts will want to avoid this ice cream.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months. Ours would have lasted until the end of April, 2017 had we not consumed it all first.

The Pistachio Pistachio ice cream is fairly light and it would be surprising if it left stains outside of light fabrics. As a dairy-based food, though, when the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Pistachio Pistachio ice cream is a good rendition of a flavor that is tough to make distinctive or interesting. The flavor is far more sweet than actual pistachios and that mutes what nut flavor the ice cream possesses.

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
That's My Jam Core
Ben & Jerry's Blueberry Vanilla Graham Greek Frozen Yogurt
Limited Edition Cotton Candy

4/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Overwhelmed: The Ben & Jerry's That's My Core Ice Cream Entirely Underwhelms!

The Good: Interesting concept, Chocolate flavor is distinctive, Wonderful ingredients
The Bad: VERY low nutritional value, Not a strong flavor or a good mix of flavors
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s That's My Jam Core Ice Cream is a cool concept with some mild elements that blend to form an ice cream that still gets overwhelmed by the chocolate in it.


A few months ago, I finally got my first try of one of the Ben & Jerry's Core flavors. Despite being somewhat unimpressed by the Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream (reviewed here!), I decided to give the Core flavors another chance. I was super excited to try the That's My Jam Core ice cream. Sadly, I found it to be an incredibly poor blending of the flavors involved and one that was not actually worth trying.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, Core flavors of ice cream are ice cream flavors that have, essentially, the “topping” of the ice cream in the pint, presented as a cylinder going through the center. So, for example, in the Caramel Sutra Core, if one looks at the top of it, there is a circle in the center of caramel (it is actually a column that goes straight down to the bottom of the pint) surrounded by ice cream. It’s a neat concept and the That's My Jam Core has two flavors of ice cream swirled around the raspberry jam column in the center of the ice cream.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The That's My Jam Core Ice Cream is a smooth ice cream on the chocolate side and chunky on the raspberry side because of the fudge chips in it. The raspberry jam core is obvious and there are fudge bits mixed discretely in the raspberry ice cream half of the That's My Jam Core pint, such that almost every bite of the raspberry ice cream has fudge in it.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other ice creams and while the Core concept is unique to Ben & Jerry’s, it is not such an incredible execution of the concept as to justify the inflated ice cream price.

Ease Of Preparation

The That's My Jam Core Ice Cream is a loaded ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the That's My Jam Core Ice Cream! No matter how one tries to consume it - blended together or with each of its independent elements, it is in no way extraordinary.

Taste

That's My Jam Core ice cream has almost no aroma to it. This is an ice cream that has virtually no scent to it, even as it nears its melting point.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s That's My Jam Core ice cream is very mild as well. The raspberry half is almost so mild as to taste like vanilla, as opposed to anything that bears a fruit flavor. The fudge chips add a rich, dark chocolate flavor that overwhelms the raspberry ice cream flavor. The chocolate ice cream is a very bland, standard flavor of ice cream. The raspberry jam core to these pints is sweet and only vaguely fruity.

Mixed together for any bite with all four of the elements, the chocolate and fudge completely overwhelm the raspberry ice cream and the jam. The jam contributes a slight sweet aftertaste to the ice cream, but this is a powerfully chocolate-dominated flavor.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s That's My Jam Core Ice Cream is a fairly light ice cream with a noticeable additive and it is not at all healthy, though it does use decent ingredients. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 260 calories, 120 of which are from fat. The thirtteen grams of fat represent 20% of the RDA of fat, with 45% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 9 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 55 mg of cholesterol (that’s 18% of the RDA!) and 45 mg of Sodium (2% RDA). The only other real nutrients are four grams of protein, 10% of the RDA of Calcium and 8% of the RDA of Vitamin A and Iron in the That's My Jam Core Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s That's My Jam Core has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The That's My Jam Core Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There are no allergy warnings on the pint.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months (the pint I purchased in April would have lasted until December 30, 2016 had I not enjoyed it so much before then!).

The That's My Jam Core ice cream is fairly light in color for the raspberry half, but predictably dark for the chocolate side and fudge pieces, so it will absolutely stain fabrics. Consult a fabric guide for getting the dairy or chocolate components out of whatever you get it on. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s That's My Jam Core ice cream is one of the all-around disappointments from the Ben & Jerry's ice cream line!

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Ben & Jerry's Mint Chocolate Cookie ice cream
Blueberry Vanilla Graham Greek Frozen Yogurt
Coffee Caramel Buzz ice cream

2.5/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Ben & Jerry's Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream Is Good, But Unexceptional!

The Good: Good flavor, Reasonably priced
The Bad: Mint is not as potent as it could be, Not one of the more nutritious flavors
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream is a good, but it's a tough sell to an ice cream maker!


A few years back, I received a Cuisinart Ice Cream Maker (reviewed here!) and I have used it pretty consistently over the years. While the other people I know who have had such things use them once or twice, I have used mine a lot, despite the expense of making one's own ice cream. At the times I have shared my mint-based ice creams, I have made a lot of people very satisfied and the most common comment I get is that my ice creams are potently mint-flavored. That has made it tough for me to enjoy store-bought ice creams with more mild mint flavor. The Ben & Jerry's Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream falls into that category.

This is a good ice cream, but for those of us who love mint, it is hardly minty enough.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream is a fairly chunky ice cream with an obvious additives. The chocolate cookie bits are present in virtually every bite.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other, comparable, ice creams. Ben & Jerry's ice cream is made of decent ingredients, which does set it apart from many other ice creams.

Ease Of Preparation

The Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream is a loaded ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream!

Taste

The Ben & Jerry's Mint Chocolate Cookie ice cream has almost no aroma to it, even as it nears its melting point. This is an ice cream that does almost nothing to foreshadow its flavor with its scent.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Mint Chocolate Cookie ice cream tastes like cookies & cream with a powerful aftertaste of peppermint. The mint ice cream makes it taste quite as cold and the peppermint is more mild than overt. It blends perfectly with the flecks of cookie pieces and the big pieces of sandwich cookies broken up into it.

This ice cream leaves a very sweet and slightly dry aftertaste in the mouth, though that aftertaste does not endure very long.

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream is a fairly heavy ice cream with a heavy additive (the cookie is pretty solid in this ice cream). The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 280 calories, 150 of which are from fat. The seventeen grams of fat represent 26% of the RDA of fat, with 50% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 10 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 80 mg of cholesterol (that’s 27% of the RDA!) and 120 mg of Sodium (5% RDA). The only other real nutrients are five grams of protein and 10% of the RDA of Calcium and Vitamin A in the Mint Chocolate Cookie Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Mint Chocolate Cookie has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Mint Chocolate Cookie Ben & Jerry’s is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There is no allergy warning on the pint.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months; the pint I just opened would not have expired until April 8, 2016, though I'm sure it won't last that long because it is so good.

The Mint Chocolate Cookie ice cream is fairly light in color and it would be surprising if it left stains outside of light fabrics. As well, when the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Mint Chocolate Cookie ice cream is good, but as one who has made their own ice cream and made it with strong, flavorful peppermint flavor, it easily could be better. That makes it a tougher sell than it ought to be and that is unfortunate, especially from such a prestigious brand that usually makes reliably good ice creams!

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream
Coffee Caramel Buzz Ice Cream
Limited Edition Cotton Candy

5/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Mmmm . . . Chocolate, Fudge, Not So Much On The Peanut Butter: Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice cream!

The Good: Interesting concept, Great chocolate flavors, Wonderful ingredients
The Bad: Low nutritional value, Peanut Butter flavor does not hold its own at all!
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream is a cool concept with great individual flavors that blend poorly.


For some strange reason, I feel like it was The Daily Show With Jon Stewart that informed me of the existence of Ben & Jerry’s Core ice creams (it was that or George Takei lobbying for his own flavor Core), but it was quite some time before they actually made it to my local supermarket and I had a chance to try some. While I’ve tried three or four now, the Peanut Butter Fudge Core is my first review of one of these.

For those unfamiliar with the concept, Core flavors of ice cream are ice cream flavors that have, essentially, the “topping” of the ice cream in the pint, presented as a cylinder going through the center. So, for example, in the Caramel Sutra Core, if one looks at the top of it, there is a circle in the center of caramel (it is actually a column that goes straight down to the bottom of the pint) surrounded by ice cream. It’s a neat concept and the Peanut Butter Fudge Core has two flavors of ice cream swirled around the thick fudge column in the center of the ice cream.

And it’s pretty good, especially for those who prefer chocolate to peanut butter in such a mix.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream is a fairly chunky ice cream with two obvious additives. The fudge core is obvious and there are mini-peanut butter cup candies mixed discretely in the chocolate ice cream half of the Peanut Butter Fudge Core pint.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other ice creams and while the Core concept is unique to Ben & Jerry’s, it is not such an incredible concept as to justify the inflated ice cream price.

Ease Of Preparation

The Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream is a loaded ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream! That said, I found it held up much better consuming each of the ice cream’s elements separate from one another, as opposed to attempting a rich flavor experience by blending the three elements on the spoon or in the mouth.

Taste

Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream smells surprisingly strongly of peanut butter. The aroma becomes more prevalent and clearer the warmer the ice cream goes. The Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream entirely foreshadows the peanut butter aspect of the flavor without even a hint of chocolate in its bouquet.

On the tongue, Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream is very much the embodiment of whichever part of the whole one tries. The peanut butter ice cream is sweet and nutty in its flavor, very much what one expects from a peanut butter ice cream. The chocolate ice cream half is a very standard chocolate ice cream, albeit not as sweet as many mass-produced chocolate ice creams. Instead, this tastes almost like a dark chocolate ice cream (which is wonderful and I tend to prefer!). The chocolate ice cream side of the Peanut Butter Fudge Core is broken up by mini-peanut butter cup candies. Unfortunately, these little candy additives are more waxy than chocolatey or peanut buttery. By contrast, the fudge core column going through the center of the two distinct ice cream flavors is dark, rich, and all that it promises for chocolate fudge flavor. In fact, it is such a perfect embodiment of chocolate fudge that I had to wonder just how Ben & Jerry’s managed to make it so malleable (it tastes like it would be very dry and hard, like pure fudge!).

Mixed together for any bite together, the chocolate and fudge completely overwhelm any flavor from the peanut butter ice cream. The chocolates are powerful and oppressive to the peanut butter and while I applaud Ben & Jerry’s for trying to make an awesome blend, the peanut butter ice cream does not hold its own against the two chocolate flavors in the Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream.

At best, the peanut butter flavor in the Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream contributes a subtle, dry aftertaste to the palate. This is not the greatest contribution the ice cream could make, but it is what the peanut butter does in this case!

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream is a fairly dense ice cream with noticeable additives and it is not at all healthy, though it does use decent ingredients. The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 300 calories, 170 of which are from fat. The nineteen grams of fat represent 29% of the RDA of fat, with 50% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 10 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 50 mg of cholesterol (that’s 17% of the RDA!) and 95 mg of Sodium (4% RDA). The only other real nutrients are six grams of protein, 10% of the RDA of Calcium and 8% of the RDA of Vitamin A and Iron in the Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Butter Fudge Core has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Peanut Butter Fudge Core Ben & Jerry’s is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free. There is an allergy warning on the pint for tree nuts and wheat.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months (the pint I purchased in February would have lasted until April 2016 had I not enjoyed it so much before then!).

The Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream is fairly light in color for the peanut butter half, but predictably dark for the chocolate and fudge elements, so it will absolutely stain fabrics. Consult a fabric guide for getting the dairy or fudge elements out of whatever you get it on. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Peanut Butter Fudge Core ice cream is a great concept, executed fairly, but not extraordinarily, which makes it a little tougher of a sell than it should have been.

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Ben & Jerry's Limited Batch Candy Bar Pie ice cream
Blueberry Vanilla Graham Greek Frozen Yogurt
Coffee Caramel Buzz ice cream

5.5/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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The Pleasant Surprise Of Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream!

The Good: Good flavor, Reasonably priced
The Bad: Chocolate flavor is almost entirely absent from the ice cream, Not one of the more nutritious flavors
The Basics: Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream is a limited edition flavor that grew on me with each bite . . . unfortunately, with its fat content, I can’t eat much, lest it literally cause me to grow with each bite!


When I first sat down to review the Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie ice cream that I picked up at the grocery store, I was ready with the snarky title “Perhaps ‘Limited Batch’ Is Ben & Jerry’s Euphemism For Weak Flavor: Candy Bar Pie.” But then I kept eating it and writing and eating and writing and I discovered that I had leapt, very much, to the wrong initial conclusion. The thing is, my local grocery store recently had an amazing sale on Ben & Jerry’s ice creams and it coincided with my getting my tax refund, so I bought a bunch of flavors. When I got ready to eat them, I looked over the Candy Bar Pie and I honestly had no idea what attracted me to it. Outside the words “Limited Batch,” I was stymied; did I really spend some of my fun money on a flavor my wife would prefer over me (my wife loves peanut butter)? Did I just buy a flavor based on its limited edition nature without actually seeing what was in it?! Regardless, when I got around to trying it, I was instantly underwhelmed.

But then, as I reviewed it and had my pint of it out, it started to smell better and better and the flavor (save the chocolate in it) began to really pop. And I found myself writing positive adjectives and smiling and enjoying myself, so I had to go back and scrap the beginning of the review!

So, right off the bat, Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie is an ice cream flavor that should be eaten closer to its melting point than when it is solidly frozen. That’s important for those who want to get the most real flavor out of it.

Basics

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream comes in a pint container. The Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream is a fairly chunky ice cream with two obvious additives. The fudge flakes/chocolate nougat were minimal, but the pretzel swirl was present in virtually every bite.

At (locally) $5.99 a pint, the Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is an expensive ice cream, especially compared to other ice creams, but things like the Limited Batch Candy Bar Pie tend to make up for that in creativity; the bigger brands are not making such creative flavors with such (supposedly) distinctive flavors. This is made of decent ingredients, which does set it apart from many other ice creams.

Ease Of Preparation

The Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream is a loaded ice cream. As an ice cream, preparation is ridiculously simple: one need only to open the top of the container, scoop out a half cup and consume! There is no trick to preparing or eating the Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream!

Taste

Candy Bar Pie ice cream smells recognizably of peanut butter. The aroma becomes more prevalent and clearer the warmer the ice cream goes. Removing the Candy Bar Pie pint from my subzero freezer and opening it right away yielded a scentless experience (which was fine because I could not possibly scoop the ice cream out when it is so hard anyway!). But, as it approached its freezing point, this ice cream became more and more aromatic and the scent of peanut butter became stronger and (strangely) more inviting.

In the mouth, Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie ice cream tastes like peanut butter in every single bite! The flavor is distinct, clear and (ironically, because the other ice cream in my freezer right now is Breyer’s Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup ice cream) might be the most accurate recreation of a sweet peanut butter flavor exactly like the center of a Reese’s peanut butter cup that I have ever tried in ice cream form! Blended in fairly regularly with the peanut butter ice cream in the Candy Bar Pie is a swirl of sweet and salty pretzels. This is essentially a caramel swirl (albeit thicker) in which pretzels have been powderized and ground up. It comes out tasting like caramel and pretzels and peanut butter. The chocolate in the Candy Bar Pie never quite pops. Whenever I encountered a piece of fudge or chocolate nougat, it manifested on the taste buds more as a texture (hard) than a flavor (chocolatey). The closest it came to popping as a flavor was contributing a waxy chocolate undertone to the sweetness of the pretzel swirl/peanut butter.

Interestingly, the Candy Bar Pie does not have a strongly dry aftertaste. This is surprising because the peanut butter and pretzel swirls in the ice cream are fairly dry in their primary flavors, so one might expect that dryness to persist after the last bite is consumed. It does not!

Nutrition

The Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream is a fairly dense ice cream with noticeable additives (thought I could not honestly find any difference between the advertized fudge flakes and chocolate nougat). The pint represents four half-cup servings. In the half-cup serving, there are 300 calories, 160 of which are from fat. The eighteen grams of fat represent 28% of the RDA of fat, with 40% of one’s RDA of saturated fat coming in the 8 grams of saturated fat in this ice cream. One serving has 55 mg of cholesterol (that’s 18% of the RDA!) and 210 mg of Sodium (9% RDA). The only other real nutrients are five grams of protein, 10% of the RDA of Calcium and 8% of the RDA of Vitamin A in the Candy Bar Pie Ice Cream.

Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie has decent ingredients. Made primarily of Cream, Skim milk, and liquid sugar! There is nothing unpronounceable in the ingredients list. The Candy Bar Pie Ben & Jerry’s is Kosher, but not marked as gluten free (which makes sense because the pretzels have flour in them). There is no allergy warning on the pint, though it obviously has nuts in it and those with a peanut allergy need to be aware.

Storage/Clean-Up

Ben & Jerry’s ice cream is both a frozen and a dairy product, so it is pretty obvious that it must be kept frozen in order to remain viable. Kept frozen it remains fresh for months.

The Candy Bar Pie ice cream is fairly light in color and it would be surprising if it left stains outside of light fabrics. As well, when the ice cream melts and gets onto fabrics, it will require one to wash it right out. On nonporous surfaces, the ice cream wipes off exceptionally easily.

Overall

The Ben & Jerry’s Candy Bar Pie ice cream is a surprisingly flavorful ice cream that is, truly, quite different from others on the market. While it might not have enough chocolate in it to balance the sweet and salty nutty/pretzel flavor out for my tastes, it remains one of the pleasant surprises of the Limited Edition line and one worth trying while it is on the market!

For other Ben & Jerry’s ice creams, be sure to visit my reviews of:
Blueberry Vanilla Graham Greek Frozen Yogurt
Coffee Caramel Buzz ice cream
Raspberry Fudge Chunk Greek Frozen Yogurt

7/10

For other food reviews, please visit my Food Review Index Page for an organized listing!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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