The Good: Decent ingredients, Does not taste bad
The Bad: Comparatively expensive, Not very flavorful at all
The Basics: My first experience with Barilla's line of cookies are their Baiocchi cookies and they are pretty unremarkable.
It's that time of year that I am gifted a whole awesome box of new-to-me foods! The first food that caught my eye to try was the Barilla Baiocchi cookies. I was pretty surprised to see Barilla - famous as a pasta and pasta sauce company - was branching out. The Baiocchi are intended as a dessert that will accent their pastas to finish a meal off well.
Barilla Baiocchi cookies are trying to compete with brand named Oreo sandwich cookies. But, with only fifteen cookies per pack - and smaller ones at that, the Barilla Baiocchi are proportionately a bit more expensive for a less-sweet, less-flavorful cookie.
Basics
Barilla is an Italian company that is famous for making pasta and is now branching out in its U.S. distribution to include its baked goods, like cookies and breadsticks. Sandwich cookies have never been my favorite type of cookie and Barilla Baiocchi are not exactly making me rethink that.
Each (almost) 10 gram Barilla Baiocchi Cookie is two tan disks approximately 1 1/2” in diameter, connected by a thin layer of brown icing that holds the two cookies together. Baiocchi Nutrition Rich Cookies come in a 5.29 oz. bag that houses the fifteen cookies. The bag does nothing to prevent breakage and my bag had several broken cookies. A serving of Barilla Baiocchi cookies is three cookies.
Ease Of Preparation
Eating Barilla Baiocchi cookies is not a real challenge; they are cookies. Simply open the bag - which is not resealable - and pull out a cookie. When you have a cookie out, all you have to do is stick it in your mouth and chew; there is nothing complicated or difficult about eating these cookies.
Taste
Opening the bag of Barilla Baiocchi cookies, one is greeted by the scent of graham crackers. The scent of the cinnamon and graham is intriguing and inviting, but not particularly strong. There is no hint of the hazelnut or cocoa in the bouquet of the cookies.
In the mouth, the predominant flavor of the cookies is dry and nutty. The exterior of the cookies is dry and not particularly sweet. The flavor transitions into something mildly akin to graham and the hazelnut and cocoa center adds a little bit of sweetness to them. These cookies are neither overly flavorful, nor particularly sweet.
The Barilla Baiocchi cookies leave a fairly dry aftertaste in the mouth, so they are ideal when accompanied by milk or water.
Nutrition
Barilla Baiocchi are intended as a dessert, not a full meal. Three of these cookies, totaling 28 grams, represent a single serving and they are predictably not all that nutritious. Made primarily of wheat flour, sugar and non hydrogenated vegetable fats and oils, the ingredient list is made of almost all-recognizable ingredients. This is not an all-natural food product and these cookies were produced on equipment that forces them to add a disclaimer about eggs, milk, soy, hazelnuts, shea nuts, coconuts and wheat.
Barilla's Baiocchi cookies have only 140 calories for a three cookie serving, but 70 of those calories are from fat. A full serving represents 15% of one's RDA of saturated fat, though they are cholesterol free. As well, they are fairly low in sodium for a cookie, having only 85 mg per serving. They also have 2 grams of protein, but no other significant nutrients.
Storage/Cleanup
Barilla Baiocchi cookies are easy to care for and clean up. Unopened, they have a pretty decent shelf life; the bag we got earlier this week (which was produced on November 7 of this year) had an expiration date of February 1, 2019. Kept sealed, I am sure they would have lasted at least that long; they were pretty dry and hard to begin with. As cookies, one need only not shake the bag excessively to care for them and wipe away any crumbs after eating them. This is a low-stress food!
Overall
Barilla Baiocchi cookies are pretty unremarkable, but not bad. Anyone hoping for anything flavorful - especially in the arena of chocolate flavoring for the central icing - will be disappointed.
For other reviews of cookies, please check out:
Creme de Pirouline Dark Chocolate Artisan Wafer Rolls
Peeps Oreo Cookies
Chips Ahoy! Thins Cinnamon Sugar cookies
4/10
For other food and drink reviews, please visit my Food And Drink Review Index Page for an organized listing!
© 2017 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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