Tag Archives: pumpkin spice products

FIBER ONE PUMPKIN BARS

Posted on by
2

Welcome to day 21 of Tag Sale Tastes’ Pumpkinpalooza!

Today I tried a Fiber One 90 Calorie Soft Baked Pumpkin Bar:

IMG_6824

The ingredients include pumpkin flakes (first time I’ve seen that), cinnamon, and spice (I wonder what the spices other than cinnamon were, and why they weren’t identified.  I hate secrets — don’t you?):

IMG_6825

Each box contains 6 individually-wrapped bars:

IMG_6863

And here’s what one looks like:

IMG_6864

These are smaller than the package would lead you to believe — not much bigger than a Fig Newton.  They were soft and had that gummy texture that low-calorie baked goods tend to have.  They had a slight orange color, accented by the pale orange icing zig zags (which were puzzling, seeing as the one on the package had white icing). These were OK, nothing special, and you really had to concentrate to believe they were pumpkin bars.  My kids and I like most of the other Fiber One varieties, including lemon, coffee cake, and chocolate mint — they’re great to tuck in a lunchbox or in a backpack for a quick snack.  The pumpkin ones were definitely on the lower end of the Fiber One flavor spectrum.

Rating:  2-1/2 pumpkins (out of 5)

STARBUCKS PUMPKIN SPICE LATTE

Posted on by
Reply

Welcome to day 20 of Tag Sale Tastes’ Pumpkinpalooza!

Two-thirds of the way through September, I finally felt ready to enter a Starbucks and order a Pumpkin Spice Latte (“PSL”).

PSL1

The Starbucks PSL is made with espresso, milk, pumpkin spice flavored sauce, whipped cream, Starbucks vanilla syrup, and pumpkin spice topping of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves.

The guy that took my order was quite patient as I went through my usual routine of trying to figure what the different sizes were.  I gave up, as I always do, and ordered a “small,” which in Starbucks parlance is “tall.”  And black is white and day is night.  I quit going to Starbucks a while back because I every time I’d go there I felt like there was glitch in the matrix.

Here is the barista concentrating intently on the precise formula for my PSL:

PSL2

My PSL arrived with a spiffy fall-themed belt around its special fall-themed cup:

It had a cute little pouf of whipped cream and pumpkin spice on top:

PSL3

The whipped cream quickly dissolved into the orange-colored hot beverage:

IMG_6873

This in-store PSL was NOTHING like the Starbucks Via Instant Pumpkin Spice Latte, which was so awful that I discarded the unopened packets.  The drink was a little too sweet for me, but other than that it was pleasant.  There was a mild pumpkin flavor, and I appreciated the real spices on top of the whipped cream, which added a nice flavor and aroma.  I can’t say I’d ever crave a PSL, but I can see how those who can afford the 300+ calories and the time to stand in line, and who aren’t afraid to call a small a tall, would look forward to this drink’s arrival each fall.

Rating:  4 pumpkins (out of 5)