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The Energy Bar Challenge, Part II!

Tuesday, October 7, 2003 Update by Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka

As a select few individuals may remember (thanks mom and dad!), I decided to assault my taste buds and various internal organs last Thursday by voluntarily consuming five popular "energy bars" located in the nearby supermarket in between the pills which kept your bones from falling apart and the all-organic Kosher marshmallow substitute topping jars. Apparently our society currently has a raging hard-on for products which will make us think that we're getting skinnier and healthier simply by eating them with a Diet Coke after consuming a supersized McDonalds lardbiscuit McCholesterol combo meal. Now I'm sure some people out there actually take advantage of the benefits that energy bars offer, such as the benefit of tasting like chewing through a clump of sod without actually having to go into your yard, but the majority of obese Americans have absolutely no use for an "energy" snack product which resembles a cigar yet weighs well over 25 pounds. Any time I want to lose weight, I simply consume mass amounts of that Kashi cereal and enjoy the benefits of digesting its wonderful mixture of pure wheat, oats, rye, barley, corn, methane, peat moss, vitamin oxygen, charcoal, plywood, and splinters from the marijuana pipes that one of their loopy workers accidentally dropped into the processing machines.

Unfortunately for me, my work last week was not complete, as there were still four energy bars which escaped my critical review. Today I shall dive into the fabulous four remaining delicacies, the GenSoy Xtreme Peanut Butter Fix, ZONE Perfect CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY, TRIPLE LAYER ENERGY BAR BALANCE Gold COOKIES N' CREME CRUNCH, and the TRIPLE LAYER ENERGY BAR BALANCE Gold CHOCOLATE PEANUT BUTTER bar. Please keep in mind that these companies, not me, made the shrew decision of using so many capital letters in their titles. If I was in charge of naming energy bars, I'd probably make them sound less retarded and call them good names like "Gross Pile of Shit" or "I Can't Believe It's Not Roadkill!", but I suspect the folks in marketing might have an issue with this.

ENERGY BAR #6: "GenSoy Xtreme Peanut Butter Fix"

LABEL DESCRIPTION: Holy shit, this soy is "Xtreme"! This is undoubtedly the most "Xtreme" soy product I have ever laid my virgin eyes upon! The wrapper comes festively decorated with a gigantic red X above a silver / grey / orange / brown series of horizontal stripes which made me feel as if I was traveling back in time... IN AN XTREME SOY WAY! OH HELL YEAH!!! I must admit that the "Peanut Butter Fix" title kind of scared me, as I'm fairly sure companies make up names like "Fix" so they won't get sued by the FDA once somebody discovers their "peanut butter" is actually a paste composed of recycled tires and alien fungus that grows on the bottom of manhole covers. Perhaps GenSoy's decision to call this a "Fix" was their shrewd attempt to score with the hip and trendy heroin-lovers crowd who must purchase a large amount of nutritional energy bars after they indulge themselves in a psychotic drug binge and shriek at their bathroom walls nonstop for three days.

Regardless of the decision behind this "Fix" - this "Xtreme Fix!" - GenSoy's wrapper warns consumers that we should all have "Have 25 grams of soy protein every day." The words "every day" are underlined just in case you're particularly dense and you stopped reading once you hit the word "protein," in which case you'd be asking yourself, "but self, how often should I have 25 grams of soy protein? I've got to know! Somebody please tell me! For the love of Christ, HOW OFTEN SHOULD I HAVE 25 GRAMS OF MOTHERFUCKING SOY PROTEIN?!?" Unfortunately, it doesn't explain why we need 25 grams of soy protein every day, but I've got some scientific nutritional-type friends and they claim if we don't get 25 grams of soy protein each day, we'll eventually turn into that kid from "Akira" and our arms will explode into a gigantic grotesque blob of fat and sinews, ultimately causing us to transform into a gigantic psychic baby which will destroy a major metropolitan city. I'm not sure why these people are my friends.

NUTRITIONAL FACTS: This Peanut Butter Fix has roughly 20-25% of every major vitamin, so if you eat four of them every day, the president of the FDA will come over to your house and present you with a decorative plaque you can place on your mantel. Unfortunately, each bar contains 70 fat calories (200 calories total), so perhaps you should look somewhere else to get your "fix."

REVIEW: Let me tell you a little story: I got really drunk one night during my freshman year of college at Vanderbilt University. In that night I stumbled over to some frat party and proceeded to entertain the nice people there by extolling the dangers of smoking while waving my arms around like a madman and generally behaving as if my spine would suddenly liquefy at any given time. I decided to demonstrate why people shouldn't smoke by putting my hand in an ashtray, scooping out a handful of cigarette butts, and chowing down on them. I'm not kidding about this incident, although I honestly wish I was. That was coincidentally the evening in which I fell down a hill and woke up in the back of somebody's pickup truck parked in downtown Nashville. One single bite of "GenSoy Xtreme Peanut Butter Fix" reminded me of this evening and brought back all the fabulous rotting, disgusting memories that it contained. This is perhaps the only way I can accurately describe the taste sensation of biting into a GenSoy Xtreme Peanut Butter Fix bar; it's like eating a cup of cigarette butts, falling down a muddy hill, and then passing out in a stranger's pickup truck. I don't know what "soy" is, but I know an awful lot of unappealing third-world countries grow it, which gives me a significant reason to dislike it. As for the "Peanut Butter Fix" which the manufacturers claimed was supposed to accompany this treat, it was really nowhere to be found. Perhaps I need to fill out my name and address on a form and they'll fax it to me at a later date.

AMOUNT OF ENERGY I RECEIVED FROM CONSUMING THIS: After consuming it, my mind instantly began thinking about the aforementioned dreaded night in Nashville, so I guess it gave me enough energy to begin contemplating one of the most disgusting and horrible events in my life besides the morning I was born. Is this a good thing? You got me; perhaps chewing on a GenSoy Xtreme Peanut Butter Fix bar will allow you the joys of experiencing the time you were abducted by aliens and they used your colon as a festive pool hockey table.

RATING: 3/10

ENERGY BAR #7: "TRIPLE LAYER ENERGY BAR BALANCE Gold COOKIES N' CREME CRUNCH"

LABEL DESCRIPTION: Hooray! More capital letters! Keep 'em coming, barkeep, I'm a big boy! In one sense I feel sorry for the companies who produce energy bars, as they're competing with approximately 64,000 other corporations who are making the exact same things as them. In an effort to attract the most attention on the store shelves, these corporations have paid for a heap of scientific marketing research that informed them "using all capital letters = GOOD IDEA." Hey, here's an idea you guys: why don't you make an energy bar wrapper which emits a holographic series of images showing a naked woman fucking a cactus? That would get some attention! Or maybe a wrapper which shoots lasers beams into nearby consumers' eyes and blinds them with fantastic savings! If there was some possible way to make popup ads appear in real life situations, I'd suggest that scenario as well.

NUTRITIONAL FACTS: It's the standard 20-25% breakdown here, with nothing particularly exciting or noteworthy. This snack has 25% of your recommended Molybdenum requirements, so if you're looking to fulfill your daily Molybdenum needs, perhaps you should eat something else like... uh... the planet Mars or something. I don't know, what the hell is Molybdenum anyway? Wasn't he the guy who battled Superman that one time?

REVIEW: Before I actually taste this thing, let me describe the smell: try to imagine a used coffee filter covered in raisins that have been marinating in a fetid swamp of chlorine for a week. Then think of something significantly worse and you'll be able to get an idea of what this white brick of waste smells like. True enough to its name, this bar has "TRIPLE LAYERS." I'm guessing the first layer is sawdust, the second is stucco, and the third is some sort of manmade synthesized metal. Perhaps eating metal is good for you. Maybe it has a lot of Molybdenum in it. I really don't know. During my valiant attempt to chew this wad of god-knows-what, some sort of exotic industrial acid covered my tongue and began eating away at the enamel in my teeth, so I think I can now file a worker's compensation claim. The second layer (the stucco) seems to be guilty of producing this disgusting taste, so all the blame should go to the engineering team who was in charge of layer #2. Please note that I did not even insinuate anywhere in this review that this energy bar tastes anything like cookies and creme. This is because I'm not a dirty rotten lying bastard asshole like the folks who run the Balance company.

AMOUNT OF ENERGY I RECEIVED FROM CONSUMING THIS: Not very much, certainly not anywhere near the amount I received from the heroin bar above.

RATING: 2/10

ENERGY BAR #8: "ZONE Perfect CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY"

LABEL DESCRIPTION: Much like the previously reviewed ZONE Perfect APPLE CINNAMON energy bar, this came with an exciting three milligrams of "OMEGA 3." It was very refreshing and relieving to discover this important fact, as I have not knowingly ingested any "OMEGA 3" since the previous energy bar review, and my body was really starting to feel it. For example, my head was itching. If that's not a clear sign that I need more "OMEGA 3" in my diet, I'm not sure what is. I would like to point out that there is a crosshair drawn on the inside of the "O" in "ZONE," perhaps indicating that this energy bar is ideal for hunters and various folk who enjoy shooting animals with firearms. Besides the deer-killing crosshair, there isn't much exciting about the packaging on this energy bar. In fact, some of the font appears to be Times New Roman, so maybe the graphic artists who designed this ran out of energy during the creative process. Oh wouldn't that be ironic? Well, actually, I guess it wouldn't really be that ironic, so forget I even mentioned it.

NUTRITIONAL FACTS: This thing is just chock full o' good crap. 200% Vitamin C, 200% Vitamin B6, 210% Vitamin E... this thing has it all! For all you folks who were particularly worried about your Molybdenum intake, the ZONE Perfect CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY has a whopping 65% of whatever that is, so you can be sure that you're getting a whole boatload of Molybdenum when you consume one of these, assuming you are somehow able to repress your gag reflex long enough to choke it down and refuse to vomit up its remains all over your ceramic floor.

REVIEW: Once again, I'd like to address the stench emanating from this product before jumping into the taste review. Have you ever purchased a box of those generic "fancy" chocolate candies that rednecks across the world buy for their obese greasy lovers on Valentine's Day? They come in a fancy white box which displays the romantic phrase "MANUFACTURED IN TAIWAN" across the front in highly decorative letters. Each of these boxes contains at least one randomly-shaped candy which cannot be identified and emits a strange foreign odor when you pick it up. Usually somebody will open up the box, take a small bite from this candy, and immediately put it right back where they got it. Then you'll open up the lid, see the half-eaten candy, and wonder why the last person didn't just throw it away. This energy bar is that candy. It gives off the same vaguely rancid odor as the infernal redneck knockoff candy, and even though it has a hell of a lot more Molybdenum than your standard Taiwanese chocolate lump, it's really not worth eating for any reason whatsoever. The good news is that this energy bar's stench is nothing compared to the horrible, horrible taste it contains. Wait, that's actually bad news. The interior of this taste treat is bright magenta colored, and I can't think of anything that says "boy howdy this shit tastes fucking great" like a neon red hue of color. Take a look at this:

Alternate name for this energy bar: Menstrual Pink Paradise.

Technically it tastes like a raspberry, much in the same sense that technically the AMD K5 was a computer processor. I am refusing to eat another chunk from this disaster on the grounds that every bite destroys a piece of my soul and, quite frankly, I can't afford to give up any more of my immortal spirit since I've already lost so much of it by reading the Weekend Web. If you want to experience the sensation of eating a ZONE Perfect CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY energy bar without actually biting into one, purchase some raspberry Kool-Aid and make it by substituting vinegar for sugar. I don't know how much Molybdenum there is in vinegar, so don't ask.

AMOUNT OF ENERGY I RECEIVED FROM CONSUMING THIS: A significant amount since I immediately got up and ran to the toilet to spit it out. Before attempting to eat this mess, I didn't think I had enough spare energy to run such a great distance, but now I feel as if I could easily run a marathon if somebody was chasing me and threatening to make me eat a ZONE Perfect CHOCOLATE RASPBERRY bar.

RATING: 1/10

ENERGY BAR #9: "TRIPLE LAYER ENERGY BAR BALANCE Gold CHOCOLATE PEANUT BUTTER"

LABEL DESCRIPTION: Well it's yet another horrid BALANCE Gold bar, so the obligatory "40-30-30" series of pink circles are floating around up top next to the word "Nutrition" which is there to let you know that the makers of BALANCE Gold support the theory of writing the word "Nutrition" on their wrappers. The back of the candy bar flap says "BEST BY JULY 02, 2003," so I'd like to point out that not only am I risking my very life by eating a horrible energy bar, but I'm risking my life by eating a horrible energy bar which expired over three months ago. You may feel free to thank me by FedEx-ing rare jewels and precious metals to my house.

NUTRITIONAL FACTS: It's almost identical to every other BALANCE Gold bar reviewed here, so I'd simply be wasting space by listing them again, much like how the actual energy bar is wasting space inside the wrapper, which could better be used as a condom for some dopey African AIDS victims who really like fucking each other.

REVIEW: Well, the "PEANUT BUTTER" doesn't resemble something like peanut butter as much as it tastes like a paste mixed from peanut shells and cheap glue. Once again, my ass was kicked by the deadly second layer of pain, which I guess doesn't really make that much of a difference since layers one and three also taste like complete shit as well. I guess there's just some inherent fundamental problem when you're producing a candy bar that has two ultra-soft layers and a middle one which feels like you're trying to gnaw through a wet bed mattress. I'm assuming layer #1 is chocolate and layer #3 is the peanut butter, which leaves nothing but unanswered questions for layer #2. If you are eating a three layered "chocolate peanut butter" bar, and one layer is chocolate while another is peanut butter, what is the last layer supposed to be? I suppose the obvious answer here would be "Molybdenum," but since this rotting heap of slag only contains 25% of the recommended amount of this precious vitamin and / or element, I doubt this is a viable answer. If you want my educated opinion, and trust me you do, this fabled third layer is composed from the compressed souls of the damned who are writhing in eternal torment and unspeakable pain. It sure as hell tastes that way, and I doubt any scientist possesses the ability to convince me otherwise.

AMOUNT OF ENERGY I RECEIVED FROM CONSUMING THIS: After consuming two bites of the chocolate layer, peanut butter layer, and compressed souls of the damned who are writing in eternal torment and unspeakable pain layer, I instantly received enough energy to make me get up and begin drinking beer. I continued drinking beer until the taste of the TRIPLE LAYER ENERGY BAR BALANCE Gold CHOCOLATE PEANUT BUTTER left my mind along with my memories of my home address, phone number, and waist size. That's a tradeoff I'm willing to accept in this case.

RATING: 1/10

Ugh. All in all, today was a very, very painful and disgusting day, even more than the days when I wake up and accidentally catch a glimpse of myself nude in the mirror. I'm not exactly sure why anybody would willingly spend copious amounts of money on these so-called "energy bars" when they could just buy a bottle of vitamins and chew on a railroad spike for free, but I suppose that's the beauty of capitalism. Or the beauty of Molybdenum; either way, I don't particularly care at this point. I'm just glad I have escaped this review with my life, and since I've eaten such tremendously healthy food, I now feel justified in heading over to McDonalds and grabbing a few deep fried McGriddle Bacon Bonanza Funnel Icing Platters. Stay tuned for my next update this Thursday when I'll eat dog bones and review them, an experience which I assume will be much more satisfying.

A VOTE FOR ARNOLD IS A VOTE FOR COMEDY

Ryan "OMGWTFBBQ" Adams here, getting ready to cast my ballot in the recall election. While voting is considered a private matter by many, I chose to tell you that I will be voting yes on the recall, and voting for Arnold to take over in Sacramento. Is he the best person for the office? Probably not. But I assume that the pure comedy gold that will be coming out of this to be more than worth whatever else shall happen. What if Arnold is even worse than Davis you ask? Who says we can't recall him? I PAY MY TAXES DAMMIT, NOW DANCE FOR ME.

Forum Goon Wonkie has this friend who found a pear. The pear looked like this:

The Goons "changed it into this:

VOTE FOR ARNOLD! NOW! GET TO THE CHOPPER!

- Rich "Lowtax" Kyanka