Kotas Reviews Orange Crush Pop Tarts

Orange soda is one of those cultural touchstones you don't actually hear about much. Growing up, it was not the soda of choice but it was always there, lurking in the cabinet at the gas station, patiently waiting for you to get tired of the same old choices. There have been a lot of orange soda choices in the world, but only two have really made a pop cultural splash: Fanta (Don't ya wanna...have a Fanta) and Crush. One is associated with a singing group of women dressed in very bright colors. The other is associated with a defoliant and an alternative rock band. So, clearly, we have to combine this sentiment with Pop Tarts. Let's take a look at...Orange Crush Pop Tarts

I've got my spine. I've got my Orange Crush.

Sweet Monkey Jebus, LOOK AT THIS. My eyes are going to burst from this visual assault upon them. I don't even know where to begin with this insanity, but I guess at the top. It does a good job of keeping the branding front and center for both products, but that background is just so damn...orange! The pastry itself is depicted as a whirling insanity of orange and white, presumably for any VOLS fans out there (Go Big Diabetic Orange!), and I do like the little spiral design. Just...maybe tone it down a bit. Anyway, will the actual product hold up?

Collar Me, Don't Collar Me. Comin' in Fast...Over Me.

Well, I suppose not every artistic design translates well to the Pop Tart canvas, now does it? The filling is an appropriately intense orange color, but the frosting pattern is very...smushed. It's almost as if the vast industrial machinery required for modern packaged pastry production isn't suited to subtle artistic flourishes. Imagine that! Still, we don't eat Pop Tarts for their looks, do we? NO. We eat them for the sugar rush that accompanies them! Let's eat!

Well, that was a raging disappointment. It's not bad. In fact, it's pretty decent. What it isn't is particularly good. The filling is both super sweet and super sour. It's like eating a sugar cube that's been wrapped with orange zest by itself and is mouth puckering in the contrast. However, eating it with the rest of pastry tones down the bitterness very nicely...maybe a bit too much, since the orange flavor is now much more muted. It's very strange, actually. You'd think this would be a sugary flavor explosion of orangishness in your mouth, but it's more like "sweet with some vague hints of orange". Like eating orange sherbet that's not particularly orange-y, or a creamsicle that has way too much vanilla. I had high hopes for these.

On the FACE Rating System, this gets 1 frowny face. It's not awful, and I am finishing the box, but I certainly won't get them again. This is yet another in a long line of foods that promise "crazy super flavor intensity" on the box, and utterly fail to live up to that promise. Eat them if you are offered them, because they are still Pop Tarts, but don't bother buying them. Go listen to R.E.M. and think of better foods instead.