I considered Marshmallow Peeps the pinnacle of the pure sugar delivery snack pack, a pure and simple delight that could not be improved upon. Sour Watermelon Peeps have proven me wrong — there is another.
Flavored marshmallows don't normally do anything for me. That's because marshmallow is lousy at flavor transport, capable at best of conveying the hint of a strong taste beyond its normal sweetness. I buy new varieties on a regular basis, hoping for some sort of flavor revelation, but I'm always left wanting.
But what if one were to cover the mildly-flavored marshmallow with strongly-flavored sugar crystals? That's exactly what the brilliant snack scientists at Bethlehem, Pennsylvania's Just Born, Inc have done, and the result is this beautiful Walmart-exclusive bastard right here.
Ah, the watermelon. Like the strawberry it has a muted flavor that's much more enjoyable when extracted, sweetened, and used in the creation of tasty candy goodness. The melon itself is delightfully refreshing on a hot summer's day, but the taste is subtle, like the lips of a lover who'd been eating watermelon Jolly Ranchers a couple hours prior to the smoochings.
No, I crave a bold, sweet watermelon taste, like the same watermelon from four or five different parallel dimensions collapsed upon itself. That is the taste of Sour Watermelon Peeps.
In the video above I compare it to chewing gum — not the tame, indy gums of today, but the bold and powerful Bubble Yums of years past. Leave them out for a day or two with the package open, and the starting sensation is exactly the same, only instead of disappearing in a couple of minutes, it stays with you until you swallow, holding your hand and telling you everything is going to be alright.
You may find other flavors of Peeps on your store shelves this Easter season. Blue Raspberry is nice, if a bit too sweet.
There's a nice and subdued Sweet Lemonade circulating, as well as a straight-up Bubble Gum flavor that really takes me back to my childhood, back in the days when a whole pack of gum would last five minutes before it was on its way to my increasingly-crowded stomach.
But Sour Watermelon — now these are the best Peeps I have ever tasted, and my little LEGO mans agree.
Snacktaku is Kotaku's take on the wild and wonderful world of eating things, but not eating meals. Eating meals is for those with too much time on their hands. Past critiques can be found at the Snacktaku review archive.