Great Big Sea
February 17th, 2005
Next we have a couple of ripoffs of the sweet sweet treasure that is the swedish fish. The first one is the mysterious voodoo birthed Juju Fish. Basically it's just a gummy bear in the shape of a fish. Maybe it has a little taste of cinnamon but it's sure no swedish fish. They're a little bigger, they come in different colors, they face to the right (swedish face face to the left) but other than that, there's nothing worth a second look, unless you're throwing a birthday party for a marine biologist. Swedes 1, Voodoo Priestesses 0! What a poser! GRADE: D.
Another generic fish treat is the Sour Gummy fish thing. A token entry into the sour gummy pantheon, it's a cutesy, awkwardly large tropical fish covered in that sour sugar. All in all, they're not too bad. They just don't really need to exist. Back in college I had a kick of these sour gummy things. I'd eat them until my mouth was raw and numb. Good times.
Anyway, these things are okay, but like I said, they're too big and there are already a ton of sour gummies already. And when you want a faux fish, you want something special. On the other hand, they did do a pretty nice job getting the two or three colors on the one fish, that is kind of nice. GRADE: B-
Oh don't worry honey, there are more fish in the sea. But they're not all friendly! Look out! What's that? Is that a floating piece of bark? Is that Noah's Ark? What, a place to park? Is it a bird, the lark? NO, no, it's...duh duh...duh duh....duh duh duh duh duh duh duh duh DUHHH!!! GUMMY SHARK!
"Tra-la-la la-la," Lego Man says, "Oh the water's so warm! Look! Fishes! Hello fishes! My, but you're friendly, all frenzied like that. Uh..."
Gummy sharks are pretty good. They go from toothpaste aqua blue to opaque white - two colors rarely ever seen in the gummy world. Mad props for that. Plus, oh yeah, they're freakin' sharks! Now, I've got this thing with gummy candy. Sometimes it hurts to eat. I don't know what's up with that, but it makes generic rubbery gummy stuff kind of hard to take. But what these sharks lack in any original flavor or quality, they more than make up for in color and...sharkiness. GRADE: B+
You know, I heard Open Water was a really, really depressing movie. Bet it would've been more fun if they were gummy sharks.
And remember; sharks are fish, dolphins are mammals.
Finally, the last one I was able to find, we have a real treat. So far our endeavours have been limited strictly to crackers and candies. The next item bridges to a whole different snack genre: ice cream! The Ben & Jerry's Phish Food ice cream found its way into my hands. Billed as "Chocolate Frozen Yogurt (there's also a regular ice cream version) with Gooey Marshmallow, a Caramel Swirl & Fudge Fish"
Okay, you know anything from Ben & Jerry's is going to get high marks. I'll try to separate the judgement of the fish from the ice creamy goodness because, after all, I'm spending my time JUDGING FISH! Even on their own, these pisces of the pints are all aces. They're small but they're highly detailed. They've gills and eyes and scales, which they totally didn't need to do when encasing them in a frozen dairy ocean of slow chocolately death. But they did. Why? Because of the love, man, the love. The Fudge Fish are really good, even just on their own. They may not be Godiva chocolates or anything, but they completely hold their own. GRADE: A-
There must be others out there that just haven't made it to our grocery store. I know those Shapesters cheese things have an oceanic themed one. I bet there were some fruit snacks or something associated with Shark Tale, or Finding Nemo. I'll keep my eyes open, but that's a pretty good look into the world of faked fish. Now I've got to figure out what to do with all this leftover candy I've got laying around.
Oh yeah, I'll eat it.
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