Blast From The Past: Junk Food

Let's go into the way back machine and take a look at some of my personal beloved childhood foods that I consumed with reckless abandon. Unfortunately pretty much all of these are no longer made anymore...

Fruit Wrinkles: The mid-80's to early 90's was a true golden age of fruit snacking. From Fruit Roll-Ups to Gushers to Shark Bites, it seemed like anything could be made into a sugary chewy fruit snack that fit in a pouch and was perfect for lunch! Amongst all the fruit snacks that were based on cartoons or looked like dinosaurs my favorite by far were Fruit Wrinkles, which resembled a raisin. Pretty boring, I know. However they did taste exactly like little balled up Fruit Roll-Ups...which come to think of it they probably were.

Squeeze It: With Kool Aid dominating the sugary colored water market for years there needed to be some sort of way to make them hip again. With the introduction of both Kool-Aid Kool Bursts and Squeeze It kids could drink said colored sugar water out of cool plastic bottles. I'm sure both tasted exactly the same, but for some reason I liked Squeeze It more, no doubt due to the silly faces on said bottles. While Kool Bursts are still available, Squeeze It went the way of the dodo. However if you click the link you can sign an online petition to bring it back.

Krunch Twists: Basically Krunch Twists were twisty Cheetos/Frito corn chips...but less straight/curly (hence the Twist). Out of all the junk foods listed here I'm sure my memory of these is better than they actually tasted.

Jell-O Pudding Pops: The one junk food that was prominent in my childhood that I still occasionally crave as an adult. The impending summer time only makes the fact that Jell-O Pudding Pops no longer exist hurt my soul even more.

Giggles: Giggles were essentially Oreos with (rather creepy) smiley faces on them. That was pretty much their only gimmick really. They relied on the fact that kids would buy cookies with smiley faces. I certainly fell for it as a 7 year old. As with the Krunch Twists I'm sure if you handed me a Giggle today my response would be...Eh.

PB Max: PB Max was like a gigantic chocolate peanut covered peanut butter mound of pure awesome. As a kid I was a PB Max junkie! In fact if you gave me a PB Max as a kid and I washed it down with a Squeeze It...I would have had enough energy to power cities!

Ahhh, sweet cavity inducing memories...

-Astroboy