Mr. Tidbit likes to joke about how often there's a new kind of Oreo cookie, but he must admit he exaggerates: In fact, in all of 2011 he noted only three additions to the Oreo franchise. But today, just three months after the appearance of "limited edition" Peppermint Creme Oreos, we have Birthday Cake Oreos, a "limited edition" celebration of the 100th anniversary of the first Oreo.
To mark this significant moment in the history of the planet, one of the two cookies in each special Oreo carries the traditional elaborate Oreo pattern, but the other cookie is largely flat, and deeply engraved with the words "Oreo 100" and the image of a candle.
There will be those who say that this is enough, but Kraft's Nabisco anniversary action team went two steps further: The somewhat thicker blob of filling contains tiny colored sprinkles, and -- through judicious use of what the label calls "natural and artificial flavors" -- it tastes sort of like cake. Because the label of regular Oreos lists only "vanillin -- an artificial flavor," Mr. Tidbit concludes that to produce Birthday Cake Oreos, the scientists at Nabisco have successfully extracted natural birthday-cake flavor.
Wow.
One other "natural" element: The bag of regular Oreos these days weighs 15.5 ounces and contains 42 cookies. The bag of Birthday Cake Oreos carries the same shelf price but -- naturally -- weighs only 10.5 ounces and contains 20 (heavier) cookies. So they cost almost 50 percent more per ounce and more than 100 percent more per cookie.
Sweet Philadelphia! Meanwhile, over at Kraft's cream-cheese operation, which recently produced Philadelphia Cooking Creme (10-ounce tubs of savory-flavored cream cheese -- "Simply stir in for creamy skillets and casseroles"), there's now Philadelphia Indulgence (8-ounce tubs of cream cheese flavored with dark, white or milk chocolate). The tubs' labeling is silent on what you're supposed to do with Philadelphia Indulgence. (If, somehow, you're stumped, the smaller package of four 1.25-ounce tubs says "dip, spread, love," and shows a pretzel carrying a dip's worth of Indulgence.)
AL SICHERMAN
