From the pizzeria

There already were nine flavors of Totino's Pizza Rolls (perhaps, like Mr. Tidbit, you were surprised to notice that they aren't still Jeno's Pizza Rolls, but the name change happened in 1993, so we both need to get over it). Anyway, what might be simply three more flavors of Totino's Pizza Rolls are instead three offerings from new label Totino's Pizzeria: cheesy garlic rolls, chicken Parmesan rolls and meatball marinara rolls.

Mr. Tidbit probably wouldn't have mentioned this were it not that Totino's Pizzeria rolls are an exception to his rule that every spinoff grocery product costs more than the original one. They carry the same shelf price as Totino's Pizza Rolls — and yes, the packages are the same weight.

Could Mr. Tidbit's rule be on the way out?

A hint of overpriced

There are two new flavors of V8 vegetable juice: V8 "with a hint of lime" and V8 "with a hint of black pepper."

Mr. Tidbit noticed them because these are flavor variants of V8 Original, not the V8 Splash or V8 V-Fusion fruit and vegetable drinks, which have been expanding almost daily. The "original" line has been stuck at six — original, spicy hot, low sodium, low sodium spicy hot, essential antioxidants and high fiber — for quite a while now.

Even so, Mr. Tidbit probably wouldn't have mentioned the two new flavors, except that — at least at the store where he spotted them — the 46-ounce bottles of all six other versions were $2.99, but the same size bottles of "hint of lime" and "hint of black pepper" were $3.39. That a "hint" of lime or black pepper produced a 40-cent price increase is perhaps the most outrageous example yet of Mr. Tidbit's rule.

Mr. Tidbit is greatly relieved.

Just checking

Only to establish that it's Totino's, not V8, that is the exception, Mr. Tidbit noted that another juice-brand extension — Tropicana Farmstand fruit and vegetable juice blends — comes in 46-ounce bottles, while Tropicana's original Pure Premium orange juice sells for essentially the same price but comes in 59-ounce bottles.

Al Sicherman