Risking My Palette With 2 New Finds

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Being a lover of food, I enjoy trying new and interesting foods.  While I'm not going to sample every canned soup or frozen meal to hit the market, I can get excited about trying a new kind of cheese, gourmet snack, beer, wine, or similar offering.

Winco is not what a person would classify as a "gourmet grocery store."  It's not the place one goes to for artisan cheeses or specialty meats.  It's the mundane supermarket people go to for good prices on every day items such as corn flakes and canned vegetables.  Nevertheless, I came across two items, during my latest grocery trip, which peeked my interest.

| Subject: Top - 6 oz BuzzBallz Chillers Display,
Bottom - 1.5 oz Epic Bar: Venison w/ Sea Salt & Pepper | Date: 09/12/2018 | Photographers: James Kiester & Dani Cogswell |

First I saw a display of small round brightly colored bottles.  The bottles contained 6 ounces of something called BuzzBallz Chillers.

The Chillers consisted of orange wine mixed with different kinds of juices (orange juice, peach juice, lemon juice, apple juice, coconut milk ). At $2.48 a pop, I was only going to get one to try.  Since, the base of the drink was orange wine, which I'd never heard of, I chose the Orange Wine w/ Orange Juice.

I poured the wine cocktail into a glass when I got home.  The beverage was an artificially bright orange color reminiscent of the space drink Tang.  The flavor was nowhere near as sweet though.

My mouth was initially assaulted by a strong bitterness on the front of my tongue followed by a harsh medicine taste throughout my mouth.  It seriously took several drinks of water to get the disgusting flavor out of my mouth.

I give BuzzBallz Chillers Orange Wine w/ Orange Juice 1 out of 10 stars.  These "Ballz" are a form of punishment rather than a treat.

When I was on the Popcorn and Snack isle I saw a meat snack I was unfamiliar with.  The 1.5 oz Epic Bar: Venison w/ Sea Salt & Pepper appeared to be a venison based meat snack.  I found myself excited as my head filled with childhood memories of my father cleaning the carcass of the deer he'd shot.  Reading the ingredient list (100% Grass Fed Venison, Lactic Acid, Sea Salt, Celery Powder, Cracked Pepper, Onion Powder, Garlic Powder) intrigued me even more. 

I was expecting a savory gamy snack with a decent meaty chew.  While the three inch bar delivered the pleasant flavor of salt and pepper, the texture was completely off-putting.   My teeth met no resistance when I bit into the morsel.  The bar was initially soft, like a brownie.  As I chewed, the bite instantly crumbled into a mouthful of sand-like bits.    The feel of the bite sent an uncomfortable chill through me from head to, and I couldn't finish the rest of the $2 bar. 

I give the Epic Bar: Venison w/ Sea Salt & Pepper 3 out of 10 Stars.

Granted, these particular experiments didn't bare fruit.  Nonetheless, I maintain that such experiments are worthwhile.  I mean, we can't know what we like until we have it for the first time.