Diet Coke-Babies

Due to my long distance relationship with Friendly’s, sometimes some amazing releases escape even my watchful eye.  So according to my research, this is a month or two shy of reviewing a brand new product.  But that’s not too shabby considering I live about 1,800 miles away from where I bought it from.

One of Friendly’s most popular (I’m assuming, but I find letting facts get in the way makes for less fun writing) products are their collection of pre-packaged sundaes.  And without a doubt, their most popular product overall is the Wattamelon Roll (again, assuming – but if someone doesn’t agree with that I don’t want to know that person nor do I want to interact with them on any level).

Friendly’s finally decided to Frankenstein these products together, in an attempt to produce an offspring that could unite the families and rule all the lands.

I’ve mentioned Friendly’s rolls once or twice on here (and approximately two thousand or so times a day in real life).  The restaurants serve actual food, but I think that’s largely just so people feel less ashamed, and don’t have to just sit down at a table and say “A very large portion of ice cream, please!”

So the ice cream is where it’s at.  And the actual ice cream is all well and good, but the packaged products at Friendly’s are the stars.  We’ve discussed the rolls before.  Well, I’ve talked about them – you have been almost aggressively non-verbal about them.  But one other line of products that is important to describe – especially since that’s what this review is about – are the pre-packaged sundaes.

They look like this, are slightly larger than the size of a baseball.

You might wonder, “If you’re largely indifferent to the ice cream, and the actual sundaes you can buy, why are the packaged ones so special?”  Easy – because they’re pre-packaged.  It’s a little cup with a sundae in it.

They come with all the advantages of other pre-packaged versions of food: convenience, not being quite as good as the real thing but for some reason that is okay, and not having to place an order means you don’t have to interact with as many people during the day.

As for the Wattamelon Sundae, finding it on the shelf should not prove to be a problem.  I think Friendly’s put something in the package’s ink to make the green actually glow.  The combination of intensely bright green, red, and pink means this sundae will never run the risk of being hit by a car at night.  There was probably a very slim chance of that ever happening anyway, but still – playing it safe is smart.

Besides the garish colors, the other thing that is immediately noticeable on the packaging is what appears to be green slime.  Like, Friendly’s got a really good deal on the factory where Hostess made Turtle Pies, and just figured “Hey, waste not want not!”

Being so used to what a Wattamelon Roll looks like, looking at the sundae for the first time was odd.  The layer of mutagen was a shocking to see.  Also new wass what appeared to be a fake cherry on top, or maybe a little M&M on some Fat Frog levels.  Further inspection revealed that this was just a little bit of the watermelon sherbet peeking through.

The green part was described as “whipped topping”, which can mean a lot of things.  Usually I think it’s more when it’s a Cool Whip type thing, where if you call it “whipped cream” that’s technically lying and you can face a small amount of prison time.

In this instance, it was more like thin pudding, which reinforces my Hostess factory theory.  The topping kind of ran down when you took a bite, which at first looked creepy, but actually was a good contrast to the firmer sherbet.

The watermelon sherbet is the same Wattamelon goodness we already know and love.  There are chocolate chips / chunks on top of the sundae, but they are still in the sherbet as well.

Given the small handful of thousands of Wattamelon Rolls I have consumed, trying the sundae for the first time was a very confusing experience.  It is, to be sure, a very good product.  But it was also an internal battle, constantly thinking, “Wait, Wattamelon Roll doesn’t have whipped cream topping!  Where is the fake rind?  What is going on?”

You may have to dig deep, to find that secondary level of courage that you’ve always hoped to never need, to overcome these initial challenges.  Because once you realize this isn’t “Wattamelon Roll crammed into a little cup”, and embrace the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle changes, it becomes an awesome sundae.

The sundae cup still doesn’t solve my main problem – Wattamelon Roll availability.  If for some reason the sundae cups made their way out to me, but not the rolls, they’d be an extremely welcome product.  They would surpass the Watermelon Bomb Pops as my Wattamelon Roll methadone treatments.

But since both Wattamelon Rolls and Wattamelon Sundaes are all, presumably, for sale in the same areas, there is some redundancy.  Which is why they were smart to make it a sundae, with an actual change to the roll.

As the old cliché goes, “Sometimes you’re in the mood for green whipped topping on your sundae, and sometimes you’re more in the mood for lemon sherbet.”

So while there’s a bit of redundancy in the products, they’re different enough to warrant purchasing both.  Especially since when it’s 3 AM and you wake up hungry, it’s much easier to grab a pre-packaged sundae and eat it in bed than it is to cut a slice of Wattamelon Roll when you’re half awake.

[insert seal of approval here]