News: New Ruffles Ultimate Chips and Dips

Following in the vein of Doritos Jacked, Frito Lay now makes new Ruffles Ultimate Potato Chips and Ruffles Ultimate Dips. The new chips sport ridges twice the size and depth of the ridges of original Ruffles Potato Chips and come in three varieties. The deeper ridges are ideal for dipping in the new Ultimate Dips which contain chunks of real bacon or real beef and cheese.

Ruffles Ultimate Potato Chips are available in The Original (yes, it's not just "Original" but "The Original"...), Sweet & Smokin' BBQ, and Kickin' Jalapeno Ranch.

Review: Panda Express - Sweetfire Chicken Breast

Panda Express' Sweetfire Chicken Breast entree features crispy-fried white meat chicken bites wok-tossed with red bell peppers, diced onions, and pineapple in a sweet chili sauce.

I got it for lunch as part of a two-entree plate for $6.29.

News: McDonald's Testing Out Various Cheeseburgers

Looks like McDonald's is testing out various cheeseburger configurations to see which ones their customers like. The one that seems to be available in a fair amount of regions is the Daily Double but they're also testing a cheeseburger variant called the McCruncher and the new Bacon McDouble.

For those of you who miss the Big 'N Tasty and like the Whopper-style of hamburgers, the Daily Double should tickle your fancy. It takes two hamburger patties and one slice of cheese and throws slivered onions (instead of rehydrated diced ones) mayo, tomato, and lettuce on it instead of the usual ketchup, mustard, and pickles. The price ranges from $1.89 to $1.99 depending on the market.

News: Cold Stone Creamery Offers Retro Desserts

Cold Stone Creamery goes retro in their latest promotion offering new, limited-time ice cream desserts inspired by ice cream parlors circa the 1950s. That means malts, classic sundaes, and floats... you know all those things that really pretty much still exist today.

The limited-time promotion runs through August 31 and they're offering the following:

For ice cream, they're offering two retro-inspired flavors: Cherry Vanilla and Chocolate Malt.

For their trademark "Creations," Cold Stone is offering two as well:

Review: Carl's Jr. - Bacon Swiss Crispy Chicken Tender Sandwich

Carl's Jr.'s new Bacon Swiss Crispy Hand-Breaded Chicken Tender Sandwich is a bit of a mouthful to say and features two hand-breaded chicken tenders accompanied by lettuce, a slice of tomato (or two), Ranch dressing, a slice of Swiss, and two strips of bacon.

It's normally $3.79 for a sandwich but a coupon scored me two for $5 (I shared!).

Neat! Burger King's New Digital Menu Boards

As part of the new menu additions, Burger King is also installing full digital menu boards in a lot of their restaurants. My local McDonald's has one digital screen for McCafe beverages but this is a complete menu. I wonder how much it all cost to set up.

Around the World: McDonald's UK - New Fruitizz Kid's Fruit Juice

McDonald's in the United Kingdom today launched a new drink option for kids called Fruitizz. It's described as "Full of fruity bubbles. It’s made with grape, apple and raspberry juice and sparkling water. There’s no added sugar, artificial colours or flavours and it’s one of your child’s five-a-day."

Basically, it's fizzy fruit juice angled as a better alternative to soda for kids. They're marketing it as one of the 5 portions of fruit you should eat a day but here's where it gets kinda weird:

Review: Starbucks - Green Tea Frappuccino

Most people know it at Starbucks as the Green Tea Frappuccino, but the full name is the Tazo Green Tea Frappuccino Blended Creme. It features a blend of sweetened matcha green tea, milk, and ice.

It can be topped with whipped cream but I tried this one without and with 2% milk. I don't normally order a Venti anything at Starbucks but I bought this one during the recent Happy Hour promo, so it was only half the normal $4.75

News: New Klondike Varieties This Summer

Klondike has three forms of frozen goodness for you to try this summer. There's two new Choco Tacos in Chocolate and Peanut Butter flavors. And, there's a new ice cream sandwich with a chocolate ice cream filling rather than vanilla (in fact, the tagline on the new Chocolate Sandwich is "It's not Vanilla.").

Review: IHOP - Red Velvet Pancakes

IHOP's Red Velvet Pancakes are something IHOP is testing out in some areas including my local restaurant. They're drizzled with a cream cheese icing before being dusted with powdered sugar and finished with a dollop of whipped topping.

A stack of 4 pancakes was selling for $4.99 but I shared a combo which came with 2 pancakes, bacon, eggs, sausage, and hashed browns for $8.69.

News: Mountain Dew - New Dark Berry Flavor

Mountain Dew is doing a Dark Knight Rises movie promotion with their latest new drink, Mountain Dew Dark Berry.

The new drink features a mixed berry flavor and an appropriately Batman-ish deep blue color. It will only be available for 8 weeks staring mid-June.

In addition to the new flavor, Mountain Dew will be sporting limited-edition 16-ounce cans with a special color changing bat symbol that turns green when the can is chilled. The cans will also debut mid-June.

There will also be product codes on specially marked Mountain Dew drinks/cans/packs that can be redeemed for gear or sweepstakes entries. (Details at DEWGothamCity.com)

News: 7-Eleven - Slurpees Now Available Sugar-Free

For those watching their calories or sugar consumption, 7-Eleven aims to please this summer with the new, limited-time Fanta Sugar-Free Mango Slurpee Lite.

The new drink is 7-Eleven's first Slurpee-branded, sugar-free drink and is available at 7-Eleven stores nationwide. The drinks are sweetened with Splenda. Slurpee Lites have about half the calories of regular Slurpees.

7-Eleven also put out a calendar of limited-time Slurpee flavors for this summer: