may i have a slice of yogurt?

ew! I've just returned home from participating in a focus group for what I was told was "snack food." I signed a confidentiality agreement, so I will not name brand names lest the suits from this corporation show up at my door with a cease and desist order and force me to take down my blog. I will say, however, that though some of the foods I tasted were quite yummy, there was one product type that still has me shakin' off the heebie jeebies.

The facilitator lady lifted the "fancy" silver lid from the plate to reveal three products wrapped in plastic. One shaped like string cheese, one like a slice of American cheese, and one like Laffy Taffy. She lifted up the string cheese shaped one and I noticed that it was a cloudy pink color with areas of dark red. It reminded me of a skinny little pimento loaf. Then she peeled it... and it began to flop and wiggle around. I was not excited about this. She then passed around a plate of one of these all sliced up. As the plate approached, I surmised that it was supposed to be some sort of fruity yogurt...but solid... sort of. To the touch it was slimy and the texture in my mouth was so creepy. My brain was screaming, "The yogurt has been left out too long! Don't eat it...DON'T EAT IT!" I know it was supposed to taste like strawberry with little strawberry pieces, but I couldn't get past the texture. Then we had to eat part of it from the "slice-of-cheese-but-its-yogurt" form. I decided to sort of let this one slide down my throat because I didn't want to chew it again. This just resulted in a whole new kind of revulsion. Needless to say, my assessment of this product was less than favorable. About 4 of the 8 people in the group disliked it (none quite as much as me) and the other half thought that their kids would love it. ack! ack! ack!

They did have us sample this cream cheese and chocolate cookie type thing that was awesome. Unfortunately, that was the first thing we tasted and the disgusting gelatinous yogurt stick was last.

I give the inventors points for thinking outside of the box on this one. But quite simply, for me, yogurt should never be eaten with a fork