So many snacks nowadays are just seeming like…some sort of dare, aren’t they? Almonds, like Internet dating, are something I keep intending to bring more into my life. They meet you halfway, almonds do. They hold up their end of the bargain of being actual food and tasting as good as the humans that manhandle them into bags, cans and boxes will allow. As a 24-almond serving of OVEN ROASTED CAFÉ MOCHA COFFEE ALMONDS equals ¼ cup of coffee, you do need to eat 96 for the equivalent of an entire cup of coffee, which is kind of a lot at one sitting. I believe maybe a better approach is to knock back a couple of Red Bulls and employ the almonds as a sort of IV drip, nibbling here and there, enjoying the sustaining dribble of caffeine and protein.

Cappuccino/café mocha/mocha/coffee crème flavored anything (i.e. Coffee Nut MnM’s, Cappuccino-flavored potato chips) invariably have the taste of the parvenu coffee house-esque coffee drinks in vending machines, which always taste like powders albeit instant coffee, hot chocolate and fake creamer. These almonds taste much like that with some saltiness. Are they necessary? Or more to the point, are they anyone’s favorites? Possibly. Maybe not vast swathes of the population, OK, but someone out there loves ‘em. At the risk of sounding awfully cute or something, I’d like to see squirrels and chipmunks review this/any/all nut products (as long as the sugar/salt would not harm).

I feel like I should be remiss considering the transitory nature of the micro seasons in a DunkinDonut Year if I didn’t say a word or two about the BOSTON CRÈME DONUT CROISSANT DONUT, in case it turns out you want one and didn’t know it was harvest time.

I was, as always, of course, perfectly willing to take it on its own terms. Obviously, this is not Escoffier and to sneer at it is just stupid (and anyway like I know anything about French pastry). But, on its own terms, I was upset by the paucity of frosting. A miserly—at best—squiggle. To the frosting-haters among you this mightn’t be so dismaying. As someone who will buy a DD Boston Cream Donut to peel off the frosted top layer and (wastefully, firstworlded-ly) toss out the rest, it seems a lost opportunity and to strip the donut of some its dignity being in the Boston Cream cake and donut tradition.

Well, OK, I got over it. As I stood in my kitchen, idly chewing my way round, I became aware I was paying less attention to the taste and texture than trying to isolate the circumstances when a BOSTON CREAM CROISSANT DONUT would taste its very best. Clearly, standing in my kitchen was not it. Which is not to say it didn’t taste good. It had charms of sugar, fat, and flour, even if the croissant aspirations were a little defeated by the 3 p.m. time I purchased it. Still, context is everything, right? I considered where BOSTON CREAM CROISSANT DONUT would shine most. My conclusion:  imgaine being person stuck in a mineshaft, very hungry and frightened, for several day. Then you are rescued, and find yourself emerging out into the bright day and rejoicing crowds, and ythe extremity of relief and joy you’d feel. You’d drink some lovely cool water. Someone hands you a BOSTON CREAM CROISSANT DONUT and you taste the gush of bloppy vanilla pudding and look up at that bright and brilliant sun, and know this is what heaven is like. So perhaps you might try this out, should you go down the BOSTON CREAM CROISSANT DONUT path. This all sounds rather damning but I don’t mean it to be.

Oh, well.