So POPular

Lately I've been on a popcorn kick, hardcore.

I'm only interested in microwaveable popcorn at the moment, but I'm sure that I will be expanding to other types of popcorns relatively soon.  Especially cheesy popcorn.  Mmmmm.... cheesy popcorn.

I'm not sure where this came from.  I've never been a huge popcorn fan; I mean I like it and all, but it's something I can pass up pretty easily normally.  Until now.

I have a case of Orville Redenbacher's light popcorn that I got at Costco and I'm devouring the popcorn at work like crazy.  Now, I didn't buy this popcorn because it's light, I bought it becasue at the time that was the only popcorn they had.  Anyways, fat doesn't bother me, it just has to be salty enough, and boy is it ever!  Its got about 330mg of salt!  Mmmmm... salt.

At home, I got myself some of that Orville Redenbacher's Kettle Corn popcorn, which coincidentally enough, is low fat as well.  Let me tell you how excited I was to cook my very first bag of Kettle Corn.  I was envisioning the sweet taste of sugar and the ever so salty taste of salt all mixed together in a beautiful collaboration of flavors.  As the popcorn was popping away in my microwave I started daydreaming about all the Kettle Corn I've eaten at past carnivals and fairs, and how good it was, especially when I got a nice little surprise of a single popcorn kernel covered in just the right mixture of sugar and salt.  Man, if they can package all these great memories in one microwaveable bag it could possibly move me tears.  I may have to write a letter to the Orville Redenbacher people and thank them for their sweet and salty bounty.

Finally the microwave started dinging at me to let me know that my Kettle Corn memories were ready to be relived.  I quickly opened the microwave door and pulled out my piping hot bag.  Man it smelled good.  It smelled just like Kettle Corn.  I opened the bag and stuck my eager, grubby hand in there and grabbed a handful of Kettle Corn and proceeded to shove my memories onto my tastebuds.  Then something went wrong.  Terribly wrong.  What met my mouth was not Kettle Corn, no.  It had the same smell as Kettle Corn.  It had the same texture of Kettle Corn.  But the taste definitely gave away that this was not the Kettle Corn of my past. 

This was imposter Kettle Corn!

Sure it was salty, but the sweetness wasn't the same.  It wasn't sugar, I knew that much.  I went looking for the box and found that instead of using real sugar they used sucralose, which is also more popularly known as Splenda. 

"Oh what the hell?" I said.  I'm not a big fan of artificial sweetners.  There's just something about about a substance that pretends to be sweet that makes me suspicious.  I especially hate that Splenda touts that "It's made with real sugar".  Well hell, vomit is made with real food but I don't see The Hubby running up to scoop some up on a plate when the cats have their "accidents".

If you want something that's made with real sugar, why not buy real sugar then?

Overall, the popcorn is decent, but anyone who has ever had real Kettle Corn will be a little annoyed and a little let down, and maybe a little broken-hearted.