You’re not imagining things:Food PR stunts have steadily been getting wilder over the past few years. My officedesk is currently cluttered with just a small sample of what我've accumulated, includingMTN DEW Baja Blast hot sauce, Velveeta cheese-scented nail polish,and Arby’s curly-油炸味伏特加,among other bizarre限时产品。我们生活在混乱的时代消费品和one brand that hasconsistentlyembraced that chaos是Van Leeuwen冰淇淋，刚刚发布了与Hidden Valley Ranch。
Van Leeuwen x Hidden Valley Ranch, explained
Starting today, March 20, the new Hidden Valley Ranch ice cream iscurrently available in Walmart locations across the country. Yup,thatHidden Valley Ranch。It’s part of a limited-time lineup that also includes decidedly more “normal” flavors including Blood Orange Chocolate Chip, Sweet Maple Cornbread, Carrot Cake, Honey Graham Cracker, Limoncello Cake, and Strawberry Shortcake.
The internet’s reactionsto this flavorannouncement aremostly what you’d expect.Eater回答与aperperation,PopSugardemonstrated somecuriosity, and social media usershave mostly expressed revulsion of some sort.
It’s time to see how we feel about this stuff for ourselves.
隐藏的山谷牧场冰淇淋的味道如何？
Van Leeuwen sent188betios下载a sample of the Hidden Valley Ranch ice cream, and I can’t say this is the most excited we’ve ever been to conduct a taste test. However,previous Van Leeuwen stunt flavors have pleasantlysurprised us in the past.
The Kraft Mac and Cheese collab wasactuallypretty darngood。So itried to goin with an open mind, knowing that Van Leeuwen thinks hardabout these flavors and treats them with care.
T他隐藏了山谷牧场ice cream looks like a regular pint of vanilla bean, which is to say it’s white with little black flecks in it. But the闻起来立即开始浮动的气味up from the surfaceis one ofsavory garlic and onion, and it isn’t subtle.
In case you’ve forgotten, ranch dressing is made primarily from a combination of buttermilk, sugar, salt, egg yolk, garlic, onion, and vinegar.And wow, that first spoonful of ice creamreally tugs you in multiple directions. It offers an initialhit of smooth,sweet vanilla with a silky texture, but the more the ice creamit warms up in your mouth, the more thoseranchy herbs and spices start to bloom.
This moment曾是a fork in the road for our team of taste testers。I watched managing editorMarnie Shurevisibly wince as the ranch flavor kicked in. Staff writer Angela Pagán continued to enjoythe vanilla ice cream aspects, and she didn’t happen to notice the ranch elements nearly as much. Other coworkers politely refused to try it altogether.
As for me, my mouth坦率地说，只是困惑。在这里我们有一个高级vanilla ice cream, but one that 被留下来a tangy garlic and onion aftertaste that just wouldn’t quit. It wasn’t that it wasbad，本身；it was just baffling. The ice cream’s quality is unquestionable, but the lingering aftertaste made me wonder just what the fuck I’d put in my mouth. Amazing.
将冰淇淋与something salty, so I dug around the officesnack藏and fished out some plain potato chips. Honestly, this wasn’t a terrible combination. People like the combination ofsalty potato with dairy; just ask all those folks who love to dip their Wendy’sfries into aFrosty.同样，一口浓烈的ranch, sweet ice cream, and savoryfried potato seemed to work just fine.
But was it great? My feelings were still quite mixed. I’m not much of a stoner, so I couldn’t see myself crushing a pint of this stuff on a random munchie bender. A friendsuggested it’d be a good chaser to extremely hot Buffalo wings, or as a topper to chicken-fried steak,两者都是practical and creative ideas for using up a pint.
Obviously, though, that kind of brainstorming is more than a stunt product expects ordeserves.S像这样的凝灰岩真的只是meant to catch our eye, and it certainly succeeds; we can only assumeshoppers will linger in front of the Hidden Valley Ranch pints at Walmart, wondering if they’re being pranked.What a clever way, then,to directpeople’s attention to Van Leeuwen’s line of new spring flavors, all of which sound like heaven compared to the ranch. If you leave with a pint of Sweet Maple Cornbread ice cream in your cart, then maybe this was never about Hidden Valleyat all, was it?