Junk Food Nation, Merry Christmas!  I hope you are enjoying it safely with you and yours.  I thought that today, since I’m curious, I’d rehash a post I made two years ago and ask you all to tell me: when do YOU open presents? The usual suspects:

1) Opening gifts the night of Christmas Eve. For people who want nothing to do on Christmas morning. You just wanna wake up to a mess of wrapping paper and say, “….anyone wanna go see a movie?”

2) Opening one gift Christmas Eve, and the rest Christmas morning. This is for parents who need to placate their screaming children who are hopped up on Pepsi and cookies and will not stop yammering about presents. HERE TAKE ONE GIFT AND OPEN IT, YOU LITTLE TERROR! NOW GO TO SLEEP!

3) Wait until midnight when it’s “technically” Christmas, and open presents then.  I remembering doing this a bunch when I was a kid.  This is for parents who are too tired to fight children who are trying to be lawyers when they are 12 years old. “Well, mom, TECHNICALLY it IS Christmas now!” Yeah, and technically you’re a nerd. Like I said, I pulled this stunt often.

4) Wait until Christmas morning. The traditional gift-opening time, if you can pull it off. Works on little kids who still believe in Santa. Doesn’t work on kids who are over the whole Santa thing, and who are asking, “So wait, are we waiting til Christmas morning to open presents out of conformity??”

And so I ask…what did YOU do this year?

While you answer in the comments, BONUS CHRISTMAS DAY NBA PICKS (after the review!)

And that’s it!  Have a great holiday everyone – see you Friday!

Today’s junk food: Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies!

Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies are the third Market Pantry cookie I’ve tried on this blog.  The first were the Pumpkin Cheesecake variety, which I LOVED, and then most recently the Chocolate Mint Creme, which were…good, not great.  How will these Gingerbread Cheesecake ones hold up?  I happen to LOVE gingerbread, so my expectations are great.  Don’t let me down, MP.

Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies sound good, but the general concept is a little weird to me.  Gingerbread Cheesecake? I’m not sure if I’ve ever had that, despite it sounding like a decent concept.  A cheesecake with gingerbread crust…..why not?

Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies contain ginger and cream cheese powder.  I’ve had gingerbread before with cream cheese icing. Would these cookies be similar?

When I first looked at these Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies, I thought they looked very nice.  Each cookie was a perfect brown, almost orange, in hue. The creme was a blazing pure white color.  Visually pleasing.

I took a big whiff of these Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies, and they smelled nice too.  Like…cream cheese frosting you’d get on a cupcake.  Nice and sweet and milky.  But no gingerbread smell.  Hmmmm….that’s not good.  Time to taste…

I managed to forcibly TWIST open one of these Market Pantry Gingerbread Cheesecake Creme Sandwich Cookies (UGH that was hard. Similar to the Chocolate Mint Creme cookies, these were surprisingly tough to manipulate. These ain’t Oreos).

I tried the creme by itself.  It was milky and sweet.  Tangy…very much tasted like a creme cheese frosting.

Oh man. Then I tried the cookie by itself.  YUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK.  I immediately made a face – I’m not sure what this flavor was, but it sure as hell wasn’t gingerbread!  It tasted like…a STALE COOKIE.  I checked the date on the box…not past its prime. WHAT was going ON?

The flavor of the cookie was NOT good.  It started out like a stale cookie.  Like a weird sweet dough that had gone bad.  NO immediate spice flavor.  The tanginess of the creme added to the weird feeling that the cookie had spoiled.  Plus, the texture was so crunchy and crumbly, I felt like my tastebuds weren’t able to get a good grasp on the taste. Yeeesh.  As I chewed the more cookie more and more and more….GRADUALLY a noticeable ginger flavor came out – but I shouldn’t have to STRUGGLE for this taste, especially since there are so many companies that make ginger snaps that are successful.  Ick.

When eaten together, creme and cookie, I didn’t get enough ginger flavor, and it didn’t taste like cheesecake.  Like I just stated, as I chewed the sandwich cookie multiple times…a decent flavor slowly seeped out from the initial YUCKY flavor of a slight ginger with a cream cheese icing taste.  The more I chewed it, the better it tasted, but these really start out tasting AWFUL.

I did not like these ONE BIT.  Epic fail, Market Pantry.  And after your Pumpkin Cheesecake cookies were SO DELIGHTFUL!  Man.  What a letdown.

PURCHASED AT: Target

COST: On sale for $1.99

Thoughts? Please comment below or hit me up on Twitter @junkfoodguy or LIKE my Facebook Page and message me there. I also have Google+!! Let’s hang out.

Sincerely,

Junk Food Guy

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NBA PICKS!!  Christmas is a big day for the NBA, and we have five originally-presumed-to-be-excellent matchups:

1. Chicago vs. Brooklyn: Should’ve been Derrick Rose and the division leading Bulls vs. Deron Williams and the new look Nets.  Instead its Kirk Henrich vs. Jason Kidd’s seething anger. BULLS take this one.

2. OKC vs. New York: Durant vs. Melo!  Two huge scoring juggernauts, potentially good game? Except OKC is 22-5 and the Knicks are 4-10 AT HOME. Ouch. OKC takes it.

3. Miami vs. LA Lakers: Does this one even need discussing? Nick Young shocks the world!  JK. Miami should dominate.

4. Houston vs. San Antonio: FINALLY a good game.  Divisional matchups are always tough, but I expect the Spurs to win, especially if Harden is unable to go.

5. LA Clippers vs. Golden State: Why is the best matchup on the latest? Poo. Despite the Clippers having a better record, both teams score about the same amount of points and allow the exact same number of points.  I’m giving GS the tip on this one, since they are at home.

Enjoy the games today!  And again, Merry Christmas to my Christmas-celebrating-readers!  To everyone else, to quote my friend Andrew, Merry Day Off!