Koala Yummies

There's something oddly reassuring about a snack that refers to itself in plural as "yummies." Sure, some of our old snack standbys are yummy (singular), but does each individual chip or pretzel convey its own unique yumminess? I think not.

Amongst all of the koala-themed snack foods out there, Koala Yummies managed to distinguish themselves as the premier marsupial-based snack on the market. Dunkaroos were able to secure a precarious second-place position with their kangaroo spokescartoon upon their release four years later, but their mascot could never reach the level of cuddlability of Yummies fame. I mean look at these guys! Could anything cling to a euclaptys tree in a more lovable fashion?


In an age before extensive concerns over high-fructose corn syrup, trans-fats, and preservatives, children were once allowed to consume nutrition-free overprocessed food without the now-requisite wealth of parental concern and intervention. No one seemed particularly concerned over whether these cookies were organically produced or if the company opted to use free-range koalas. 90s parents food fearmongering was fairly tame compared to their 2000s successors, and junk food reigned supreme for parents with even a shred of concern for their children's cafeteria credibility. Parents weren't sending their children off to school with Disney lunchboxes full of tofu nuggets or soy milk juice boxes; they were sending them with carbohydrate-rich festival of tastes that would make today's South Beach, Atkins, and Sugar Busters-dieting parents blush.

Koala Yummies were one of those magical foods that contained absolutely no natural ingredients. There was something particularly satisfying about biting into a cookie with the knowledge that each component of the fantastic taste sensations on your tongue were developed in a lab specifically for your snacking enjoyment. Just imagine, these little guys were created specifically with your unnatural cravings for artificial sweeteners in mind! The packaging heavily featured a rainforest-type theme, which was certainly misleading. Koala Yummies were in no way linked to nature aside from their marsupial likeness and that's the way we wanted it.

For any of you not fortunate enough to remember the fine blend of sweet tastes that made up these confections, allow me to paint a picture for you. Well, perhaps not paint a picture. While we're using metaphors here, I might as well make them related. Allow me to bake a figurative chocolate-filled cookie for you:

Outside: Pure crispy hollow cookie deliciousness all dolled up in the best koala finery a cheap Asian food production company can buy. These yummies had personality: some of them played some sort of ukelele, some ate plates of cookies, and others yet indulged in deep fits of hysterical emotion (pictured below, bottom left)

Inside: We didn't want to let our parents in on this little secret, but the inside was a Halloween-rivaling level of sweet candy ecstasy. While technically these goodies could contain chocolate, vanilla, or strawberry centers, but everyone knew the chocolate ones were truly the epitome of Koala Yumminess.

The packaging was somewhat odd and clearly reflected its Japanese origins through its complicated shape and construction. Rather than coming in an ordinary household-size box or bag, Koala Yummies lived in little cardboard octagonal prisms. There was no explanation offered for this idiosyncratic packaging, but it certainly made it more fun and plausible to play with the Yummies in the context of their three-dimensional stop sign-shaped house. This awkward shape and size meant that while consuming a full package of Koala Yummies was likely not recommended or healthy, it was certainly an easily attainable goal met by countless 90s youngsters.

As with the now-discontinued Dunakroos, 90s children have been experiencing extreme symptoms of Koala Yummy withdrawal since they were pulled from mainstream American markets. There are full sites, blogs, and lengthy forums devoted to the persistent and persevering quest for these tasty little Koala treats. Unfortunately, the public health community has yet to recognize this as a valid addiction worthy of treatment programs and/or methadone supplementation, but it certainly seems to have reach this level of cookie-crazed concern. Strung-out sugar-deficient 20-somethings beg and plead for a black-market source for their favorite discontinued snacks. A cursory Google search for Koala Yummies shows hundreds of requests, petitions, underground tips, and supposed store sightings. These are clearly more than cookies we're dealing with here, they're the snack of a generation.

There have, however, been some major breaks in this former cold case.

Exhibit A:


Exhibit B:


Your eyes do not deceive you. The once-beloved snacks of your childhood are still enjoying relative fame, and not just from doing the occasional Japanese commercial for extra income. Though now known as "Koala's March", these guys do appear suspiciously similar to our coveted Yummies of snack times past. Of course, that disgusting image of gooey, melty centers is a little off, but we can only imagine (read: pray) that this depiction is for illustrative purposes only. If you live near an Asian grocery or market that stocks ethnic specialty fare, you may be in luck.

Beware of imitations, though. The Meiji Seika corporation has been producing notorious knockoffs known in some Yummies-seeking circles as "Hello Panda". Do not be fooled by the octagonal packaging or similarly emoting cartoon animal images. Online Asian Food Grocer describes Hello Pandas as "Chocolate cream filled biscuits that are surprisingly tasty with no oily after taste. Go ahead, try these finger sized biscuits. You wont be disappointed. Excellent for kids school time snack pack." Surprisingly tasty? Finger-sized? No thank you.


Our new Koala Yummies incarnate, however, on the other hand are described by the same vendor as "Chocolate cream filled biscuits that are surprisingly tasty with no oily after taste. Go ahead, try these finger sized biscuits. You wont be disappointed. Excellent for kids school time snack pack." Wait a second. That sounds suspiciously familiar.

So whether you choose to sell out to Hello Panda or continue to support your old standards with Koala's March, you can still purchase these once-forgotten goodies online.

Just remember not to follow it up with anything vaguely nutritional for a truly authentic 90s snacking experience.

Then and Now

Then:

Jennifer Aniston, 1990

Now:

Jennifer Aniston, 2009


What? She had a deviated septum. It was reconstructive.

What Would You Do?

If you ever really need to know the answer to a question, here's a little tip from Nickelodeon circa 1991: lead in with a question word remixed on repeat. You may not find out what you would do, but you certainly have a better chance of ascertaining what what what you would do. You know. If faced with some sort of slime/pie type situation. The usual.

Yes, early 90s-era Nickelodeon was full of these handy tidbits of unconventional wisdom. Like their penchant for placing a germ-phobic obsessive-compulsive as host in not just one but two television shows whose underlying purposes were to cause disgusting uncontainable messes. Perhaps it was to Nickelodeon's credit that a hosting gig on their network was so highly coveted that even those with a disordered need for extreme constancy and cleanliness were willing to overlook their most basic anti-mess instincts. Not just any network held the power to persuade Marc Summers at the height of his inner OCD torment to host a show with the words "Super Sloppy" in the title.

Fortunately for Marc Summers, What Would You Do? was somewhat toned-downed in the super sloppy department in comparison to its sister show, Double Dare. I'm not sure this granted him any reprieve, but at least he was allowed a few brief moments of filming during which he was not coated head-to-toe in gooey green slime.



What Would You Do? was another of those magical Nickelodeon shows for which there was no reasonable explanation or justification. Children of the 90s, specifically those who grew up in a house with a cable TV hookup, were generally passionate about nonsensical programming. Nickelodeon demonstrated time and time again that they truly understood what kids were about; they managed to strike the perfect balance between recognizing the simplicity of entertaining children and not insulting their intelligence.

They also had a serious fixation on pies.

For some reason as of yet to be publicly declared and documented, the show included innumerable pie-themed features. While possibly derived from the original pie-in-the-face slapstick gag, What Would You Do? was determined to take this gimmick as far as whipped cream could possibly be flung. No pie stunt was too farfetched for this game show/interactive audience/wacky stunt television mash-up. Usually these pie shenanigans were tied to some sort of competition, but the reasoning was loose at most. There was no shortage of pie-centric hijinks, including but not limited to:

The Pie Slide
Sometimes, a straightforward name is best. The pie slide was, well, a pie slide. Contestants braved a regulation playground slide that culminated in an enormous vat of pie. Thankfully, they had the option of a head-first or feet-first dive. Full pie immersion ensued.



The Pie Pod
There's nothing like sitting in a chair, being covered with an enormous saran wrap-style tarp, and pelted directly with multiple pies, the number of which was based upon helpful audience input. Also popular was the Crowning Glory feature, which dropped additional pie on the participant's head.



The Pie Coaster
See Pie Slide. Replace "slide" with "coaster." Proceed.



The Pie Wash
Imagine if you will a car wash featuring an all-pie cast of cleaning supplies. Now remove the frame of the car and its mobile abilities. Congratulations! You've got a pie wash.



You've got to love that maniacal laughter by Marc Summers while issuing this pie sentence.

Clearly (or perhaps through pie-coated goggles) What Would You Do? could not be characterized by any conventional TV standards in its zany undertakings. The show frequently pitted adults and children against one another (in sometimes Double Dare-esque fashion), with the winning team holding the pie pronouncement power. Pie punishments could also be conveyed by means of the all powerful Wall o' Stuff. While the Wall o' Stuff had its benevolent side in which it dispensed freely the crappy What Would You Do? licensed merchandise to so-called lucky winners, it more often sent the contestant straight to meet their cream pie fates. The show also inexplicably had a "roving camera" segment featuring Candid Camera-style tomfoolery. As I said, the links between any of these segments were fairly difficult to ascertain; pie seemed to be the only element tying these things together.

Regardless of the lack of adherence to television norms, this show was beloved by children everywhere. Its sheer creativity was enough to captivate our young impressionable minds and forever instill within us a deep-seated love/fear relationship with a certain satisfyingly messy cloying confection. As What Would You Do? only filmed new episodes from 1991 to 1993, there is a lot to say for a show that can thrive through an oddly skewed rerun-to-new-show ratio. Because there were only 90 episodes produced, chances are all of us out there in 90s TV-land saw each of these pie-flinging episodes countless times during which we could ponder what indeed we would do in the place of these contestants. Whether you'd choose to brave the pie slide or take your chances on the Wall o' Stuff, What Would You Do? had a little something for everyone.

Everyone without whipped cream allergies, that is.


Check it out:
Pies on the Web: Dedicated to Pictures of People Getting Pies to the Face