Flavor Review: Ben&Jerry's Clusterfluff

Ah, the quest goes on.

   I am a massive enthusiast and infatuate of peanut butter, so when Clusterfluff hit the markets back in March, I was amped. The first time I tried it was when I was visiting my brother in New York City. The second day I was up there Clusterfluff appeared in the stores, and we bought it upon first sight. I have had it countless times since then, and it has never ceased to satisfy.
 
Clusterfluff - Peanut Butter Ice Cream with Caramel Cluster Pieces, Marshmallow Swirls & Peanut Buttery Swirls.

   The word is a play on a phrase I will not speak in words here, but it is pretty clever, though I do not endorse such language. This is a very dense ice cream. Peanut butter ice creams always, in B&J's case, make for the richest, densest ice creams on the market.

   The peanut butter base is by no means subtle. It is more potent than their other peanut butter flavor, Peanut Butter Cup. It has a high sugar concentration, which is something that I frown upon in peanut butter bases. With the sugary add-ins, there is no need for a sugar-dense base. It is too much. Let the natural saltiness of the peanut butter accent the sweetness of the add-ins.

   The caramel cluster pieces are just out of place. I have yet to come up with an explanation as to why their presence is needed in such a tasty ice cream. What caramel has to do with peanut butter and marshmallows is beyond me ("This foe is beyond any of you"). I see a recurring theme here; one that I have pointed out in numerous posts. B&J loves their caramel. They will, sure as the sun rises each day, throw it in wherever the opportunity presents itself; and in the event that it doesn't present itself, they will force it in by any means necessary (as in the case of Clusterfluff).
   The clusters are not even crunchy. They have become soft in their freezer incubation, and do not provide any sort of textural pleasure. I love a good crunch in ice creams, but the chewiness of the caramel clusters ruins each bite they are in.

   Marshmallows in ice cream? Yes. And it is brilliant. I have been wary of marshmallows in ice cream for many years, but I became a fervent advocate after trying Clusterfluff. They are like rivers of billowing clouds where one can dance along in blissful comfort and dreamy delight...
   They are gooey, soft, sticky, and creamy. All of which add a huge combination of awesomeness that counteracts the badness of the cluster pieces. If you try this flavor for one reason it should be the marshmallow swirls.

   Now, for my favorite part: even better than the marshmallow river of dreams are the swirls of peanut butter. They are uniquely, and oddly, described as "Peanut Buttery Swirls". But I know the very reasoning behind this naming. As I do in my ice creams, B&J combines peanut butter with confectionary sugar, which sweetens it and gives it a consistency better adapted for swirling and freezing. The taste tapped from adding sugar to the peanut butter is astronomical. It sometimes blows my consumers' minds. Without fail, in each ice cream that I add the peanut buttery ribbon, it immediately becomes the favorite aspect. So it is with Clusterfluff as well.
   I wouldn't call them swirls. I would rename them 'ribbons' or 'oceans' or something that would get at how large and thick they are. As shown in the picture, one peanut butter 'cluster' (they gave cluster to the wrong add-in) was more like the size of a spoon of peanut butter I eat late at nights or mornings or lunchtime or whenever I see the jar, and delve deeply into it as a Dwarf delves into a mine, and come out with a heaping mount of peanut butter. That is how this ice cream does peanut butter.

   Peanut Butter ice creams are always the most fat saturated. This is saddening, yet I never shy away from them. In fact, it spurs me on to eat them more. And I love every bite of it. And you should too because ice cream is not something you should ever feel guilty about. It is a thing to be loved, desired, consumed with the whole being, and not to be made 'low-fat' or 'skinny'. Leave those weak terms of self-consciousness to the yogurt lab-mountain-places. I say wield your spoon as if were a double-edged blade, keen as an eagle's eye, and thrust it into every pint you can reach. That is where happiness lies.

-Reese O'Shirey, Esq.