Magnolia Cookie Monster was first released in the market a few months ago together with the Magnolia Ice Cream Best of the Philippines collection. It is endorsed by Philippine teen celebrity Elmo Magalona, son of the late Filipino celebrity rapper and music icon Francis Magalona.

A few months after and with an aggressive marketing, Magnolia, through a media event held at Magnolia Flavor House in the new Robinsons Magnolia mall, announced two new flavors or variants of the Magnolia Cookie Monster in addition to the Choco Classic. The two new flavors are Choco Caramel and Choco Hazelnut. A grand fans day for the  followers of Elmo Magalona was also held afterwards.

Magnolia Cookie Monster,Choco Classic

Magnolia Cookie Monster Choco Caramel and Choco Hazelnut

Yours truly was invited as a blogger to the launch and was able to try the new products.

The packaging design is generally the same as that of the Magnolia Cookie Monster Choco Classic but in yellow and red colors for the caramel and hazelnut flavors, respectively.

It’s main thrust is its over-indulgence with chocolate having been made with four different kinds of chocolate from coating to filling. The coating would remind you of the classic Pinipig Crunch because of the rice balls in the coating. I’m not sure if they are also rice crispies (pinipig) and they just changed the name for marketing reasons. You may also be briefly reminded of the Magnum craze, only more conservative (thinner coating).

Magnolia Cookie Monster Choco Hazelnut

Moreover, Magnolia Cookie Monster is filled with a fudgy center filling on the inside, surrounded by chocolate ice cream.

As per the taste, I found the caramel variant too sweet and was not even able to finish the whole choco-stick. For an ice cream lover such as I, my friends would be surprised of this rare occurrence.  🙂

Magnolia Cookie Monster Choco Caramel

On the other hand, the Choco Hazelnut (Top Photo) gets the thumbs up for it’s interesting twist on the flavor. It’s not common to find a hazelnut flavor in a choco ice cream bar which retails for only P20. However, the Choco Classic retains it’s top spot on my favorites.

Magnolia Cookie Monster TVC

Tomorrow – October 28, 2012 – the Magnolia Cookie Monster television commercial will be released in major television networks (watch the TVC video in advance here).

Elmo Magalona is still it’s endorser effectively catering to the young market, specially the ladies who usually succumbs to the impulse of buying one of the best comfort food known to man – ice cream. 🙂 And also, the play of words with ‘Elmo‘ and ‘Cookie Monster‘…Sesame Street, anyone?

If you haven’t tried the Magnolia Cookie Monster ice cream bars, you can find them in major supermarkets nationwide specially in Rustans Supermarket, Robinsons Supermarket, and Ministop outlets. Try their new flavors too – the Magnolia Cookie Monster Choco Hazelnut and Choco Caramel and see if my verdicts are right. But of course, don’t miss the Choco Classic which is a NomNomClub.com recommendation for a price-busting P20. Follow Magnolia Ice Cream on Facebook at Best of the Philippines & Magnolia Cookie Monster and Twitter as well at @MagIceCream & @MagCMonster.

Oishi has been a long established snack brand in the Philippines. It was one of the few I grew up with as a child when there were only a handful of snack brands in the market.

Oishi Kirei

Years forward, NomNom Club was invited the other day for Oishi’s new campaign/slogan – “O Wow!” It’s long withstanding snacks like the Oishi Prawn Crackers & Kirei  and the newer ones like the Gourmet Picks, Baked Porky Pops (which I just tried last week off the grocery shelf), Marty’s Cracklin’ , the ultra sweet Pillows, Bread Pan, Oishi Potato Fries, and Wafu were all presented in an “O Wow” way.

Baked Porky Pops

NomoNom Favorites

The Oishi Prawn Crackers brought back a lot of childhood memories but among the Oishi products, Smart C has been my favorite in the beverages line. It’s not too sweet like other bottled juice and tea drinks.

Oishi Prawn Crackers

Among the snacks, the Gourmet Picks is almost always a staple in our grocery cart while Oishi Wafu wafer stick is my personal sweet indulgence – highly recommended. 🙂

Also getting my thumbs up are the Oishi Potato Fries (for being baked, not fried) and Marty’s vegetarian chicharon that’s almost as good as it’s sinful pork counterpart.

Marty's Cracklin'

Finally making in the NomNom’s a-list is the Bread Pan (photo above) whenever I wanted a quick toast-bread-fix matched with some jam. 🙂

Two more of my favorites which I did not see that day was Marty’s Baconette Strips and Oishi Ridges. Something I forgot to ask the people from Oishi.

Elmo for Oishi

Elmo Magalona: New Oishi Celebrity Endorser

In the finale of the Oishi-O-Wow presentations, their newest product celebrity endorser was revealed in the personality of Elmo Magalona, the son of the late Francis Magalona – an icon in the Philippine music industry.

Still in his teen years, Elmo represents Oishi’s energetic and dynamic product line from beverages to the variety of its unique snacks.

Oishi ‘O Wow’
Website: http://oishi.com.ph/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/oishi.ph

Elmo Magalona: New Oishi Snacks Celebrity Endorser

It’s good to see a long-established brand like Oishi continually developing itself and keeping abreast with the times and its market. Oishi deserves it’s own “O, Wow!” 🙂