Pepperidge Farm Fruit & Nut Chewy Granola Cookies

After trying Pepperidge Farm's Trail Mix Chewy Granola Cookies over a month ago I'd been eager to try the Fruit & Nut version, but I couldn't find them anywhere. So when I saw a bag in a bookstore yesterday I bought the Fruit & Nut Chewy Granola Cookies for $3.59.

The cookies contain rolled oats, whole wheat & enriched wheat flour, sugar, raisins, almonds, palm oil, and/or interesterified & hydrogenated soybean & or hydrogenated cottonseed oil, brown sugar, steel cut oats, pecans, raisin paste, crystalline fructose, invert sugar, butter, & corn syrup solids.

It contains 2% or less of cranberries, honey, whole eggs, leavening (ammonium bicarbonate, baking soda) salt, cornstarch, citric acid, elderberry juice concentrate, natural flavors, spices and sunflower oil.

Pepperidge Farm claims that their Chewy Granola cookies begin with a "flavorful blend of smooth rolled oats, whole grains, and golden steel cut oats - the heartiest of the hearty. Mix in raisins, almonds, pecans, and cranberries and you've got our Fruit & Nut recipe - pleasantly lumpy, irresistibly bumpy and baked full of wholesome satisfaction in every chewy bite."

When I tried the Pepperidge Farm Trail Mix Granola cookies I really enjoyed the cookie itself but I didn't care for all of the chocolate chunks. So I bought the Fruit & Nut variety because it's the only other chewy granola cookie that Pepperidge Farm carries (the other two granola cookies they make are crunchy) & I thought that since they didn't have any chocolate in them, I'd enjoy them more.

Unfortunately that didn't turn out to be the case. I really didn't like the Fruit & Nut Chewy Cookies at all.

The chewy texture & the steel cut oats scattered throughout made the Pepperidge Farm cookie pleasurable, but I hated all of the flavors. The cookie itself tastes slightly different from the Trail Mix variety; it had a fruitier flavor that I really didn't care for.

And I usually don't have a problem with pecans or almonds but in this cookie they just didn't add any presence, in fact I thought it just made them taste bland. But I found the worst flavor of all to be the cranberries.

I usually hate when cranberries are added to a snack and this time was no exception. Even though there's supposedly less than 2% of them in this cookie, it feels like a lot more because the flavor is so loud & tangy. They provide the most of the flavor in the chewy granola cookie but I don't think cranberries go all that well with oatmeal, so I wish they weren't in this cookie at all.

In the end...

I am sorry to say that even though I had high hopes, the Pepperidge Farm Chewy Granola Fruit & Nut Cookies failed to live up to my expectations. I felt like I was eating a holiday cookie, because of all the pecans & cranberries.

I'd describe it as a hearty snack, but I wanted something sweet & enjoyable, so I won't be buying these cookies again. I'd probably stick to the Trail Mix variety or try the Crunchy Granola flavors. I give these cookies 2.5 out of 5 stars.