And now for something that has been far too long in coming. That’s right; it’s time for another posting about snack cakes.

It seems that the Little Debbie people got wind of my previous assessment of their expanded snack sizes, for a few months back, I received a gift of a box of new yellow cakes with butter creme icing. While this was not the appeasement that it sounds like, (the gift was from my mother) it’s good to know that someone out there is listening, or at the very least thinking along the same lines that I am.

Little Debbie Yellow Cakes. Not exactly the answer to my prayers, but I'll take it.

At any rate, compared to their leviathan cousins, the yellow cakes in question (which claim to possess not only ‘Fresh Taste’, but ‘Right Size’! as well,) the 100 Calorie Cakes are tiny, and I have the photographic evidence to prove it:

Framing this image was like trying to put the Hulk, Juggernaut, and a pygmy kitten all in the same frame.

It’s also interesting to note that since my last critique of the Little Debbie line of cakes, the prices of the larger-sized cakes have jumped again, now retailing at $.75 apiece, when less than a year ago they were $.25. However, the Oatmeal Creme Pie seems to have lost its second layer, for which I am actually quite grateful. Seriously, that was way too much to be justifiably called a single serving.

It may be shorter, but the Oatmeal Creme Pie is still bigger than life.

Getting back to the cakes of the day, the 100 Calorie Yellow Cakes were rather tasty, if small. The little cakes are small even compared to the older ‘small cakes‘ that Debbie has been making for so long, and those come twin-wrapped in a box of eight (or ten in some cases).

They are almost delicate, and not as sweet as the fare that Little Debbie usually provides. Because of this, (and probably also because of the programming that has me trained to bite unmercifully into anything that comes wrapped in cellophane) I found myself tearing through them without even realizing it.

They fit in the palm of your hand, even out of the wrapping.

Whether this is the result of clever marketing or purely accidental still remains to be seen. Nevertheless, these confections might go best with coffee or tea, at the end of a meal, as opposed to a standalone snack- they are too small and light to satisfy in cases of actual peckishness, but could easily fill the need for a sweet taste on the heels of something heavier.

On the whole, I approve of these cakes, although mostly for their intent. These non-monolithic cakes manage to be 100 calories without artificial sweeteners (as far as I can tell, anyway,) and still taste good, and even fill a niche in the world of snackery that their predecessors had long since ignored.

That is to say that they’re almost grown-up cakes when compared to the zanier (and more child-oriented) high-calorie cakes that had come before them, by the packaging alone, nevermind the smaller size and calorie count.

Say what you will about "second childhoods," these are some mighty fine cakes.

So, good job, Little Debbie. Keep on keeping on, and I can’t wait to see what else you shake out of your petticoats.

Not exactly "wafer thin," but you get the idea. That also happens to be my least favorite Monty Python sketch.