Munch on Some Magic With Kellogg's Disney Classics Fruit Snacks

When I was growing up, I remember being bombarded with kid-centric advertising as I watched the Saturday morning and after-school cartoons. Most of it went in one ear and out the other, but the Fruit Roll-Up commercials must have made an impression, since those were a staple in my school lunches, along with their somewhat more sedate cousins, fruit snacks. It’s been quite a while since I’ve punched the shapes out of a Fruit Roll-Up, but it’s still fairly common to find fruit snacks on top of the refrigerator. And if you’re going to indulge in nostalgic goodies, why not double the fun by getting snacks whose shapes correspond to beloved characters?

There are many such themed snacks out there, from Star Wars to VeggieTales, produced by a variety of companies. Right now, the fruit snacks atop the fridge are Kellogg’s Disney Classics, which feature characters from six different Disney movies. To make things nice and simple, each character always is the same color, which is frequently the case with fruit snacks, but not always. The main advantage I could see to changing things up would be that then it might make more sense to have more basic shapes tossed into the mix. After all, six characters to represent “Disney Classics” is pretty paltry. Still, there’s a decent representation here.

Mostly, it’s fairly early Disney that we’re getting. Pinocchio, Fantasia and Dumbo all hail from the early 1940s, while Dumbo and Peter Pan came out in the mid-1950s. That leaves just The Lion King in the mid-1990s. Pinocchio looks a little funny in all yellow, but at least it goes with his hat. Likewise, an all-red Dumbo is a bit odd, but at least it goes with the ruffle he wears, along with the snazzy suit worn by his tiny manager.

Meanwhile, classy Cocker Spaniel Lady wears no purple at all, but there’s a certain royal air about her, so I can buy the coloring there. Still, the choices for the other three seem much more natural. Mickey, as the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, is all blue, which goes so well with that big blue hat of his, and verdantly garbed Peter Pan, quite understandably, is all green. Simba, meanwhile, is a very natural shade of orange. All of them are pretty good likenesses for as small and squishy as they are, and I don’t have to squint much to see what each one is supposed to be. Dumbo is probably the hardest to make out, while Mickey is the easiest.

Each box comes with ten pouches, each containing about eight fruit snacks, which, despite having six different colors, come in four different flavors: strawberry, grape, orange and cherry. The flavors aren’t super-distinct; I think the greens are strawberry and the yellows are orange, but I’m still not sure what the blues are. Meanwhile, the reds are cherry, the purples are grape and the oranges are orange. They’re reasonably tasty, and while I tend to like my fruit snacks just a tad firmer, I have no real complaints about the texture.

In nutritional terms, these are pretty standard, with each pouch containing 80 calories, 13 grams of sugar and 5 mg of sodium but no fat. They’re also made with real fruit (20 percent) and contain Vitamin C. So not super healthy, not super unhealthy. Certainly not something to feel guilty about munching on now and then. If you are looking for a way to put a little Disney magic into your diet, Kellogg’s Disney Classics fruit snacks aren’t a bad way to do it.