Ice Cream Cupcakes a great choice for kids' gatherings

PhillySwirl Ice Cream Cupcakes. $4.99 to $5.99 per 19.5-ounce package of six frozen cupcakes or $7.99 to $9.99 per 39-ounce package of 12 frozen cupcakes.

Bonnie: These new frozen ice cream cupcakes could come in handy for any gathering of small children. That's because they're ice cream, cake and icing all in one small portion, packed in a resealable muffin-tin package. Each includes vanilla or chocolate cake and vanilla ice cream topped with chocolate or vanilla icing and sprinkles. They're the perfect size for kids' birthday parties and for recognizing the birthday person at your dinner party when you don't want to serve an entire birthday cake. Be sure to add a candle.

The nutritionals are even reasonable: 160 calories, 9 grams of total fat (of which 6 are saturated) and 15 grams of sugar per cupcake.

Carolyn: PhillySwirl Cupcakes is the perfect product for our individualistic, time-pressed, weight-obsessed society.

These Carvel-like ice cream-topped cupcakes seem especially tailor-made for kids' birthday parties. With these, you can forget the trouble and mess of cutting cake and scooping out ice cream, not to mention complaints about unequal-size servings or the wrong cake flavor (since PhillySwirl multipacks come with half-white, half-chocolate cake). They're also great for celebrations in small families or as an everyday, not-too-indulgent treat.

In fact, I'd like to see these in supermarket three-packs, or individually wrapped in the ice cream cases at convenience stores.

Oscar Mayer Deli Creations Flatbread Sandwiches. Buffalo-Style Ranch Chicken, Chicken and Bacon Ranch, Fajita Beef & Salsa, Steakhouse Beef With Garlic Parmesan Sauce, and Sun-Dried Tomato Chicken. $2.99 to $3.99 for 4.9-ounce to 5.1-ounce package.

Bonnie: I bet there's no environmentalist on Oscar Mayer's R&D team — not with all the packaging used in these flatbread sandwiches. First, there is the main box. Then the flatbread comes in a sealed tray that you use for cooking. And the shredded cheese, sauce, and cubes of meat or chicken are each separately packaged. This makes no sense for our planet, but it does for "freshness." And I use that term very loosely, as the chicken in these tastes more like ham from all the preservatives.

To make a sandwich, you top the flatbread with the meat, cheese and sauce, microwave about a minute, and then fold and eat. One sandwich has a modest 280 to 330 calories, a modest to high 9 to 14 grams of total fat, a modest to high 590 to 910 grams of sodium (from all the additives), and almost no fiber.