Goldfish Hello Kitty Strawberry Shortcake Grahams Review: It's Like Eating An Air Freshener

In 1974, Japanese company Sanrio and designer Yuko Shimizu introduced to the world the adorableness that is the character Hello Kitty. The little white cat, sporting a tilted red bow in her hair, has a spread-out pair of eyes, a yellow nose, and, notably, no mouth whatsoever. According to her Sanrio bio, "Her hobbies include baking cookies and making new friends." To celebrate her 50th year of cuteness, her parent company teamed with the makers of Goldfish to bake up a limited-edition, special batch of its graham crackers — Goldfish Hello Kitty Strawberry Shortcake Flavored Grahams.

On the sleek, dark salmon-colored packaging of these Strawberry Shortcake Flavored Grahams, Hello Kitty herself greets buyers. She hides behind a single, tiny strawberry cake that she's holding in her precious paws. On the back of the bag, the punny mantra "Be Your Berry Best" further invites eaters to tear it open and dig right in on this birthday party grub.

Since Hello Kitty doesn't have a mouth, and therefore may never know what her Grahams taste like, Daily Meal decided to help her and the rest of us find out. So, are these strawberry Hello Kitty Goldfish the cat's meow, or do they make us want to ferociously hiss? Without further ado, here is my chew and review.

Some recommendations are based on first-hand impressions of promotional materials and products provided by the manufacturer.

After prying open the plastic, non-recyclable bag of the Hello Kitty edition of Goldfish Grahams, a strong aroma of artificial strawberry engulfs the senses. Right off the bat, I didn't have the greatest feeling about these strawberry shortcake-flavored snacks. The shape of these crackers is split between standard Goldfish swimmers and little Hello Kitty faces. They are primarily standard graham cracker brown in appearance, coated in a barely visible layer of pink dust.

After crunching on a single Goldfish, I must confess, I wasn't eager to try many more. I love things that are super sugary and super sweet, but there is just something wholly unnatural about the strawberry taste dominating these graham crackers. It's almost like unwrapping one of those Little Trees air fresheners for the first time and being blasted and overwhelmed by its odor. Yet, instead of opening this air freshener in a car, you're opening it in your mouth.

If you don't care for the taste of these Goldfish, you may be stuck with it. As one's teeth grind down on these graham crackers, bits of them sometimes get lodged, leaving an aftertaste that just won't leave. Even with that knowledge in my head, I kept popping one Goldfish after another into my mouth. Eventually these strong strawberry-tinged treats slowly started to work their weird juju on me. Perhaps they weren't noxious non-starters after all, but just a novelty graham cracker worth trying once.

Like all other Goldfish crackers, the first ingredient listed, in bold, on a bag of Hello Kitty Strawberry Shortcake Flavored Grahams is "made with smiles." The rest of the actual ingredients may not raise a smile, but highlights include whole wheat flour, vegetable oils, sugar, brown sugar, and 2% or less of raspberry and strawberry juice concentrate, natural flavors, salt, nonfat milk, and vanilla extract. The product contains wheat, milk, and soy.

A single bag contains about 155 Goldfish pieces. A serving is 31 of them. That's good for 140 calories, 5 grams of total fat, 140 milligrams of sodium, 1 gram of protein, and 21 grams of carbohydrates, of which 1 is dietary fiber and 8 is total sugars. These little fish are cholesterol free, and a serving will satisfy 2% of the daily recommended intake of iron at .5 milligrams.

Based on the expiration date on the bag I taste-tested, the shelf life of Goldfish Hello Kitty Strawberry Shortcake Flavored Grahams is approximately five months.

The Goldfish Hello Kitty Strawberry Shortcake Flavored Grahams are a limited-time-only item, currently available at nationwide retailers like Target, while supplies last. A single 6.1-ounce bag retails for $3.69, although cost may vary by location.

This seasonal treat can also be purchased directly at shop.goldfishsmiles.com as a two-pack for $7.38. However, the last time I checked, they were sold out online. If you're having trouble tracking down a bag, resellers are more than happy to help you out on online marketplaces like eBay or Mercari.

Goldfish have been a salty and savory treat raising smiles since 1962. The Goldfish crackers didn't gain an actual smile in their design until 1997, and just two years later, the brand branched out into sweeter pastures with its Goldfish Grahams line. Ever since, the Grahams' sugary flavors have run the gamut from cinnamon to honey to vanilla cupcake to s'mores. However, none may have pushed the envelope of acceptable taste more these im-purrfect Hello Kitty strawberry shortcake ones.

Beyond Hello Kitty diehards, fans of artificial strawberry flavoring, and perhaps eBay flippers, I'm not sure these crackers are worth celebrating. Still, there's no denying the cuteness of seeing Hello Kitty adorning a shiny bag of Goldfish, and who can deny celebrating 50 years of her any which way we can? Perhaps these limited-edition treats are "berry best" left in the bag, sealed off from the world and displayed on a shelf as a work of art.