by Lore Sjöberg

Twinkies
The quintessential Hostess food, similar to foods you might create in your own kitchen, but profoundly different. Yes, the outer coating bears a passing resemblance to sponge cake, and the "creamy filling" might have once read a book about a dairy product, but overall it has that quality of taste and texture that can only be found on the snack food aisle. A+

Cupcakes
These are odd. What is it with the so-called frosting? It's this weird flat tortilla of sugar and chocolate clinging pathetically to the much larger cake unit. The best theory I've heard is that the cake and frosting of a Hostess cupcake are actually the male and female versions of the same organism. This would mean that the little swirl of white frosting on top is actually genetic material, which let's face it is what it resembles in the first place. B+

Chocodiles
A rebel Twinkie. The Chocodile rejects the hypocritical sociability of the other Twinkies in their happy little packs of three, wrapped in plastic and denial, and instead chooses to go it alone, sitting in its chocolatey leather jacket and brooding about the futility of existence. But they're hard to find and really not as tasty, so they get a B.

Fruit Pies
Hostess is the reigning monarch of hand-held pies. You can keep your Dolly Madison, your Home Run pies, your miniature pecan pie gas station desserts: give me a cherry Hostess fruit pie and a place to eat it and I shall gain some weight. Other manufacturers skimp on the fruit filling, the shortening for the crust, the festive artificial coloring, but not Hostess. Truly the luxury model. A

Suzy Q
What is the point? Do we really need a Hostess product where you can see the "creamy filling" before you even open the package? The end result is that a thick layer of the dessert in question remains attached to the wrapper, not to mention the fact that the filling is free to squeege out all over your fingers if you're not careful. Not the sort of snack food I want my children exposed to. C-

Unfortunately I have reached an impasse on perhaps the most controversial issue of our time. To wit: which are better, Ding-Dongs or Ho-Hos? Blood is shed daily on the streets of some of our more pathetic cities over this very question, and I have a friend who has promised to personally whack me with a titanium microphone stand if I come out on the wrong side, although I've forgotten which she prefers. Well, what the hell, let's say serve Ho-Hos with red meat and Ding-Dongs with fish and give them both an A.