What the hell is up with “lite” sour cream, would someone please tell me?

I am a huge fan of sour cream and this was such an incredible lack of judgment on my part, I just have to share — to warn and advise.   Mostly to warn.   Strenuously.

Like many of you, I try to be conscious of what’s sliding down my gullet and I’m all about choosing products that are lower in fat, salt, sugar, and anything else determined to be cancer, heart-attack, stroke, or stupid-causing.   I will happily defend my consumption of diet pop, I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter (really — it’s not that much of a stretch), and low-salt gravy not in the name of them being exactly like the original products, but close enough proximity that the sacrifice of flavor is more than made up by not coating my insides with lard and corn syrup on a daily basis.

Not so much luck with Lite Sour Cream.

I don’t know why I picked it up — I guess I saw the label, like above, and figured that whatever was lost in the pursuit of something that doesn’t stick to your hips as readily would be acceptable.   Boy, was I mistaken.

Have you SEEN lite sour cream?   It looks like a plastic bucket of cold whale spooge and has the consistency of snot.     Immediately upon opening it up I checked the label to make sure I didn’t accidentally stop by the “Spawn Your Own Salmon” department instead of the dairy case.   I was dubious about it crawling out and throttling me as I stood there, let alone trying to flavor my baked potato.

But looks aren’t everything and one shouldn’t judge a book by its…gelatinous appearance…so I proceeded to slop it onto my baked tubers and give it a shot.    To say that it invokes a gag reflex is being kind and gentle, I assure you.

Whether or not it has any flavor besides “disgusting mess” is hard to determine as your tongue backs away from it in a damned hurry.   What little made it down my throat before I decided that starving sounded better had a strong essence of moose spit and rubbing alcohol.   I’m unsure whether or not there is actually any, “cream”, inside and if there is, I’m probably better off not knowing what sort of cream it really is.

Let’s not kid ourselves — sour cream is one of man’s finer culinary creations, right up there with butter, but it’s horrifically hard on your body, what with a ton of fat, calories, and so forth.    But my god it’s tasty and goes perfectly well smothered ontop of any number of food items.     So why wouldn’t we look for something that’s a bit easier on the paunch yet still gets the point across?   I understand the motivation at least.

Lite sour cream, however, is not the answer, unless you are so sadistic that you enjoy self-torture with food products.   Clearly this is one area where a healthier alternative has not been achieved and we would all do better to simply use the real thing in moderation or shrug and ladle on great globs of its creamy, sour whiteness with glee and screw the consequences.

Whatever the outcome, I guarantee you’ll be happier than if you had used something lite-er.