The Tyranny of “Mini” Snack Food Treats

Have you noticed that there are now shrunken “mini” versions of your favorite guilty-pleasure snack foods? There are mini cookies, mini chocolates, mini donuts — and now mini Tastykake Cupcakes.

Tastykake is selling their new line of mini cupcakes as, “perfectly portioned little indulgences” with a serving size of three cupcakes coming in at under 200 calories.

Sounds good, doesn’t it?

But here’s the problem with these, or any other mini-treats: good luck eating just three of them.

The psychology of “mini” things is that they’re tiny and harmless. One more wouldn’t hurt, right? But by the time you’re done conning yourself into “one more” you’ve eaten a dozen. In many cases, you’ll have eaten more than you would had you simply chosen the full size version.

This is, of course, exactly what snack food companies are counting on. They have perfected the twisted psychology of The Mini Snack.

So, go ahead and tear into that cute little packet of Tastykake Mini Cupcakes. What’s the harm?

You can choose from Mini Peanut Butter Swirly Cupcakes, Mini Swirly Cupcakes (chocolate, mmm) or Mini Koffee Kake Cupcakes (which – in an act of evil genius — are made as crumb-covered, creme-filled coffee cake cupcakes).

They all seem so darned little, and sweet. You can discipline yourself to eat just one or two, after all. Of course you can, of course! (insert evil movie laughter here).