If you're a Clyde and needing to lose weight (like me), I don't eat anything on rides of less than about 2 hours unless it's a hammer-fest or a social-schmooze with the local club.

However, I am partial to PowerBar products (sponsor of our team ). I really like their fruit smoothie bars now--really excellent, maybe just a bit too much sweetener. But, I only use gels occasionally: on longer training rides of 90-mins to 2 hours just for a little extra boost. They only contain like 100 kcals so it's not much, just gives a little boost for accelerations.