Kev's Snack Reviews

At last, all the new Wonka bars are out in shops! This Crème Brûlée variety is unfortunately only available in large 100g blocks, but I found one in Tesco recently for £1.40. After my disappointment with the Millionaires Shortbread and Chocolate Nice Cream varieties I was hoping this bar would be the one gem of the three. And although it was much better than the other two, it's still not exciting enough to do the Willy Wonka name proud. It's described as simply "Vanilla creme with a caramel crunch" and has an eye-rolling rhyme on the pack: "This isn't the only Wonka bar, you'll find the others near and far; Millionaires Shortbread and Chocolate Nice Cream, they came to Wonka in a dream". The packaging has a rather cool resealing mechanism, with a Wonka tophat "peel here" sticker on the end: It can be peeled off, then the wrapper can the be folded over and resealed. This is handy for keeping the chocolate fresh should you wish to...

When I saw these Jolly Rancher fruit chews reduced to 50p in a local department store I couldn't resist buying a pack. They usually cost a lot more in import stores so this was a real bargain indeed! They were only just past their best before date, but this didn't bother me since sugary sweets usually keep for ages. There were 4 different flavours in the box: Green Apple, Cherry, Watermelon and Blue Raspberry. They contain both natural and artificial flavourings. Here are my thoughts on each flavour - Green Apple : This had a good strong sour apple flavour. It was nice, but a tad artificial. Cherry : This was my favourite flavour, it had a nice sour cherry tang that didn't taste too artificial and was very refreshing. Watermelon : This was my second favourite flavour, it had a nice subtle watermelon taste that wasn't too harsh or artificial, just mild and subtle. Blue Raspberry : This was the worst flavour - it tasted completely artificial and rather unplea...

I must admit, I don't really know what Hello Kitty is all about. It's a cultural thing that has completely passed me by, despite seeing the products in most shops. I know it's very popular though, so when I spotted this Hello Kitty milk chocolate bar for just 17p I thought I'd give it a try and see what all the fuss is about. Turns out this wasn't the best introduction to a Hello Kitty product. It's just cheap-tasting calender milk chocolate with a Hello Kitty wrapper! I wasn't expecting much for 17p, but I still expected better than this. If Cadbury can produce Freddos for 20p then it can't be that hard to make a small bar of decent quality chocolate, surely? These are made by Kinnerton Confectionery who specialize in "Calender chocolate", though, so I suppose I shouldn't have been too surprised! Overall, this is a poor quality chocolate that I would recommend avoiding - even if you have kids. Go for a Freddo, Cadbury Fudge or...

I was really excited to find this new Butterkist Toffee Popcorn flavour ice cream in Tesco recently. I've never tried a popcorn flavoured ice cream before, despite always being curious about the Heston Blumenthal Salted Caramel Popcorn  version from Waitrose. The description on the tub reads " Butterkist Productions are proud to present to you our delicious toffee popcorn flavour ice cream, made using our safely guarded popcorn recipe combined with soft ice cream, smooth toffee sauce and crunchy toffee pieces. " It cost £3 - I'm not sure if this is an introductory price or the regular price, but I would recommend grabbing some ASAP regardless, because this is a fantastic ice cream flavour and just as good as anything from Ben and Jerry's or Haagen Daz!  The Butterkist logo really intrigued me - it says Butterkist Productions Estd 1914 Indianpolis. A little research ( thanks, wikipedia! ) revealed that the Butterkist name originates from a Kentucky-based popco...

For a while now I've been experimenting with gluten and dairy-free products. I feel much better using them, and usually go for gluten or dairy free options if they're available in cafes. One product I've been buying regularly is Koko (formerly Kara) Dairy Free, so I thought it about time I give it the review treatment! Koko is a dairy free alternative to milk, and I've found that it goes well with cereal in particular, but it's also good for drinking by itself or making smoothies with. It's good in tea and coffee although it can be a bit watery, so you need to use more of it to get the same effect as regular milk. It doesn't curdle though, unlike some milk substitutes. I much prefer Koko over soya or rice milk, as the taste is "cleaner" and it actually tastes refreshing to drink. For anyone who's been put off coconut drinks by trying the likes of Vita Coco, Koko is very different as it doesn't have that weird sour taste that cocon...

Just a quick review for this new Options flavour today as there's not really much to say about it! I found this in Tesco along with the other Options varieties, but nearly passed it by as the packaging looks quite similar to the Toffee flavour that Options used to do (anyone know if they still make it?). It tasted pretty much like regular Options hot chocolate but with an extra hit of butterscotch flavour. It was very pleasant and sweet, and of course low calorie which is the point of Options. It's a nice limited edition, but personally I think I'll stick with Options white hot chocolate which is my personal favourite! I tried to make this without lumps by stirring the powder with a splash of milk before adding hot water, but unfortunately still ended up with some lumps as you can see here: It's not the first time I've had lumpy hot chocolate from Options...anyone else have this problem? Price: 32p per 11g sachet or 4 for £1. Suitable for vegetarian...

As well as the new " Dairy Milk Snowy Delight ", I was pleased to find this limited edition Dairy Milk Winter Wonderland bar in Tesco recently. It's one of the few Christmas products I've been truly excited about and that's only because of the unique tree-shaped blocks! They look fanatstic; I don't think I've ever seen a chocolate bar that looks quite this cool before! The blocks break off fairly easily and cleanly, which is quite a feat considering their unique shape. They can be split into diagonal rows:  ...or individual chunks:  ...or even three-chunk triangles! The bar comprises mostly of Dairy Milk, with the white pieces containing a layer of white on top of milk chocolate. The white chocolate amounts to 12% of the bar in total. The chocolate tasted delicious; it was exactly as you'd expect from Dairy Milk, but with an extra hit of creaminess from the white chocolate. The flavours blended together perfec...

This "Strawberry Sours" pop from Barr has been calling me for a while now. I kept seeing it in a local discount store and thinking "ooh, that looks interesting", but the cheap price made me think it would be a bit rubbish. After seeing Foodstuff Find's post on Barr's Limited Edition Bubblegum flavour pop though I decided to finally give it a go in the hope it would be as good. Of course, the most famous pop Barr are known for is the Scottish delicacy Iron Brew, or " Irn Bru ". Being a big Iron Brew fan I hoped this would be similarly as good. Unfortunately it wasn't, but it was still a pretty tasty pop drink for 39p. It was strongly fizzy, moreso than a lot of carbonated drinks these days which have a rather weak fizz. The strawberry taste had a nice sour tang but it was quite artificial and certainly didn't taste anything much like a strawberry I've ever eaten. But I suppose that's the joy of pop isn't it - artificial f...

After my disappointment over the lack of detail on the Cadbury Mousse Snowman , I was hoping this Maltesers Merryteaser would be an improvement. Unfortunately, I'd forgotten about the Malteaster Bunny from my Easter Bunny Beauty Contest earlier in the year. That guy didn't have a face...so it was no surprise to find his reindeer cousin didn't either! At least he has a nose, I guess: Come on Mars, you can do better than this! He looks like he was made using a Poundland cookie cutter! (I have nothing against Poundland, but still...) Luckily, he tasted a lot better than he looked. The chocolate was creamy as with most Mars branded chocolates, and the filling was super smooth. There were crunchy Malteser pieces embedded within the filling, similar to those in the new "Maltesers Teasers" bars. In other words, this is the Malteaster Bunny but disguised as a reindeer! Overall, this is a delicious Christmas snack which you really can't go wrong wit...

Whilst looking for the new Cadbury Winter Wonderland bar in Tesco recently I was surprised to come across this limited edition Dairy Milk "Snowy Delight". I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised though, since there's been an almost never-ending stream of new product releases from Cadbury this year! The description of "Milk chocolate with a vanilla flavour filling" made me yawn a little bit, as it means this is basically just a repackaged version of the now-discontinued Dairy Milk Bliss bar (which also made a limited edition resurgence for the 2012 Olympics as Dairy Milk Silvery Creme ). Grumbles aside, I have to say I did like the packaging - the picture of the Dairy Milk block on a sledge is a fun, festive touch which really made me smile! Taste-wise the bar was very nice; the chocolate was typical Dairy Milk, and the filling was very smooth and creamy with a nice vanilla flavour. Whilst it was all very pleasant and tasty, for a Christma...

Amongst all the new Christmas chocolates in Sainsbury's recently I spotted this one from Lindt. Being a fan of all things Lindt I had high expectations, and it sure didn't let me down! It's basically a snowflake-shaped piece of chocolate containing a melting Lindor filling, which can be split in half. I love the snowflake design, it's simple but I think it looks really cool. The chocolate smelled very creamy and had a distinctive Lindt aroma. Splitting it open revealed the smooth filling: It tasted as delicious as you would expect from Lindor: the chocolate was creamy and rich, whilst the filling was smooth and melt-in-the-mouth. It was quite full-on and maybe a bit too rich to eat all at once, so it's probably good that it can be split in half! Overall, this Lindor Snowflake is a nice little treat and far  better quality than some of the Christmas offerings from other mainstream companies this year. It's a bit rich so you might want to eat onl...

In recent months I've noticed that Lucozade now comes in a dizzying array of different flavours. I'm not sure what's behind this trend, because Lucozade never really struck me as a drink suited to different flavours. The original Lucozade has it's own distinctive, unique taste, which surely gets lost when you start adding berry or apple flavourings to it? So yes, call me old fashioned but to me proper Lucozade has just one flavour, although the orange version is a nice one-off. Nowadays though there's blackcurrant, cherry, apple, tropical, lemon, berry...and now this limited edition "Melonade" variety too. I found this in a local newsagent but it's also available at Asda in large bottles, plus I've spotted it in WH Smiths. It's described as "Sparkling melon and lime flavour glucose drink with tropical fruit juices" and contains caffeine. It's fizzy pop that tastes of melon, basically. It has that full-on "glucose...

Well, this is a first - a new product on shelves that isn't Christmas-themed! Yes, Butterkist have bucked the trend and released a limited edition flavour more suited to the Autumn months instead - Toffee Apple! I found this popcorn in B&M Bargains of all places, for 99p. It's described as "Popcorn coated with Apple flavour Toffee (65%)". There's a blurb on the pack that says "A taste that transports you to a land of ferris wheels, helter skelters and horse carousels". I don't know about anyone else, but I don't think of any of those when I think of toffee apples - I think of Bonfire Night and Halloween! I was expecting the popcorn to have a buttery toffee taste, but instead was met with a strong, sweet apple flavour. Infact I couldn't really taste much toffee at all - the coating was just sweet and crunchy. The apple was most dominant, and in that respect I guess this popcorn replicates the flavour of toffee apple quite well...