Kev's Snack Reviews

Last year Cadbury launched the new Dairy Milk Puddles, and if the clearance section in Tesco is anything to go by they may not be selling very well. I personally liked them although I do think they're a bit of a ripoff for the price. So I was excited to see this Milka version of the same thing in 99p Stores recently. Milka chocolate is usually a lot creamier than Dairy Milk, it's less sugar-dominated and more milky (alpine milk to be exact), so I was certain these would be good. The bars have the same design as Dairy Milk Puddles, curved "puddle" shaped blocks - perhaps this is where the "splash" part of the name comes from. Each piece contains a syrupy hazelnut filling. These were definitely a lot more pleasant than Dairy Milk Puddles, the chocolate starts off creamy and smoother than Dairy Milk, with the hazelnut syrup adding a sweet tasty hit of hazelnut. It's not quite upto the standards of Nutella and I'm puzzled why they didn&#

It seems the Golden Hen has become a bit broody recently and decided to lay some eggs! Yes, it's not even Christmas Day yet but Easter eggs are already in the shops...crazy. Despite the madness of eating Easter eggs in December, I have to say I was rather excited when I found these in WH Smiths over the weekend. For £1 you get 80g of Galaxy mini eggs containing pieces of crunchy caramel, all rolled in a gold coloured coating. The eggs looked very cool indeed, the gold coating creates a nice effect and makes them look more special than your average mini egg. They tasted a bit plainer than they looked however. It's basically creamy Galaxy milk chocolate with some crunchy sugar pieces added...they reminded me of the Galaxy Honeycomb bar that's now been discontinued. They were pleasant, I enjoyed them, but I couldn't help think they're more style over substance. Overall, these are pleasant enough chocolates and I'm sure they'll be very popular thanks to

I don't know if it's just me but I've noticed there's A LOT of "luxury" crisp manufacturers popping up in supermarkets recently, like it's a big deal. There's Kettle chips of course who are the original boys on the scene, they've been out years now, but recently there's been other companies to step in too...Tyrell's, Burts, and more besides.  Anyway when I saw this bag of Burts roast turkey and chestnut stuffing flavour in Aldi over the weekend I obviously had to give it a try since it's both in the "luxury" category, it's the festive season and well, I'd be a Scrooge not to! They were only £1 - bargain!  The crisps actually contain real Norfolk bronze turkey powder, as well as various herbs and spices, and are free of msg and artificial flavours. They were nice and thick but the flavourings, as always with these types of crisps had sunk to the bottom of the bag. I gave it a shake but still the most str

Recently, Grocery Gems did a review of this Vego Vegan Hazelnut chocolate bar, and after reading her review I immediately wanted to track this down. She described it as being like Nutella which sounded like the best thing ever to me! I found it in a local charity shop (of all places) that sells vegan products, and decided to go for the "mini" version for £1.69 (there's also a larger bar). The bar comes in two large, substantial blocks which are very thick and chunky. Splitting them apart revealed some whole hazelnuts embedded in the chocolate: With it being a vegan bar of course it didn't contain any dairy, but you'd never guess! It tasted so rich and creamy and hazelnutty I was in heaven...Grocery Gems description of Nutella was spot on! The whole hazelnuts further added to the luxury, reminding me a little of Ferraro Rocher. This is a very rich and indulgent bar indeed and I certainly didn't miss the dairy! Overall, I have to say this is a f

Many years ago, Nestle brought out a white chocolate Smarties bar. Many people won't remember it as it wasn't around for long, but needless to say it was a pretty tasty bar of chocolate. Sadly they discontinued it, leaving a gap in the market for chocolate bars with colorful "chocolate beans" embedded in them. Now it seems Asda have come to the rescue with their new "Rainbow Choc" bar, for the very low price of 60p for 100g. Sadly, it's nowhere near as good as the White Smarties bar used to be. The white chocolate tastes very cheap, with little creaminess and a lot of sugariness. The chocolate beans don't add much to the flavour either, maybe a little hint of overly sweet, cheap milk chocolate but that's all. This is a very poor bar indeed.... Overall, I would urge people to avoid this; it's just a gimmick from Asda to sell poor quality white chocolate. I imagine it's aimed at children, but please don't give your kids cheap

Marks & Spencer have recently brought out a few interesting bars in their own-brand chocolate range, there's a caramel one, a Bubbly one and this...a combination of milk, white & dark chocolate in the same bar. Can't decide which chocolate you fancy? Now you don't have to...have a bit of everything! Opening the wrapper, on the front side the bar had spiky, almost pyramid shaped blocks. They reminded me a little bit of Toblerone. The back of the bar revealed a chequered effect, almost like a chessboard! I snapped off a few pieces with varying amounts of milk, dark and white chocolate and took a bite. First I noticed the white chocolate; very milky and comforting, then the milk chocolate adding to the creaminess with a nice smooth cocoa flavour, with the dark chocolate finishing everything off with a richer cocoa hit. All the flavours work perfectly together, which surprised me as I thought this was just a gimmick initially. There's a nice balance o

When I first read about these new Asda Giant Pinwheel Buttons on One Treats blog, they were something I really wanted to try. I was a big fan of the Caramac Giant Buttons that Nestle recently introduced, but these sounded even better...they consist of a mixture of white and milk chocolate buttons in a swirled effect, containing a centre of sticky caramel. They're somewhat similar to Cadbury Caramel Nibbles. And they tasted a lot nicer than Cadbury Caramel Nibbles, despite being much cheaper - I paid only 80p for my bag! The chocolate is a lot creamier thanks to the addition of white chocolate, and doesn't have that weird waxy texture that Cadbury's chocolate now has. The addition of the caramel makes them very moreish, but also a little sickly if you eat too many. The caramel itself is runny and sweet, not the best quality in the world but about what you'd expect from a supermarket own brand really. Overall, I have to say I'm impressed with these, they'

Ombar recently contacted me about reviewing their Dairy Free Vegan Raw Cacao Bars, and since these are technically refined sugar free (they contain coconut sugar instead) I thought I'd give them a try. Not only do they contain coconut sugar, the "milk" varieties also contain coconut milk instead of dairy, making them dairy free and suitable for vegans. They also contain "live cultures", making them good for your tummy too! I've actually reviewed Ombar before - I tried their Strawberry Mylk bar - but I was delighted at the chance to try the Coconut Milk and Lemon & Green Tea varieties, especially as these bars usually cost £2 each in my local health food store. They're definitely only an occasional indulgence, which chocolate should really be anyway (Who am I kidding?!) I tried the Lemon & Green Tea variety first, which contained real lemon powder & oil, and matcha green tea powder. I wasn't sure what to expect from this bar but

I honestly wasn't going to bother reviewing this new Fruit & Nut Chopped bar from Cadbury when it initially came out, it's just Cadbury upto their usual tricks of giving you less product for the same price, but after reading One Treat's Review I decided it was my duty to inform everyone of just what Cadbury's are upto!   Unlike a regular 120g bar of Dairy Milk Fruit & Nut, this bar contains 95g but costs the same - £1. Opening the wrapper I could instantly see that although the bar looks longer, it's significantly flatter, more like a Milka bar than a Dairy Milk really! It's a shame Mondelez are determined to stamp out the traditional "chunky" style blocks we all used to know and love Dairy Milk for! Snapping the bar in half I could see the chopped nuts and raisins (or "dried grapes" as Cadbury so enticingly call them on the ingredients list) dispersed throughout, and I must admit it looked like a nicely proportioned bar

Morrisons recently had an offer on Haagen Dazs ice creams, they were just under £2 and at that price I really couldn't say no! I decided to try this new Coffee flavour, because what could be better than the combination of coffee and creamy ice cream?! It contains all the usual classic Haagen Dazs ingredients; sugar, cream, condensed milk, eggs, as well as coffee powder. I allowed mine to melt a bit before eating as I always find this the best way with ice cream...I can't stand it when it's frozen solid! The ice cream was lusciously creamy, as you would expect from Haagen Dazs, with the delicious added flavour of espresso coffee. Now this wasn't the strongest of flavours, it came off more like a good cappuccino than a strong coffee, but the creamy vanilla and coffee flavours blended together beautifully. If you're a coffee lover and an ice cream lover...this is one you simply have to try! Overall, a fantastic new flavour from Haagen Dazs proving that sim

Ben & Jerry's have brought out a few new ice creams this year, exciting ones like Cinnamon Buns & Pumpkin Cheesecake, but sadly I can't eat those as they contain gluten. Boo! Luckily this new "Save our swirled" variety doesn't, so I had to give it a try when I spotted it recently! It contains "Raspberry ice cream with marshmallow & raspberry-blackberry swirls & Chocolatey cone pieces". I wasn't too sure how this would turn out really, I haven't had raspberry ice cream in ages, so had pretty much forgotten what it tasted like. Well, I was very pleasantly surprised, this ice cream was delicious! My first thought was "it tastes like jammy dodger ice cream". I dont know why, since it doesn't contain biscuit and I don't eat jammy dodgers anymore (gluten!), but the strong sweet raspberry flavour is very reminiscent of the jam in Jammie Dodgers. I absolutely loved this ice cream. The raspberry blackberry

Some time ago a blog reader requested that I review the Irish Dairy Milk Caramello, and since it apparently tastes nicer than our UK Dairy Milk Caramel I just had to give it a go. I managed to find a bar from Morrisons for around 95p - not cheap for a small bar, but if the chocolate tastes good who cares? It comes in 8 small blocks that are somewhat square shaped, but not quite. It certainly looked better than the silly "curve shaped" blocks that Cadbury/Mondelez have introduced to UK Dairy Milk bars! It also smelled somewhat different to UK Dairy Milk...somewhat richer and more chocolatey and creamy - like the Dairy Milk we all used to love before Mondelez tampered with the recipe! (They claim they haven't changed it, but it seems different to me...perhaps they're using a different milk supplier now?) Breaking off a piece, the caramel oozed out and had a lovely aroma. And it tasted gorgeous...a little more sticky than the UK version, but a lot more flavoursome

Whilst in Sainsbury's recently I noticed they had a few new interesting bars in their own brand range, amongst them this White Chocolate Strawberry Creme bar. As a long time fan of white chocolate I just couldn't say no! The bar cost £1.29 which is very reasonable for a large 180g slab of chocolate. It's also fair trade which means it's good for the old conscience too...double win! The white chocolate contains a sticky strawberry fondant center with 0.7% strawberry...not a lot, but enough to give it an authentic strawberry flavour. The blocks were rather chunky and thick, each one giving a satisfying mouthful of creamy chocolate. I really enjoyed this bar, the white chocolate is comforting and creamy but of course, very very sweet! It's not the best quality white chocolate around but it's pretty decent for the price. The strawberry fondant just adds to the sweetness of course but brings it a refreshing fruity edge, making the bar very sweet over

It's no secret that I've been trying to quit the sugar recently, and to that end I've been trying a lot of different dark chocolates that contain none. They can sometimes be too bitter, so when I heard that Chocologic were launching in Tesco with their stevia sweetened chocolate I was overjoyed! In fact I nipped over as soon as I knew these were available! Glancing at the ingredients I noticed the chocolate contains "alimentary fibres" which consist of dextrin, inulin and oligofructose. Presumably these are a bulking agent, since the chocolate contains only 55% cocoa. 4 segments of the bar contain 2.5g of carbs and 0.4g of sugars. That's a very low amount of sugar for chocolate, although 4 segments is a very tiny amount of the bar so don't be fooled. Opening the wrapper, there was a faint whiff of cocoa but it wasn't too strong. As a fan of rich dark chocolate I was surprised by this. Snapping off the top layer of 4 squares, I took a bite.

Before going on my recent sugar free diet, I tried a few different snacks which I haven't yet got round to reviewing...this new Tesco Free From Fruit Loaf Cake being one of them. I've always been partial to fruit cake so I wondered how it might taste without out the gluten. Unfortunately it turned out to be a rather dry, bland cake filled with cheap sultanas and coated with hard crunchy sugar crystals. It just wasn't very appetising at all by itself, so I ended up slathering custard all over it to make it edible. This made it easier to eat, but it was still rather bland. Come on Tesco, you can do better than this! Gluten free folk need cakes that taste just as good as the real thing! Other companies have achieved it so there's really no excuses. This is a miss for me. RATING: 4 out if 10. Are you gluten free? Have you tried this new Free From Fruit Loaf? If so let me know your thoughts in the comments!

I originally reviewed Kingdom Chocolates a few years ago now, they brought out a range of bars proudly made in Britain (made by the same company as Montezumas) with flavours such as peanut butter and rhubarb, although I've not seen them in shops much since. I suspect the range may not have been a success and I can kind of see why...as nice as they are, they don't quite live upto what they promise. I was surprised to find this banana variety in a local independent discount store recently. I never knew such a flavour existed and it's quite a bold flavour to combine with chocolate. It's basically a milk chocolate bar with a banana flavoured softer milk chocolate center. The milk chocolate was very creamy, rich and good quality although nothing particularly distinctive. The banana flavour was pleasant, although it didn't really blend well with the milk chocolate and the whole thing became a bit sickly after a few bites. I wasn't too impressed really. I think it

Whilst in 99p Stores recently I spotted this unique sounding chocolate bar from Lindt...with it being Papaya I just had to give it a try, it's not every day you see such a flavour combined with chocolate! It was an imported bar so had a sticker on it with the English ingredients on. Unlike most Lindt chocolate bars it didn't contain any barley malt, which means it was safe for me to eat with my gluten sensitivity. It contained a milk cream filling with a layer of papaya "jam" on top, all coated in milk chocolate. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but it wasn't quite as exciting as my imagination told me. It tasted okay, the milk filling was nice and creamy, but the papaya layer was a bit overly sweet. Papaya isn't really a great flavour to pair with chocolate really, it lacks tartness to balance out the sweetness. Overall, I'm glad I tried something a bit different from Lindt but I can see why these are in 99p stores and not sold in most super

A few years back now, when Cadbury introduced a "Coffee Escape" chocolate to Roses I did a scathing review of them...I was shocked at how much the quality had deteriorated since I last ate Cadbury Roses. So it may come as a surprise to readers that I'm reviewing them yet again...to be honest, I only bothered buying them as they were on special offer and I needed a fix of cheap chocolate! I was also curious to see what the new addition of "Almond Caramel Bite" tasted like. I presumed it would be a bit rubbish...but actually it turned out to not be as bad as expected! The boxes have been redesigned again, with a slightly different shape and logo. I like them, they're eye catching, in fact the new shape means they look somewhat taller than boxes of Celebrations and Quality Street. They've also started using sealed packaging for the chocolates, before it was plastic twist wraps but they're now completely sealed. I have to say I think it's a g

As a little birthday treat recently, I decided to spoil myself and give these new desserts from Thorntons a try. Thorntons are the masters of toffee and fudge, so combine that with "real Devon clotted cream" and surely they're onto a winner?! The desserts cost £1.50 at Tesco and are described as "fudge mousse with a layer of toffee fudge dessert". Each pot contains 65g which is small, but they're so tasty and rich this is a good amount. Naturally though, I ate both in one sitting...call me piggy, but I can't imagine many people would eat just one pot! It was a little difficult to distinguish between the layers as both are the same color, but the fudge layer had a nice sticky texture and was full of rich butterscotch flavour, whilst the mousse was smoother and lighter but equally as tasty. These are very indulgent desserts indeed, and far nicer than the similar Pots of Joy from Cadbury. Overall, these are a win from Thorntons, I just wish I

Since it was my birthday recently, naturally I've been on the sugar again after an extended detox (don't ask!), so I finally decided to give this Dairy Free Coconut Cream dessert a try that's been winking at me from the frozen aisle of Marks & Spencer for quite some time. Coconut is the "in thing" right now, you'll find coconut oil flying off the shelves (almost literally) in Holland & Barrett, coconut milk drinks in most supermarkets, and even coconut water in your local Tesco Express. So coconut ice cream was only the next logical step really! This cost me a very reasonable £3 at M&S, and contains 30% coconut cream as well as coconut oil, sugar and maltodextrin. Like many of my snacks I ate it on the go, this time at the local park. Whilst I did get some jealous looks from the ducks and pigeons, they certainly weren't getting any! The ice cream, or rather "dessert" as M&S are calling it was frozen solid, more so than

Following on from my review of the Boots Gluten Free Salted Caramel slice, here we have their handcrafted Lemon & Coconut Slice. It's part of some new gluten free options Boots have quietly added to their range recently. It's described as a "soft chewy base topped with lemon curd and a sweet coconut layer", and contains maize and egg whites, so not suitable if you have an a egg or corn allergy. I have to say it tasted delicious, I much preferred it to the Salted Caramel Slice as the coconut and lemon flavours were spot on...creamy and coconutty yet tangy and zingy. I also loved how moist the slice was, despite containing coconut which can often make some cakes rather dry, this was deliciously moist and a delight to bite into. Overall, if you're celiac or gluten sensitive then this is a fantastic option! It tastes just like a regular cake, which is what most folks sensitive to gluten really want, so bravo to Boots for coming out wth these! RA