Kev's Snack Reviews

Quality Street have recently expanded their range by branching out into Lindor territory...with truffles! But they've given their own unique spin on them and these have crunchy coatings to fit with some of their classic Quality Street Chocolates. There's Orange which is a bit like the Crunchy Orange chocolate, Salted Caramel which is apparently based on the toffees, and Praline which is of course based on the Green Triangle. Sounds a bit gimmicky but they actually do fit with the Quality Street chocolates rather well. Consisting of a smooth, almost gooey truffle centre, coated in chocolate and with various crunchy coatings. The Orange was a favourite - a smooth orange flavour centre with some crunchy orange bits on top. It tastes like the orange chocolate from quality street but the truffle adds an extra dimension to it, replacing boring crunchy inner chocolate with a smooth ganache. I think I liked this better to be honest. The crunchy bits still give you the crun...

You may have heard in the news recently that KitKat Chocolatory has been launched in the UK - it's a service where you can create your own KitKat bar with different chocolates and fillings, or choose ready made creations. The service is available in selected John Lewis stores as well as York's Chocolate Story, but will soon be more widely available to buy online too! I was very lucky to receive some samples recently from KitKat Chocolatory - thanks so much guys! There's some interesting flavours and varieties like Billionares Caramel, Gin and Tonic and more...but today lets start with the Springtime in Japan variety, which consists of 6 wafers coated in Ruby Chocolate, filled with an apple and cherry jam and cherry pieces. It's inspired by the beautiful springtime in Japan. Now I'm not a huge fan of Ruby Chocolate, I've had mixed experiences of tasting it thus far so wasn't the most excited about this, however I have to admit it looks very pretty inde...

Recently, folks got rather excited when two new Munchies varieties were announced by Nestle: the first being today's review; Munchies Chocolate Fudge Brownie, and the other being Cookie Dough. They're possibly the first new products from Nestle in a long, long time (maybe since the Munchies Bar in the 90's?) so this was indeed quite exciting news! The Chocolate Fudge Brownie variety had me rolling my eyes initially, because it sounded like it would just be chocolate flavoured caramel. However it turned out to be quite different - they've removed the caramel and replaced it with a chocolate fudge mixture! And in my opinion this is actually a good thing as it makes these a bit different. The Munchies look like the regular ones, but cutting them open reveals the fudgey chocolate filling with the classic biscuit centre in the middle.  I have to admit it does look a bit wrong without the caramel - that's what makes a Munchie a Munchie, after all! It...

It's been a few years now since Nestle added a new variety to their Quality Street boxes, which was Honeycomb Crunch - do check out my review of it from 2016. They're at it again however and this time have even admitted it's a ploy to get folks attention - they've removed the Toffee Deluxe from boxes and replaced it with a "Chocolate Caramel Brownie". Does it contain brownie? Of course not, and maybe that's all part of the controversy plan...it's simply a chocolate flavoured caramel. Now don't get me wrong, it tastes very good! Chocolate flavour caramel is always a nice variation of regular caramel, giving it an extra oomph of cocoa flavour, and somewhat toning down the sweetness of the caramel. But it ain't no brownie - a brownie is a fudgey cake! Since when did it become shorthand for companies to do an "extra chocolatey" version of whatever? The rest of the chocolates are all as you'd expect, full of sweet, cheap fa...

Nestle recently sent me some of the new Smarties Limited Edition, or rather "Llama Edition" to review (I know, jammy so and so etc), and I have to say I am very pleased that Llamas are now becoming the new Unicorns, at least with Nestle anyway. The unicorns have had their day and need to be put out to pasture thanks very much! Of course, with them being Llama themed they get their own colours...which are apparently pink, red, yellow and purple. I don't know who came up with the colour scheme but I guess it works. As well as that there's 4 different bag designs with different puns on, which is...fun. Things like "No Probllama" and so on. The Smarties taste like any Smarties, sweet and delicious of course. It's a shame there's no orange ones in there and also that there isn't any new flavours, though I understand there's some difficulty producing flavoured ones due to costs and manufacturing processes etc. All in all, these are ...

As I wrote about in my review of Randoms Squish’ems , the Rowntree's sweets range has had a bit of a switchup, with the Randoms Foamies variety from the original bags now getting their very own selection. Hurrah! Nestle kindly sent me some to review recently and I was super excited to receive them - they're currently available from Tesco, while the Squish’ems are available from Poundland.  The sweets come in a variety of "on trend" shapes, which I have to say look really quite cool, and they get bonus points because they didn't even include a unicorn. Hurrah! Instead they've gone for... A mermaid! There's also a gnome, watermelons, and of course a rainbow: Plus...a pug?  And of course the symbols of modern life, hashtags and @'s... All of the sweets have pink and orange and white and orange colours, and I have to say...I think these are the best Randoms bag yet! I've always loved foam sweets since being a ki...

This week, Nestle launched another new product to the confectionery world under the Aero brand. It's something I had always thought they should do - a fancier version of Aero - and comes in a similar style box to Nestle Kitkat Senses. There's three varieties in the range; Milk Chocolate, Mixed and Salted Caramel selections. Nestle kindly sent me all three to review, and I'm supposed to hashtag them with #blissmoment...but do they deliver said moments of bliss? Well, I ate the whole pack in one go so that's probably a good sign! And I'm not alone in that which makes me feel a little less guilty. The pack opens in rather a cool way (you may have seen my mini video on Instagram ) and kind of becomes a cardboard bowl...but in reality, let's be honest you're gonna eat the lot! The chocolates are described as "Velvety whipped bubbles wrapped in delicious milk chocolate" and "smooth milk chocolate filled with a salted caramel aerated whipped ...

Nestle recently announced that their Rowntree's range would be getting a refresh; they've stopped making Tooty Frooties (say what?!) and added some new varieties to the Randoms range. One of them is Foamies and the other is today’s review: Squish'ems, which are available currently from Poundland. (side note: who remembers Randoms Tandems , Squidgy Speak and Rip'ems ? Check out my reviews of those!) These are a mix of squishy jellies in various fruity flavours and shapes to make them "random": Most of these are easy to tell but some are a little mysterious - I'm not sure what the square "tombstone" shape one is supposed to be...any guesses, leave a comment! According to the pack there's so many combinations that you'll never get the same bag twice. The sweets are so sticky that they almost bonded to the plate, haha! So they definitely deliver on the promised "squishy" front, and they have that kind of texture too...

Last week the foodie community got rather excited over the announcement of these new Milkybar Mix Ups chocolates, and understandably so since they’re a rare "new" product from the Milkybar brand. They have done Milkybar Milkshake Mix Up Buttons before of course which were a somewhat similar idea, but the execution of these is much better. They're a mix of white chocolate pieces with a creamy cocoa filling, and milk chocolate pieces with a milky filling. They will be available in all major supermarkets later this week, but I was lucky because Milkybar UK contacted me on Instagram and offered me samples to review. How could I say no?! I tipped a bag out and arranged it in various ways, which proved to be quite fun. I also had a go at channeling Eat Explore Etc and tried balancing some of the chocolates on top of each other. Which is difficult when you're me - I'm usually too impatient and want to eat the food, haha! But I somehow managed to make small s...

After hearing about this new Ruby Chocolate with Raspberries from the Nestle L'Atelier range it was one I just had to hunt down. I enjoyed the Prestat Ruby bar from last year and was hoping this might be just as good. In addition to Ruby Chocolate it also contains raspberries to take the fruitiness up an extra notch! These are currently only available from select Sainsbury's stores, luckily for me one of those was nearby. This isn't cheap at £3.50 but I was hoping it would be worth it. Although I was told that it's going to be on a half price offer this week - so keep an eye out in your local stores! (and do check with them via Instagram if your local stores stock it) Described as "couverture chocolate with freeze dried raspberry pieces" it contains 48% cocoa solids, and comes in a 100g slab. There's sections that can be broken off as shown above. The bar is quite thin, but the raspberry pieces are still clearly visible within the chocolate. ...

Today's review is a quick one as there's not a lot to say about this new Smarties Scaries Halloween Edition. It seems Nestle are doing a lot of limited edition Smarties now, following from the success of the Unicorn Edition and Orange Limited Edition ...I'm guessing a Christmas version will be next! I received these from @gbgifts , a new company selling snacks boxes with a variety of fantastic treats, from old classics to new limited editions. To a Skittles gift box please check out my Instagram page - we are doing a joint competition this week! These Smarties are simply described as "Milk chocolate in a crisp sugar shell" and are basically brown-coloured milk chocolate Smarties and orange-coloured orange flavour milk chocolate Smarties. Which is pretty good because Orange Smarties are always a bit more special than regular ones (if you like orangey chocolate of course!). There's not much to say about them other than they taste as sugary and swee...

It's that time of year again...September, the classic month to get in the festive mood prematurely! Yep, lots of Christmas themed snacks and gifts are now appearing in shops (plus a few Halloween things), and amongst all the niknaks this year is a new Matchmakers flavour! Initially I thought this might be replacing the Salted Caramel Matchmakers from last year, but it appears not because that's also available alongside this in Tesco Express, currently for a mere 75p. At that price I couldn't say no to a pack! Described as "Gingerbread flavour chocolates with skimmed milk chocolate, dark chocolate and boiled sugar pieces" these weigh 120g. Opening the box I was immediately hit with a sugary, slightly artificial but definitely gingery aroma. It was very strong indeed...I wasn't sure if I liked it to be honest! I did what had to be done: dug out my fancy festive star-shaped snacks dish and arranged the Matchmakers on it. It's surprisingly perfect fo...