Fibre One Chocolate Fudge Brownie

Nobody wants to read the nitty gritty details about why fibre is important on a junk food blog. It is important though, especially as a protein heavy diet is the in thing at the moment, and so when I'm having a particularly crappy food day I like to add some fibre. Preferably through fruit and veg but I'm quite partial to a chocolate All Bran Breakfast biscuit too. 

The Fibre One bars don't have as much in as the breakfast biscuits but they manage to pack more than half the amount of fibre in nearly half the calories. 

I was shocked at how teeny they were! I should have realised as they are only 90 calories each but the box was 3/4 empty. They smelt and felt like an ordinary chocolate fudge brownie and although they were extremely small I cut it in two. I ate half straight from the wrapper and stuck the other half in the microwave for 10 seconds - I'd read online it improves the bar. 

The first, unzapped half was OK. It was quite soft with a slightly harder outer layer, it was edible but reminded me a little of when brownies get left out and go a bit stale. The flavour was good, chocolatey with quite a few big chocolate chips inside, the chocolate drizzle on top didn't add much except for a slightly crunchier texture. 

The microwaved half was much better. 10 seconds was just enough to soften the brownie up, the slightly firmer shell was gone and was a big improvement on previously. The chocolate drizzle and chocolate chips both melted and increased the already quite chocolatey flavour. 

All in all I was pleasantly surprised by the Fibre One chocolate fudge brownie bars. Eaten cold, straight from the box they wouldn't be a brownie I'd choose, although the flavour is good for a fibre/health conscious type bar. Microwaved they were quite tasty, I think I'll be zapping the rest of the box and chucking some vanilla ice cream on top! If you need to up your fibre intake I'd definitely give these a go, I'm a bit of a weirdo who actually just likes the flavour of All Bran Breakfast biscuits so they won't necessarily replace these but it's nice to know I have another (tasty) option when I need a bit more fibre! 

7/10 

Valor chocolates - Crocan chocolate con leche + American Brownie

This has to be the most reviews I've done in a week! I sent my husband shopping and he came home with 5 new chocolate bars, 3 new bags of chocolate, some white chocolate raisins, 7 Galaxy ripples, 2 pints of lemon sorbet, some Müller corners and a couple of sad looking ready meals. I think I'll send him food shopping more often!

Because he chose (and paid for) all this weeks treats I couldn't stop him from eating his fair share before I had a chance to review any, which is why half of this gigantic 200g bar of Valor Crocan chocolate con leche + American Brownie is missing in the picture above. 

We spent some time in Spain a few years ago and I can only remember a few phrases here and there, one (the most important when you're spending all day every day in Spanish waiting rooms) being "té/café con leche"- tea/coffee with milk. Being the genius I am I gather chocolate con leche is milk chocolate. 

This is supposed to contain 10% brownie pieces and 3% cereal but I think that's another underestimation, this is the back of my bar and not only did it seem there were more cereal bits than brownie but there seemed to be more than the chocolate too!

He bought this from B&M who are more well known for their bargains than good quality chocolate, the one near me tends to stock novelty chocolate and a few imports so I didn't have high hopes for this, expecting a combination of the two. As I said before this is a huge bar, double the size of most sharing bars and I was pleased to find that it was nice and thick, I hate it when companies make a bar look big by stretching it out and the chocolate ends up matchstick thin. The chocolate itself was surprisingly tasty, it has a minimum of 30% cocoa solids and although sugar comes before the cocoa butter, milk and cream powder in the ingredients it wasn't overly sugary but a nice mixture of creamy, milky and sweet. It went down nicely and for the price I'd buy another block of this size of just the plain chocolate quite happily. It's not high quality great stuff but it does the job. 

The texture is the winning factor for me here. The cereal pieces are very crispy and crunchy, they didn't have a flavour I could pick out but they're certainly noticable in the overall bar. The brownie pieces are huge. The photo I have doesn't do them justice, they are soft and chewy and have an actual brownie texture. Not only do they feel and chew like a real brownie but they were big enough to get whole chunks to eat alone and they tasted authentic too, the flavour was strong enough that it overpowered the chocolate for most of the bar. 

All in all I liked this, it does what it says on the packet - a milky, creamy chocolate bar with a lovely crunchy, chewy texture that actually tasted like I was eating a brownie. 

Rating 7/10 

Odds And Sods

I've tried a couple of bits over the last few months that didn't really warrant a whole post of their own so I've decided to lump them all together in one random post here.

E. Wedel Leśny Duet.

When I purchased this bar in Tesco I assumed it was the strawberry bar I had seen online - I really should learn to look properly before I buy things! It turns out this is a milk chocolate with blueberry and wild strawberry filling. According to the ingredients on the back the filling contains 0.6% blueberry juice and 0.3% wild strawberry pulp.

 The bar itself looks like the E. Wedel bars I've had before and I enjoyed the filling in those bars so I was looking forward to trying this one.

I was very surprised to find a sort of jelly inside, I was expecting more of a cream but I am glad it wasn't. The jelly is a great textural difference to most other filled bars and there is a generous amount inside each square. I wouldn't say one flavour overpowered the other but considering there is more blueberry than strawberry I could taste the strawberry a little more - maybe that's because it is pulp rather than juice.

I enjoyed this and from what I can see on the packet there are two more in this range - one looks like pear and grape (?!) and I can't work out what the other picture is for the life of me but I'll be keeping my eyes peeled!

Rating 7/10

Toffee Crisp Sharing Block

I'm very very late with the review for this bar, I actually ate it in September but I didn't bother with my review as I'm pretty sure everyone on my blog roll (>>> have a look!) has reviewed this as soon as it was out.

I liked this as a stand alone bar, it definitely tastes like Toffee Crisp but I do prefer the original, it's crunchier and I think these flavours work better in a nice thick block rather than a thin bar. That said if I'd tried this before I'd ever had an original Toffee Crisp the rating would easily be an 8 based on flavour.

Rating another 7/10

Heinz Tuscan Beanz

I didn't get a photo of these once they were plated up I got stuck right in! I had them for a while but I wasn't too sure what to serve them with, the Heinz website suggests poured over chicken or with pork chops but I didn't fancy that. Instead I had them with a cheap bit of frying steak (I would never ruin my good steak with beans!!).

I actually really enjoyed these, the sauce was still a tomato sauce but there were peppers mixed in too aswell as roasted garlic and basil. These felt like a more grown up tin of beans to me - they wouldn't go well on toast or even a jacket potato in my opinion. They're more of a side to a Mediterranean style dish, and go nicely with a "proper" dinner.

Rating 8/10

Double Chocolate Fudge Brownie Cookie Dough Bites

I hunted these down after trying the dark chocolate cookie dough bites and finally got them in a MR Simms Emporium shop, although Tesco have started restocking them now - typical!

Once open they really smell of fudge brownie. That part is spot on - they smell like Ben and Jerrys Chocolate Fudge Brownie without the ice cream if that makes sense. Sadly they don't really taste like they smell.

These are just as moreish as the Dark Chocolate version, and they are pretty tasty but they taste of chocolate bites. I can't even compare them to anything, imagine a ball of maybe chocolate button but with a bit of crunch inside? They're basically the same as the first version I tried but milk chocolate instead of dark and kind of missing the cookie dough - replaced instead with a nice smelling but non existent tasting fudge brownie filling. I've confused myself so I'm probably confusing anyone reading this but after the lovely smell the lack of taste in the filling was dissapointing. I would rename these solid chocolate crunchie bites.

Rating 6/10

The Collective Dairy Russian Fudge

I've tried this yogurt before, it's not new or a limited edition but it's too good not to make a post on it. This flavour is Russian fudge and according to The Collective Dairy this is a New Zealand sweet (otherwise known to us as Scottish Tablet? I just always assumed that was fudge).  It’s a live gourmet plan yogurt with fudge swirled throughout, though it's not really a swirl more like a giant splattering.

The keep fresh seal made me smile.

In this photo it looks quite watery, I probably should have given it a stir but I wanted to show how much fudge is dumped in this! The flavour is just pure fudge, just like real fudge not the cheap stuff you get in a pick and mix or the sweet shop. Good buttery creamy fudge. Mixed with the plain yogurt this is delicious.

And it's not just a layer at the top or bottom like other yogurts, this fudge is all the way through. I absolutely love it.

Rating 9/10

A special mention to the Banoffi flavour too, it's only available in 150g tubs and I'm afraid I ate that before I even thought of reviewing it.