Galaxy Duet - Toffee & Popcorn

There's a new chocolate bar on the block! Galaxy have added Toffee & Popcorn to its Duet line. You won't find many Galaxy chocolate reviews on my blog, I was, until recent years, a Cadbury girl but Cadbury are sadly pants now and I'm a sucker for new and 'strange' flavours. 

The bar itself looked the same, same shape as the other Duet bars and the same distinctive sheen of Galaxy chocolate. Things didn't start off well as it smelt sickeningly sweet - even by my standards - paired with a not too pleasant toffee scent. 

The toffee is actually a toffee flavoured caramel filling, so no lovely chewiness but that thick gooey caramel isn't a bad consolation! The bars are on the narrow side anyway, sectioned in to two separate fingers make things even smaller but they'd managed to pack a fair amount of each in. 

As with the previous two bars I tried each finger individually before eating it how it's intended.

The 'toffee' side which smelt a lot like toffee but looked a lot like caramel thankfully was bang in the middle of both. A lovely toffee flavour that was nowhere near as sickeningly sweet as it smelt with the thick luxury feel of a caramel. Pleasingly the toffee is still strong enough to distinguish from caramel though - it doesn't taste like the other Galaxy caramel flavours at least! 

The popcorn side wasn't quite as good. I enjoyed the crunchy texture as I knew I would but there was nothing really 'popcorn' about it - it could well have been crisped rice or bland nuts for all I could tell, I didn't notice any popcorn flavour at the time anyway. Some pieces did have a softer chewier bite like proper popcorn but the majority were crunchy.

I wish I could say that both flavours eaten together improved, any slight popcorn flavour that might have been there was overwhelmed by the strong toffee until half way through I realised I wasn't getting much popcorn at all... 

... Thanks for that Galaxy! It did return eventually but to tell you the truth the gooey sticky caramel and the thick smooth chocolate really diluted what crunch there was. 

Apparently there are toffee pieces included somewhere in the bar, which side I couldn't tell you! I didn't notice any toffee flavour in the popcorn side and there were no harder pieces inside the caramel so who knows where mine got to, maybe it was hiding wherever my section of popcorn went! 

Rating:

It's O.K. The toffee flavour was nice but I think the popcorn side would benefit from being in a larger bar to squeeze in some bigger pieces. I said I didn't taste the popcorn alone and that didn't change throughout but I am left with a slight saltiness in my mouth afterwards, a bit more of that and they could well be on to a winner! 

7/10 

Butterkist Limited Edition Gingerbread Popcorn

I thought I didn't like gingerbread but I've changed my mind, my new love of gingerbread, cinnamon, spice and all things nice couldn't have come at a better time - just as every company are releasing their Halloween and Christmas products! 

Butterkist have a good track record as of late, I loved the Pulled Pork Popcorn and convinced Mr.1T to try it - he's five bags in and has another two in the cupboard! So a combination of Butterkist popcorn and gingerbread was one I couldn't turn down. 

This is popcorn coated with a cinnamon & ginger flavour toffee. 

This smelt like run of the mill sweet popcorn, I expected a stronger gingerbread or cinnamon scent as they're both quite powerful flavours but never mind. 

As you can see in the photo there wasn't really an even coating, the toffee is the sticky glaze on the popcorn and I had quite a few plain pieces. Unfortunately these were the kernels I tried first and they tasted how they smelt, just a plain sweet popcorn. I'd learnt from the Pulled Pork flavour that these aren't to be eaten in a dignified manner - the flavour is strongest with a good, full handful but my next again had pretty much no flavouring, there was a small trace of cinnamon that hinted at the good stuff to come but nothing too major. 

None of this sounds great but once I ate through the plain stragglers (these would have been at the bottom of the bag but I'd dumped it out into my popcorn holder) the rest of the bag was delicious. 

The unflavoured pieces might as well have been a completely different bag to the kernels with the glaze on, the gingerbread flavour is immense. Texture aside, I could well have been eating actual gingerbread. It's nice and strong, quite sweet, has a slight toffee flavour and a little warm kick from the cinnamon. Lovely!

The pieces that aren't gingerbread flavoured are still good - they're sweet with a slight toffee flavour and are perfectly tasty but the gingerbread kernels are amazing. 

I really want to give this a 9/10, it was so addictive and the whole bag didn't last me long at all, I'd just have liked all of the pieces to taste like that - if I wanted toffee or sweet popcorn I'd have bought a bag of that. I think I'll give Butterkist the benefit of the doubt on the plainer ones, the Gingerbread is good and I wish I hadn't eaten them all last night now! 

Butterkist Discoveries Hickory BBQ Pulled Pork Popcorn

I've been trying to find some snacks that aren't chocolate, sweets or ice cream and these Butterkist Discoveries Hickory BBQ Pulled Pork flavour popcorn sounded so disgusting I had to try them. 

I like popcorn, I like BBQ sauce, I like pulled pork but I didn't like the idea of the three together. 

They did give me an excuse to use my popcorn holder that I bought last Valentine's Day and forgot about though... 

The popcorn is made with nice and healthy wholegrain but I think the BBQ and pork flavourings and the smoke seasoning may counter that! They're also suitable for vegetarians so if you're a meat craving veggie you can get stuck right in. 

They smelt sweet and not very porky or BBQ-like. It was a mixed bag at the start, I was eating one at a time and each kernel seemed to be differently flavoured and seasoned. There were kernels that were purely Hickory BBQ flavoured that seemed to have a dried syrup like coating that did have a BBQ flavour that was strangely sweet but still savoury. Some parts had a smokey, salty flavour, others were plain and a small amount had a pork like flavour - not necessarily pulled pork, not a bacon (the most used pork flavouring) but porky enough that I noticed it. The pork was actually the tastiest of the four individual flavours I came across and it reminded me of crisp flavourings. 

Nobody eats popcorn by the single kernel though so I started shovelling handfuls in and this was were I started to enjoy it, all together it ended up with a tangy, smoky, salty, savoury taste that had a sweet BBQ flavour to it. As I didn't seem to have many pork flavoured pieces in my bag I didn't really notice it against the stronger BBQ flavour but it didn't matter so much, it was very addictive as it was and I ate the bag in no time - completely surprising myself. I really didn't expect to like this! 

Blind taste testing my inconsistently flavoured bag, I'd have called this as a sweet BBQ flavour, the pork got a little lost but other bags may well have stronger pork flavours. 

I didn't think I'd say this but I'll buy it again! 

Rating 7/10 

The Licktators Jiggy Pop

It's been a while since I've reviewed an ice cream and I think I chose a good one for today's post. 

This is The Licktators Jiggy Pop - 'our titillating, twerky take on Toffee Popcorn. Laced with popcorn, rippled with toffee sauce & studded with crunchy caramel pieces'. The Licktators blurbs are always a bit confusing but to clear things up the ice cream is actually toffee popcorn flavoured aswell as having popcorn pieces and the toffee sauce and caramel. 

The familiar popcorn scent was apparent as soon as I'd peeled the inside seal away and I couldn't wait to get stuck in. Judging by how it looked initially I thought I'd get a spoonful of just the ice cream first but looks are decieving and the whole top layer was littered with popcorn bits and caramel. 

The darker parts are the caramel and the yellower pieces are popcorn. Although the pieces are smaller than you would find in a Ben & Jerrys for example, the sizes are made up for in number. The popcorn is extremely chewy and somehow retains a proper popcorn consistency despite being drenched in creamy ice cream. The popcorn flavour was dominant at first, in both the pieces and the ice cream. I could tell it was Toffee Popcorn but at times the toffee in the ice cream was a little overwhelmed. They've absolutely nailed the popcorn flavour though. 

The caramel was delicious too, the pieces were very hard and crunchy but soon gave way to a smooth , sweet melt in the mouth. Getting a spoonful with all three on was beautiful, the thick creamy ice cream mixed with the chewiness of the popcorn and the crisp caramel was texture heaven for me! 

I had noticed at this point a lack of toffee sauce but this was only because I was looking for it as I knew I'd be reviewing it. To be honest until I got to it, the rest of the ice cream wasn't lacking anything at all. It turns out my sauce swirl was towards the bottom half of the tub and although there wasn't too much of it, I think it might be intentional. It has a lovely toffee flavour which is quite strong but also pretty rich, anymore than there was and I could see it overpowering the toffee popcorn ice cream. It wasn't too thick but beautifully gooey and runny - the kind that stretches from the tub to the end of your spoon as you pull it away. 

The best of the Licktators range I've tried and one I'll buy again for sure. 

Rating 8/10 

Maryland Mix'ems - toffee popcorn, caramel & candy shells

Today's review is of the awfully familiar looking Maryland Mix'ems, there are two different versions one being a double chocolate chip cookie with raspberry jellies and candy shells and the packet I've got which are chocolate chip cookies with toffee popcorn pieces, caramel and candy shells. 

These have been about for a while, and to be blunt I avoided them as they seemed a bit of a Chips Ahoy copy but we ran out of biscuits and these were on special offer in Morrisons (£1 at the moment) and so I found myself trying one Friday night. 

They're fairly large cookies with nine in a pack and even though they're chock full of other flavours the distinctive Maryland cookie scent is all I could smell opening them up. 

The biscuit itself feels quite hard to touch but it gives an easy chew and is actually quite soft. It's sweet and buttery as normal Maryland cookies are - not an 'artisan', pretentious cookie but a nice enough, tasty choice for your biscuit tin! 

The first flavour that I noticed was the caramel, it's not a flavoured biscuit base there are actual pieces of caramel dotted about. The cookies aren't uniform in additions at all, some have far more popcorn others candy etc, and this particular cookie didn't seem to have many caramel pieces but the ones it did have had a strong flavour that managed to be dominant without drowning out the others. 

The chocolate chips are massive, and tasted to me the same as the ones used in the original cookie - just larger and as always chocolate and caramel are a delicious combination. The crunchy candy pieces are sugar coated chocolate shells - so basically smarties and don't add too much flavour wise alongside the big chocolate chips but do give a lovely crunch when combined with the soft(ish) cookie, chewy caramel and popcorn pieces. 

I can't say I noticed the popcorn pieces being toffee flavoured too much, caramel and toffe are quite similar, so while they do go together well and taste good, maybe they could have used a completely different popcorn flavour if they really wanted to go the crazy/strange mix route. The pieces of popcorn were very chewy and quite strange added in, it wasn't necessarily bad just different. I was picking pieces out of my teeth for a while after though! 

I think I judged these too harshly based on the comparisons to Chips Ahoy, alone they are a perfectly nice, tasty, fairly priced cookie. So for the rating I'll pretend the two Chips Ahoy I reviewed a while ago don't exist and rate it 

7/10 

But I would like to see completely different ingredients than the ones Chips Ahoy are using too. 

Various Christmas, forgotten and a new(ish) treats

I really let blogging slack over the Christmas period, I had lots of lovely chocolates thanks to family members travelling well this year but sadly none made it to Boxing Day! Here are a few bits I've eaten and remembered to photograph! 

Lidl J D Gross Dark mousse au chocolat bars

   

I picked these up a while ago under the mistaken idea that it was one big bar of dark chocolate and I wasn't too impressed when I opened it up and found 15 tiny ones! However the makers  clearly know what they're doing as this would be far too much in an ordinary or sharing sized block. 

The bars are pretty long, narrow but still quite deep and have a nice thick shell of dark chocolate. Inside however is the good stuff, a lovely whipped chocolate mousse which goes perfectly with the outside casing. 

These really are delicious little bites, they are extremely rich though which is why the size is perfect. They were just right with my afternoon coffee, the richness gives a lovely chocolate hit without wanting more and I can keep telling myself they're so little I don't have to feel bad about eating them all! 

Rating 8/10

Chips Ahoy Popcorn Candy Chip 

I've previously reviewed the other cookie in the 2 we in the UK are provided by Chips Ahoy and really enjoyed it, about time I got round to this one. 

I wasn't really too excited to try this cookie, it seems a bit strange - a chocolate chip cookie with smartie like pieces and popcorn in it? But I bought them anyway in the name of blogging (yeah OK!) and 'forced' myself to have one. 

They are pretty much identical in size and shape to the other cookie, albeit with more bits sticking out, quite small in diameter but nice and thick and I did notice my cookie seemed to be lacking in the pieces department! 

Then I turned it upside down.. 

The cookie itself is good - as usual, the chocolate chips are good, the crunchy candy pieces are fine as is the popcorn and they make for an interesting mouth feel. But I really can't say I'm too impressed by these, don't get me wrong I didn't dislike them it's just maybe a bit too much in one cookie for me, I prefer the stronger flavours in the other version. I'll eat these again because they really aren't bad but I won't moan if my fiancée manages to eat all of them. Again. 

Rating 6/10 

Toffee Penguin 

I'm not sure how new these toffee penguins are but I certainly haven't tried them and toffee is a favourite of mine so I grabbed these as soon as I saw them. 

There's probably not much point in describing the basic penguin bar, I'm sure everyone's tried one - and both the packaging and the actual bar look like your basic penguin bar, although the wrapper is orange (a colour I normally associate with toffee for some reason). 

The outer chocolate is the same, a pretty tasty thick chocolate shell, the texture is the same as well but the creamy filling inside is where all the flavour is. As promised its definitely toffee - and a good toffee at that. To me this is actually nicer than a standard penguin and asking as its on sale I'll be buying! For such a simple change it makes a big difference, good stuff! 

Rating 8/10 

Hershey's Cookies 'n' Creme Holiday Bar 

I've tried the Hershey's cookie and Creme bar before but looking back I can't seem to find my review! I don't mind it to be honest, I find it the only enjoyable bar Hershey sell the rest seem a bit off to be honest! 

I only bought this because the front promised that the same creepy picture that is printed on the wrapper would be printed on the bar but as you can see it didn't really turn out that way! 

I forgot to photo the back of the chocolate and you can't really see from the front just how many chocolate chips are in this. The 99g bar was actually nicer to me as it is a much thicker bar than the single serving version, which is longer and thinner. The extra thickness added a nice crunch and chew and I did enjoy this. That said I bought this in the reduced section, I wouldn't pay the extortionate import prices for this, there are much nicer home grown cookie filled or flavoured bars available. 

Rating 6/10