Lidl Christmas Treats Part 2

Part one of the Christmas treats I found on my adventures through Lidl (seriously Mr.1T tried to talk me into buying a kayak in there a while ago?) can be found here. 

Favorina Stollen with a Finest Marzipan Filling 

Christmas isn't Christmas for me until someone whips out the stollen. Not only do the dried fruits and marzipan make stollen taste Christmassy but they even look all snowy and pretty too! 
I had a very nice Kuchenmeister Stollen from Sainsburys a while ago, before the poor girl had even put them on the shelf to be truthful, and I hoped the Lidl version would be even nicer. 

They're only 200g so not very large but they're solid little things, naturally we ate half each - nobody wants stale, hard Stollen! Lidl had been a lidl (I couldn't help myself) deceptive and put it heavily sugared side up in the clear packet. There was still a decent amount but not as much as it first seemed. It felt a bit different to the Kuchenmeister stollen in that the Lidl was a lot firmer, with no give or squidge at all. 

I wasn't impressed when I cut it in half or when I took a bite. It tasted as dry as it looked. The very large raisins and 'candied fruitpeels' were lovely and moist with a sweet juicy flavour but the stollen itself was dry and bland. 

In the photo above, underneath the raisins there is a slightly darker patch. This was literally all the marzipan filling I had in my whole entire half. That small pocket was delicious; sweet moist marzipan with juicy raisins and a thick stollen texture. The rest was boring, plain and a chore to eat. Turns out Mr.1T had all of the a marzipan in his half! He couldn't choose between this and the one we tried from Sainsburys as his favourite whereas I have no doubts in my mind. 

5/10 my half 7/10 his. 

This is why I don't share! 

Favorina Gingerbread Hearts, Pretzels, Stars - Dark Chocolate 

I know, I've already bought and reviewed a Favorina gingerbread from Lidl but c'mon this is gingerbread with dark chocolate! 

I thought they'd all be bunged in the box like they were in the bag reviewed in part one, but they were all nicely sitting in a plastic tray. The reason for this, I'm assuming, is because they're beasts. To put it into perspective a bit, there are only 18 Gingerbread (compared to about 100 before) and the box weighs half a kilo. They're big. 

The texture threw us both immediately. I suppose where we'd had gingerbread biscuits before and the chocolate coating gave these a hard to the touch feel, we expected biscuits but these felt more like a cake. I think they had a nice gingerbread flavour but honestly, it was mild - all I could really pick out was the chocolate. That was dissapointing in itself. I'm unsure whether it was the chocolate or gingerbread but it was on the sweet side. The taste was 99% chocolate but it wasn't a dark tasting chocolate at all, much more along the lines of a milk. Which Lidl sell too. Either way, if it's the chocolate or the gingerbread providing the sweetness, I can only imagine the milk chocolate version being sickly sweet. I couldn't taste any cinnamon or gingerbread like flavours at all, no warmth or hint of spice sadly. 

Don't get me wrong, these were nice - if I'd wanted to eat a soft, chewy, sweet chocolate covered cake/biscuit hybrid. But I wanted rich, dark chocolate coated gingerbread biscuits and sorry Favorina hearts, pretzels and stars. That you ain't! 

6/10 

Lidl Christmas Treats Part One

Today's reviews are the first two products I picked up from Lidls Christmas range. As Lidl are a German company and lots of my favourite Christmas treats are traditionally German, they seem a little more authentic and a lot cheaper too! 

Favorina Gingerbread Assortment 

It's only been recently I've developed a real taste for Gingerbread and I couldn't resist this big assorted bag. 

There were a few different types in the bag but they all had a soft, chewy biscuit base with a delicious warm gingerbread flavour. The small ones with sprinkles had a lovely little sweet crunch added that played off against the spiced gingerbread nicely, the plainer ones with a chocolate drizzle on top had a solid, slightly dark thin chocolate bottom - the gingerbread was strongest but there was just enough to differentiate it from a plain biscuit. The coloured ones didn't have any difference in flavour, the sugary icing was good, very sweet but balanced against the chocolate bottom and biscuit centre made for a sweet, spiced, warm, rich delicious mouthful mash up! It sounds like there's a lot going on but they all really blend well together. 

These were amazing, so addictive and moreish and the bags gone already! I've read they tend to sell out quickly so I hope there's some left when I get a chance to get back into Lidl. 

8/10

Lidl Deluxe Butter Fudge with Christmas Spices  

I'm a sucker for fudge, I've tried the original Lidl Deluxe Butter Fudge and really enjoyed it so this was always going to end up in my basket. 

This is a spiced butter fudge with raisins, glacé cherries and brandy. The spices are ground cinnamon and nutmeg and suprisingly this was what I could smell - especially the cinnamon. 

The fudge was the same as in the plain version. Firm, crumbly, buttery, rich and creamy. This is authentic traditional fudge, if you're used to Lonka/Candy King style fudge - plastic feeling, hard and chewy (don't get me wrong I like Lonka fudge but it's definitely low end stuff), then don't expect anything resembling that at all. A very tasty fudge base but it was pushing my limits for sweetness. The spices are certainly very Christmassy tasting especially with the slight brandy flavour thrown in the mix. There were a few chewy raisins but not many and not enough to make a dent in the Christmas/butter fudge flavours. The glacé cherries were a different story altogether. My box was seriously lacking on both the raisin/cherry front, but in the whole box I had ONE glacé cherry. The one you can see in the photo. The one that wasn't even inside any fudge, just sitting on top. Thankfully the other flavours were good enough to make up for it but I was very dissapointed! 

Overall there was a very festive flavour to the fudge - it tasted like Christmas for sure - and the quality was good and extremely buttery but it ended up sickeningly sweet. If I'd stopped at one or two (and had cherries and raisins as promised) this would be a 7/10 but the pure amount of sugar (ingredients; sugar, butter, sweetened condensed milk, glucose syrup, partially inverted sugar syrup, raisins, brandy, glacé cherries, flavouring) was too much. I know fudge is just sugar, butter and milk but come on! 

6/10 

Sainsbury's Gingerbread Ice Cream

There's nothing particularly Christmassy on the packaging of this new Sainsbury's Gingerbread ice cream so it could possibly well be a new addition to their range rather than a seasonal. Still there are a few flavours associated with Christmas and gingerbread is up there with the best of them so if this is going to be a year round product, Sainsbury's couldn't have picked a better time to release it! 

Gingerbread flavour ice cream with a toffee sauce and gingerbread crumble 

The lid of the tub claims it to be "packed full of gingerbread biscuit crumble & a rich toffee sauce". I could see both before I'd even scratched the surface so so far, so good. 

If you don't like gingerbread you might as well stop right here. 

Wow. The ice cream has an amazing, extremely strong gingerbread flavour. It's a very warm, spiced flavour - incredibly moreish and absoloutly delicious! The gingerbread crumble is just that, don't expect any large chunks a la Ben & Jerry's they're diddy little bits but what they lack in size, they make up for in flavour and texture. They're very crunchy with an (if possible) even stronger gingerbread flavour. 

To tell you the truth, I only noticed the quality of the ice cream after the flavours - if you normally read my reviews, when it comes to ice cream, the quality is normally what I comment on first. I didn't expect top end, luxury ice cream and to be blunt it's not. But it's very good for a supermarket own brand, creamier and thicker than I expected. Perfectly acceptable. 

Besides the small amount on the very immeadiate top of the tub, I was yet to find any toffee sauce or strangely any dark chocolate. Dark chocolate? Well it's listed in the ingredients, but missing from the description and the whole of my pint, so who knows! 

I finally found some toffee swirl, a very small toffee swirl! Trying it alone was dissapointing. Compared to other brands swirls this has a very mild toffee flavour and somehow no real difference in texture from the ice cream. Strangely I noticed the swirl more against the ice cream. I thought it would be easily overpowered but while I couldn't really taste outright toffee there was a sweetness balancing out the spiced gingerbread. 

Bloody lovely, they should do something about the sauce though. Either get rid of it all together - the rest is more than good enough alone and it's a waste of toffee sauce or add more and make it stronger. It's a bit irrelevant at the moment. 

8/10 

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! 

The Collective Dairy - limited edition Gingerbread Live Gourmet Yoghurt

I don't know what it's like where you are, but down here in miserable London it's dark and freezing when I start work and dark and cold again by the time I finally sit down and start to think about dinner. With the change in weather, longer nights and shorter days, I'm embracing all the Autumn and Winter themed products that are being released wholeheartedly.. I can't wait for snow! 

The Collective live gourmet yoghurts are a favourite of mine, especially Coffee, Russian Fudge and the Banoffee flavours and I've reviewed a couple here. They are a little on the pricey side but I think they're the Ben & Jerry's or Haagen Dazs of the yoghurt aisle. 

Gingerbread is nice and straightforward a live yoghurt with a gingerbread syrup swirl. 

The foil seal is themed as always and the back has a little 'run, run as fast as you can - you can't catch me, I'm the gingerbread man!' ditty, alongside a little paragraph explaining that it's not made to hang around and there is "no Bull". This is also gluten free, suitable for vegetarians and made without artificial colours, flavours or preservatives. 

I don't buy gingerbread ever, I think I don't like it but then I get to my mums house, find the gingerbread house she's made and inhale the lot. So I went into this with an open mind - remembering that although it's not a particular favourite of mine, gingerbread is addictive! 

I couldn't explain to you what plain yoghurt smells like, but I could smell it after I peeled the foil away, the huge swirl had a delicious scent that reminded me of Christmas. 

The Collective yoghurt is great quality as always; thick, creamy and rich. It's thick enough that it feels like you're eating a Greek yoghurt just without any of the tang but not so thick that it ends up being a chore to eat it. I'd say easily the nicest commercial plain yoghurt I've eaten. 

The gingerbread syrup is amazing. It's very thick, rich and sweet with a gritty texture. It is gluten free but the Collective have included breadcrumbs made from rice and potato flour. This really makes it feel like you're eating crushed up gingerbread - some of the little pieces were big enough to get a proper chew on. The flavour is delicious, a warm, slightly spiced (hello again cinnamon!) proper gingerbread flavour. It's quite sweet but like with yesterday's review the sweetness is balanced out by the rich warmth and depth of the flavour. 

It mixes in with the plain yoghurt perfectly and I was impressed, as I always am with these tubs, that the gingerbread was consistent thoughout and I had barely any layers with just plain yoghurt. You could easily portion this out over a few servings and get an equal helping of both parts in each one. 

I really like this flavour, another good Autumn/Winter flavour and it tasted to me like Christmas, not long now.....

8/10