Cadbury Apricot Crumble Crunch

Last Cadbury and chocolate I consume in England!

Okay, this was a bit of a throwback to the Fruit & Nut except instead of nut, there are crushed granola clusters and instead of raisins there are chopped pieces of dried apricot. Not a whole lot of chocolate, thus it isn't as stiff of a bar. Taste-wise, not too sweet. Kinda fancied it a bit, I must admit. I'd rank this pretty high in the Cadbury competition. But I would've liked more chocolate content.

Cadbury Double Decker and Cadbury Tasters

Mmmm... paying visits to the vending machines between classes...

Cadbury Double Decker:
Incredibly chewy nougatine upper deck and a crispy cereal lower deck. Very filling. I wasn't a fan of the chewy upper deck -- twas waaay too chewy, with an Airheads-esque consistency. Biting off a piece produced a sensation very similar to a rubber band snapping in your mouth -- mildly frightening. Also, the whole bar was borderline too sweet.

Cadbury Tasters:

They look like Whoppers, but they're really just Cadbury milk chocolate in spherical form. Indeed, each ball is only meant to give you a taste of the brand. The balls were quite hard though and not recommended for the weak of teeth.

Cadbury Creme Egg McFlurry

Before I went on break, I tried a limited edition Cadbury Creme Egg McFlurry due to a tip I got from a loyal reader. (Yes, we have loyal readers! Plural!). Aside from trying as many chocolates as possible, usually the commercial stuff (Ivy "specializes" in the high class chocolaterie-type chocolates), I've also been trying to get every limited edition McFlurry.

I've never had a Cadbury Creme Egg before, so I don't know how "faithful" this McFlurry was to the candy. However, you can see that it looks like what I imagine a cracked and crumbled Cadbury Creme Egg sprinkled over McDonald's soft-serve ice cream. Here's a little secret I'll let you in on (but you could probably figure it out): this McFlurry was made by sprinkling pre-crumbled chocolate pieces and squirting caramel (or whatever the "yolk" is made out of) in a seemingly irregular fashion -- in other words, no Cadbury Creme Egg was actually used! This isn't supposed to be surprising, but I felt like sharing anyway.

Back to the taste. It was a little melty since I waited until I got back to my room to consume this (after, of course, taking multiple pictures of it). But it was the typical run-of-the-mill McFlurry. It probably didn't taste much like a Cadbury Creme Egg mixed with ice cream; at least, this was the case with the Yorkie McFlurry I had ages ago (tasted NOTHING like a Yorkie!). But I digress. The chocolate flakes were quite flaky, and a little powder-y? As for the "yolk," it tasted like caramel (is that correct for the yolk?). In the typical McFlurry fashion, the chocolate flakes and the yolk were weaved throughout the ice cream, but there wasn't a lot of either, so the McFlurry tasted like someone took a sundae with toppings added on and just stirred it with a spoon for a bit, as opposed to, say, chocolate and caramel ice cream.

Overall, good dessert for £1.19. It certainly is what you pay for.

Cadbury Picnic

I bought a 4 pack of these for £1 when I was in Sheffield earlier this month. They look like turds, especially so since I got the full size bars (texture AND size resembled a turd!). However, they make up for their appearance in their taste.

It's got a bit of everything that might be good for you: peanuts, raisins, and cereal. Thus, eating a Picnic is like eating a Quaker Chewy bar, except covered in milk chocolate (and OK, there's some caramel inside to reaffirm its classification as candy and not health bar). Due to the caramel, the bar is quite chewy and moist, and not as crunchy as a granola bar. The raisins are well integrated in the bar -- I can taste them and their squishiness exploding in my mouth, but when I look at the cross section of the bar, I can't find them! Then again, it is quite a mess of cereal+caramel+peanut+raisin deliciousness.

Since it's got real carbohydrates, this bar is quite substantial and can fill you up while giving you a sugar crash. Also, it's quite easy to fool yourself that you're eating healthy because of the cereal+peanut+raisins. Mmm... healthy chocolate... mmm I've been deceived...mmm I think I'll doze off right now...

Cadbury Roses, pt. ii

the rest of the lot:

Brazilian Darkness: i was disappointed by this. i thought it was going to be super-exotic dark chocolate, but again with the great expectations thing - i know i shouldn't but i persist anyway, with my overly-romanticized notions of what chocolate should be (poor pip). there's barely any dark chocolate here. the candy is essentially like the rock solid caramel i previously reviewed, except covered with a pathetically thin sheen of dark chocolate, and there are tiny minced bits of hazelnut embedded in the caramel. wasn't feeling this at all.

Cadbury Dairy Milk: a nice, tried-andtrue classic. perhaps one of the least outright unsavoury chocolates in the box. what can i say? i love the added creaminess.

Caramel Velvet: not bad for crappy chocolate - i guess this is what i had in mind in terms of "caramel" (unlike the one i reviewed last time, this caramel was soft to the point of being almost liquid), and it was accompanied by a nice satisfactorily velvety chocolate filling. pretty sweet.

Hazel in Caramel: pretty straightforward: a hazelnut ensconced in caramel wrapped in a milk chocolate thing. too sweet, but i like hazelnuts.

Golden Barrel: the same kind of liquid-y caramel as in the caramel velvet in milk chocolate. extremely sweet, but i much prefer the consistency of the caramel.

Hazel Whirl: really, not as exciting as it sounds; there's nothing particularly whirly about it except for the little design on the chocolate. essentially, overly sweet milk chocolate with a lovely whole hazelnut in the middle. there were only, like, 3 of these in the entire box, which was incredibly disappointing (and there were 6 of the yucky fruit creme ones. thanks for trying to rip me off, cadbury. are whole nuts really that expensive to deal with?)

do i sound unsatisfied?

the speed with which i finished the 400g of chocolate my belies my answer - which is to say, cadbury, you can SHOVE IT.

Cadbury Roses, part i

Pretty pricey - seems like the equivalent of the Thorntons box, except this was slightly cheaper (3.55 pounds) and has a lot more variety (which is why i'm going to break this up into parts...):

Strawberry Dream (pink wrapper): so, pretty conventional, strawberries and chocolate. alright, hold on (i'm eating as i type)... it's really more like... strawberries in some wicked syrup-y sweet syrup form (blech) + milk chocolate. not awful because at least the filling tastes like strawberries, but jesus, you think it could be less disturbingly sweet. a resounding no you didn't. moving on.

Tangy Orange Creme (orange wrapper): again, nothing extraordinary or interesting in terms of flavours: this time, orange + chocolate. this was far less sweet than the strawberry filling and had a nice tanginess to it, but it still tasted a bit synthetic. in terms of chocolate/orange combos, i'd rank it last (so far) behind Thorntons and Hotel Chocolat's orange-chocolate crispy things.

Caramel (blue wrapper): i'm going to stop expecting extraordinary - this is cadbury after all... anyhow, thin layer of milk chocolate over a solid-as-a-rock chunk of caramel, though if you're patient and wait for it to melt in your mouth, the caramel is not too sweet and has that nice warm, buttery flavour.

Country Fudge (skinny golden wrapper): i'm not quite sure what country fudge is supposed to taste like. the fudge seems a tad dry, but i'm not particularly good at judging since my predilections in the realm of fudge run towards the hot, melted-on-top-of-ice-cream variety (oh sorry, i think i may just have drooled). i suppose the fudge at least brings an interesting texture to the mix: sort of like how i would expect dense bread to feel, except this dense bread is made entirely of sugar and a bit of cocoa. a tad too sugary for my tastebuds, but not awful.

Cadbury Double Chocolate Fingers

To make Ivy feel better, I shall update! :)

So the last 2 days, I ate a box of Cadbury Double Chocolate Fingers. This is the last of the three £1 Cadbury bars/boxes that I bought from Sainsbury's two weeks ago (I've been exercising self-restraint).

I opened the box on Monday and was appalled.


DUDE! This is the love I get for £1?! Seriously, Cadbury, you dropped the ball on this one.

Ok, maybe they taste ridiculously good...

I tried my first finger. Firstly, I was not expecting a chocolate-covered biscuit (why yes, I am illiterate and I did not read the small print on the back suggesting me to "enjoy these chocolate-covered biscuits with tea"). Instead, I was expecting a solid chocolate finger. Secondly,... chocolate-covered biscuit?! The biscuit itself resembles a vanilla wafer in terms of texture and lightness. However it is chocolate-flavored. And of course, it is dipped in the classic Cadbury milk chocolate with which I have familiarized on too familiar terms. I feel like I've had these so-called Cadbury Double Chocolate Fingers before in the States but I couldn't put my finger on it. Food déjà vu (déjà mangé?), seriously.* Arghh. Perhaps some variety of cereal.

Since I received such a paltry quantity, I finished the box in 2 days (only because I controlled myself). Tasty, don't get me wrong. But dude, I did not come to Britain for this.

*Oh yea, Ivy told me that these are sold in the US. I guess I wasted £1, although I am 99% sure I never purchased these before. It was a somewhat new experience for me, but folks, please accept my apologies for misfiring, if you knew all along.

Cadbury Dairy Milk Fruit & Nut

I had been consuming this bar for the past week (and marathon-ing it in the last 2 days because I just couldn't control myself anymore!). Here's why:

• Almonds! Solid choice of nut, if you ask me. Definitely made things crunchy. Another plus: the almonds were whole.
• Dried fruits! If you're not a fan of raisins or the like, I advise you steer clear of this bar. However, since I love raisins (you have no idea), I was in heaven.
• The trademark Cadbury milk chocolate

I loved it a lot, more than the Turkish Delight bar. The Turkish Delight bar was too strange for me. This Fruit & Nut bar was nice and familiar -- Cadbury did a great job mixing chocolate, dried fruits, and almonds together without being boring about it. However, I do have one gripe -- more almonds, please! Sometimes I'd eat 1/6 of the bar without tasting an almond. Perhaps this is how I finished the bar so quickly...

In short, this has been my favorite Cadbury bar this far (out of 2, I know). I loved it so much that it might be in the running for "Chocolate I will buy again once I've tried it all," but for now, I must continue the chocolate study.

Looking Ahead (Chocolates currently in possession): Cadbury Double Chocolate Fingers, Aero Mint, Aero Chocolate