Cadbury Flake

Product name: Cadbury Flake
Purchase details: £1.79 for a pack of six bars (Home Bargains)
Calories: 135 per bar
Country of origin: UK 

The Cadbury Flake may not be the most exciting of products but I needed some lower calorie chocolate in my stash, and I love the value for money multipacks offer, so here we are!

Like most people, I love the reliability of Cadbury chocolate, but the Flake is certainly not my favourite. It may well be the ‘crumbliest, flakiest milk chocolate’ but herein lies the problem – it gets everywhere and I often find bits melted on my clothes hours later! Fair play to Cadbury though, the song from the advert doesn’t half get stuck in your head.

These Flakes came in the well-known yellow packaging that stands out on shop shelves and also manages to incorporate the purple of Cadbury in the product’s name. On opening the multipack packaging, I was surprised that I could actually smell the chocolate before I’d unwrapped a single bar, and I wondered if this was due to the twisty-tied ends of the bars’ wrappers. However, these were still sealed so maybe the strength of the aroma really was that strong! This aroma was the specific one I associate with Cadbury chocolate, with a slight milkiness to it.

Unsurprisingly, crumbs had already come away from the chocolate before it had been opened, so getting a neat photograph wasn’t going to be an option. The intact bar, though, did look attractive with its ripply texture, and I thought it looked a bit like a chocolate log. Its visual texture looked a bit like a hardened, folded velvet, rather than being glossy, and cutting through the bar really didn’t improve its appearance in any way!

This really wasn’t a bar that’s best enjoyed by allowing it to melt since it provided quite a rough and rubbery texture. However, when chewing, the chocolate crumbled in the mouth and also provided bits of friction where the different layers rubbed against each other. I did have to cup my hand under my chin for the duration of the bar in order to catch any stray specks of chocolate and, whilst this was a slight annoyance, it was only to be expected from this product!

Despite only containing 25% cocoa solids, the chocolate initially tasted slightly more bitter than I’d expected, but this then became more milky and delivered the familiar Cadbury flavours.

As an overall experience, I found it hard not to associate the Flake with the good old 99 ice cream which, by the way, I’m appalled now costs over £1.00! However, it still provided a good experience on its own and, whilst its USP was its annoyingly crumbly texture, it was a great chocolate hit for so few calories. 

Appearance: 7/10 
Aroma: 7.5/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 7/10
Overall score: 7.13/10