Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream: Satisfy my bowl

Product name: Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream: Satisfy my bowl
Purchase details: £2.24 for a 500ml tub (tesco.com)
Calories: 255 per 100ml serving

I seriously don’t know how I survived for so many years without having tried the delights of Unilever’s Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream. This Fairtrade Satisfy my bowl tub was a special edition to mark the 30^th anniversary of Bob Marley’s Legend album, and also supported the 1Love Foundation which funds a youth-empowerment programme in Jamaica.

I was really interested in this ice cream since it was banana flavoured (it contained 4% banana puree) but also had cookie (6%) and caramel (9%) swirls and ‘chocolatey peace signs’ (4%). To fit in with the Caribbean theme, the usual green field of the branding was replaced with a sandy beach and a cow playing a guitar. However, the pale blue sky meant the packaging was still recognisably Ben & Jerry’s.

For this variety, a 100ml serving equated to 91g, and 23% of the product was cream itself. The ice cream was pale in colour but did have some visible caramel swirls. The chocolate chunks were presented as thick discs with raised peace signs, although the visibility of this finer detail varied.

As usual for frozen products, this didn’t emit any kind of smell, but the flavour was immense and felt like a full-on dessert. I allowed my ice cream to soften a fair amount before trying it and it was ridiculously creamy! Adding to this, the banana flavour was really strong, but then there was also a lovely, sugary taste from the caramel. I can’t say I really noticed the cookie swirls as a feature but, in contrast, the size and abundance of the chocolate made a massive difference to the experience. It tasted just liked ice cream chocolate sauce but its format meant it provided a crunchy texture amid the juicy, thick, but not completely smooth ice cream.

Whilst this tub of Satisfy my bowl wasn’t quite up there with the amazing Peanut butter cup, it did feel really special and it’s a shame it was only a limited edition.

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 5/10
Taste: 8/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.13/10

Tesco Ice Creams: Cookie crumble

Product name: Tesco Ice Creams: Cookie crumble
Purchase details: £1.50 for a box of three ice creams (Tesco)

Calories: 273 per 100ml ice cream
Country of origin: UK

I wanted to try these new Tesco Ice Creams: Cookie crumble all Summer but never quite got around to it. Thanks to The Orchard, though, I’ve finally managed to do so...for free!

The picture of the ‘vanilla ice cream with dark cookie pieces coated in white chocolate with dark cookie pieces’ looked phenomenal on the icy blue box, with an abundance of ‘cookie crumble’ (8%, in fact). The reality wasn’t too dissimilar but the Belgian white chocolate (34%) did look pretty yellow which was a shame.

Due to being a frozen product, the ice creams didn’t produce any kind of scent when removed from their very simple plastic wrappers. However, I was pleased to find there was more going on in the taste test. The chocolate was very sweet and quite creamy, and it had a great snap, as well as a solid crunch from the cookie pieces. This cookie was an ever-present since it could also be found throughout the ice cream, although the moisture had softened it, here.

I was a little disappointed by the ice cream itself. The crumbs from the cookie had caused the ice cream to be on the grainy side which, in itself, wasn’t a big issue, but I also found it was watery rather than thick so the quality didn’t feel wonderful. Furthermore, whilst it had a slight milky flavour, it wasn’t creamy, unfortunately.

Overall, I felt a bit torn by these Cookie crumble ice creams. The cookie crumbs themselves didn’t noticeably add a specific flavour but the overall experience was in-line with the flavour inspiration. I also really enjoyed the white chocolate shell but the quality of the ice cream meant I felt unable to give the product a higher score.

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 5/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 7/10
Overall score: 6.63/10

Maryland Choc Chip, Oatmeal & Honey

Product name: Maryland Choc Chip, Oatmeal & Honey
Purchase details: £1.00 for a 200g packet or two for £1.00 (Poundworld)
Calories: 51 per biscuit
Country of origin: UK

I must confess that I only bought these Maryland Choc Chip, Oatmeal & Honey cookies to make use of the multibuy offer when I was buying some other biscuits! Initially, I didn’t think they looked that exciting, but on noticing the magical word ‘new’ in the corner of the golden wrapper, I realised I couldn’t remember having had any cookies with honey in them before.

The packaging contained inviting images of oats and honey which, unusually, looked more enticing than the photos of the biscuits themselves which looked like standard chocolate chip cookies. However, the treat was described as being ‘choc full of yumminess’ and contained 6% oatmeal and 3% honey, in addition to the 16% chocolate chips.

The cookies were made by Burton’s Foods and contained no artificial flavours or colours, no GM ingredients and no hydrogenated fats and oils. They were quite dark in appearance, inside and out, compared to other cookies, particularly when considering another Maryland offering – Strawberry & White Choc.

I quickly realised that the scent was a cross between that of a standard cookie and flapjack. The latter seemed to be caused by the honey and oats and I was kicking myself for not having thought of the connection earlier!

Despite the quantity of chocolate chips varying in each biscuit, their taste was pretty strong in every bite and it was far and away the main flavour element. There was also a baked aspect to the taste which wasn’t usual for this type of cookie. However, neither the oats nor honey seemed particularly noticeable in themselves as additional flavours, at first. I did then find, though, that the honey released a delicate and almost floral sweetness which created a nice contrast with the comparatively bitter chocolate. I found that dipping the biscuits in tea also released more of the honey’s juices, although I preferred to eat them au natural.

These really crunchy cookies didn’t provide an obviously ground-breaking experience but they were different enough for me to choose them over standard chocolate chip cookies in future. Apart from anything else, the flapjack-like element meant they tasted a little more homemade than most mass-produced biscuits.

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 7.5/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 7.5/10
Overall score: 7.38/10

Krispy Kreme Chocolate Cookie Crunch

Product name: Krispy Kreme Chocolate Cookie Crunch
Purchase details: £1.50 for a 73g doughnut (Krispy Kreme Doughnuts)
Calories: 292 per doughnut
Country of origin: UK

I think the Krispy Kreme loyalty scheme is my new favourite! I received yet another free doughnut as a reward for filling in a short online survey so I decided to try again in getting the Chocolate Cookie Crunch.

This doughnut wasn’t earth-shatteringly innovative in that Krispy Kreme's website stated that it was a twist on the ‘popular’ Cookie Crunch. However, I’d had the older version a few years ago and enjoyed it, so I still wanted to see what difference its ‘chocolate dough makeover’ made. As part of the Choco Mania range, the ring doughnut also featured a ‘chocolate icing and cookie crunch’.

The Chocolate Cookie Crunch was the same in appearance as the Chocolate Iced – it simply had a darker dough and additional topping. I thought it looked great and the sprinkling of icing sugar was a nice touch too. On the downside, I found its delicious Krispy Kreme scent was a bit weaker than normal.

I had a little try of the cookie topping first. This was formed from large, black crumbs that looked like Oreos in style. Whilst crumbly, the cookie’s texture wasn’t crunchy, and I didn’t find it tasted of much either. Instead, the main chocolate flavour came from the icing which, the nutritional information showed, was identical to the Chocolate Iced's.

As a result, the taste of this doughnut was pretty much a repeat experience of the Chocolate Iced, although, all combined, it did seem to have a very slightly stronger chocolatey taste. However, as with the Peanut Butter Kreme, I found the dough tasted a little oily and not really like chocolate, so this additional flavour did seem to be coming from the cookie crumbs, despite their initial apparent blandness.

Where this doughnut differed most from the Chocolate Iced was in its texture. Whilst it didn’t interfere with the soft dough, the crumbly topping added an extra depth, and I loved the ever-present crispiness provided by the moist glaze too. Once more, I really enjoyed the juiciness this created.

All things considered, this doughnut provided a good mix of sweetness from the dough and glaze, and a pleasant chocolate flavour.

Appearance: 8.5/10
Aroma: 7.5/10
Taste: 9/10
Texture: 8.5/10
Overall score: 8.38/10

Ritter Sport Cookies & Cream

Product name: Ritter Sport Cookies & Cream
Purchase details: £1.75 for a 100g bar (monstersweets.co.uk)
Calories: 571 per bar
Country of origin: Germany

There’s been something missing from my life in recently: Ritter Sport! It’s been over five months since my last review of this brand but, thankfully, I was able to stock up on the latest varieties from Monster Sweets.

This Cookies & Cream bar came in a fresh-looking blue and white wrapper that contained a lovely image of the product, as well as a cookie scooping some cream out of a bowl – if that doesn’t get your mouth watering, I don’t know what will!

I’m sure I initially got this limited edition ‘Springtime speciality’’s calorie content from Ritter Sport's own website but, by the time I came to eat it, the variety no longer seemed to be featured. However, the figure I’d recorded on my spreadsheet (yep, I’m that cool!) was also the one provided by MyFitnessPal, so hopefully it was accurate.

Monster Sweets described the 16-squared bar as ‘milk chocolate with a creamy vanilla cream and chocolate cookie filling’ and it seemed to be the same concept as Lindt Hello My Name Is: Cookies & cream.

The Ritter Sport Cookies & Cream had the same outer appearance as most of their other bars. Inside, the cream (39% of the overall product) was slightly grey in appearance which was a shame, though it was night to see the cookie (6.9%) scattered throughout.

The bar had a sweet, milky chocolate scent and I really enjoyed how the taste of the really sweet centre offset the rich chocolate. The flavour wasn’t too far off that of an Oreo so it must have done a good job of replicating the cookies and cream flavour. However, the experience on offer here was a bit more grown-up and (dare I say it), slightly less enjoyable than the popular biscuit. I think the reason for this was that the biscuit pieces actually reminded me a bit of amaretti ones rather than chocolate cookies. However, there was no shortage of strong cocoa flavours from the smooth chocolate shell, and it was nice and creamy too.

The product also provided a great texture. When chewing, it was chunky yet soft with added crispy bits and, when melting, the cream felt smooth with a very slight grittiness, leaving behinds bits of crunchy biscuit.

Overall, this was a rich bar that was full of flavour: my mouth actually felt a bit numb from everything that was going on by the time I reached the end! I also enjoyed the aftertaste which was very much like cookies and milk. Lovely jubbly.

Appearance: 8/10
Aroma: 7.5/10
Taste: 7.5/10
Texture: 8.5/10
Overall score: 7.88/10