McVitie's Digestives: Strawberry cheesecake creams

Product name: McVitie’s Digestives: Strawberry cheesecake creams
Purchase details: £1.00 for a 168g packet (Asda)
Calories: 67 per biscuit
Country of origin: UK

I really wanted to try these McVitie’s Digestives: Strawberry cheesecake creams as soon as they were released as they seemed more exciting than the vanilla version. However, although I bought them straight away, it’s taken me until now to open them!

Made by United Biscuits, there were around 13 ‘wheatmeal biscuits with strawberry and cream cheese flavour filling’ in each packet. The wrapper and sandwich biscuits were designed in exactly the same way as the vanilla variety but featured baby pink colouring, instead, which I really liked. I did also think the firm filling looked a bit thinner and more widely spread out but that may have just been the unlucky biscuit I attempted to dissect. (As you can see from my photo, the McVitie’s Digestives remained soft and crumbly which made the finished product practically impossible to pull apart in one piece!)

There was no mention of strawberries of any kind on the ingredients (just ‘natural flavouring’) but the biscuits did have a subtle yet noticeable strawberry scent – very much like flavoured milk. The ‘cheesecake inspired strawberry flavour cream filling’ also had a good strawberry flavour but without the sugar hit that I noticed in the Hill Biscuits Snack Packs: Strawberry creams. I was also pleased to find that the cheesecake concept was better executed, here, since there was a cheesy tang from the ‘dried cream cheese’ (2.5%) mixed in with the strawberry.

The biscuit itself was the usual, slightly sweetened kind, with a soft crunch and, even on its own, it had picked up hints of the berry taste. The nature of the sandwich design did mean that the proportions still weren’t right for an authentic cheesecake feel but I did think these Strawberry cheesecake creams were much more enjoyable than the vanilla ones.

I’d definitely buy them again!

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 8/10
Taste: 8/10
Texture: 7/10
Overall score: 7.63/10

Recipe: Nanaimo bars

Recipe: Nanaimo bars
Source: My Kitchen Antics

We had a big family event at the weekend that required lots and lots of cake! I was happy to help and was asked to make something that would serve 20+ people. As well as being tasty, it needed to be something that could be stored for a couple of days, wasn’t messy to eat and, since I work full-time, I also wanted it to be incredibly easy to make or a recipe that I’d successfully made before. I opted for the latter...

I was first told about Nanaimo bars by a colleague in my old work. She told me they originated in Canada and, once I’d looked them up on Wikipedia, I knew I just had to make them. When the time came, I settled on this recipe from My Kitchen Antics (adapted from The Boy Who Bakes) because I was too lazy to follow a recipe that used cups for measurements, and I also liked the way it had added pecans to the base.

The first time I ever made these, I also made a peanut butter version (following a different recipe), and both types were a big hit. I’ve made this ‘original’ recipe again since and they turned out exactly the same – no problems! My memory did fail me, though, as I was thinking I’d only previously got 16 pieces out of the batch rather than the predicted 20–25, so I ended up making two batches for the weekend...I ended up with 40 slices. Oh well, the more the merrier!

For some reason, I didn’t read the recipe properly on this occasion, so I lined my baking trays with greased baking paper rather than foil. Whilst this did turn out ok, it made it harder to ease the finished product from the tins, so I’ll definitely be sticking to the foil in future!

The recipe was as easy as I remembered it. I used digestive biscuits which I whizzed in the food processor and the smell of these combined with the coconut was fantastic. When preparing the cocoa mixture for the base, I loved watching it turn silky and thick and, once combined with the rest of the ingredients, all the elements held together really well and left the mixing bowl clean once transferred to the baking tray. It smelt delicious and tiffin-like, although its slightly greasy appearance didn’t look promising in terms of any health benefits. (Who am I kidding? This was never going to be a healthy treat!) In terms of pressing this layer down into the tin, I’ve always found that the back of a metal serving spoon does the job nicely.

 

The middle layer was my only cause for concern on this occasion. When mixing the butter and icing sugar, it didn’t go smooth before I added the cream (as the picture shows), and I couldn’t remember if that had happened before. I carried on regardless and, thankfully, everything turned out fine. For this layer, I used a spatula to spread it evenly.

I was slightly nervous about the final layer of these bars as my last experience was of making an orange version where I made the stupid mistake of setting the heat too high and leaving the chocolate for the full two minutes without checking on it. The result was a burnt-tasting ganache! I definitely learnt from my error and had no further problems this time so I quite happily applied it to the top of the traybake with a palette knife.

The only downside of this recipe is that it does require patience in taking time to spread each layer out carefully (although I’m a non-artistic perfectionist so probably take longer than most!) and then leaving them to set. On this occasion, my start to end baking time was around five hours but, bearing in mind I made two batches, stopped for lunch, had a couple of fights with cling film (urgh) and realised part way through that I didn’t have enough icing sugar and had to wait for more to arrive, this seemed totally reasonable. Even better was the fact that I remained stress-free throughout!

Most importantly, the Nanaimo bars were as rich as ever. They had a lovely chocolatey taste with a subtle coconut flavour and chunky pecans. I guess they weren’t too dissimilar from other chocolate traybakes, but I think these Nanaimo bars were sweeter than most, although this was mellowed greatly by the chocolate. I’ve always found that the custard adds more texture than flavour, whilst the icing sugar provides a different, slightly grainy texture in the middle layer, which is also something different to other similar treats.

 

As for the crowd, they were definitely pleased – I only heard positive comments from those who tried them and some people raved and raved. I know I’ll be making these for years to come!

  

Ease of recipe: 9.5/10
Finished product: 9/10
Overall score: 9.25/10
Bake again? Yes

McVitie's Digestives: Milk chocolate & orange

Product name: McVitie’s Digestives: Milk chocolate & orange
Purchase details: £1.00 for a 300g packet (tesco.com)
Calories: 84 per biscuit
Country of origin: UK

I vaguely remember these McVitie’s Digestives: Milk chocolate & orange biscuits being released previously but I know I never got around to sampling them. Thankfully, they’re now back, so I was looking forward to trying another incarnation of one of my favourite flavour combinations.

Made by United Biscuits, the pack contained an average of 18 Digestives, and they came in a ginger wrapper which reminded me of an old cat of ours! The product image looked like standard chocolate digestive biscuits, and I noticed that these particular ones contained 30% chocolate, had no artificial flavours, colours or hydrogenated vegetable oil in them, and they also supported British farmers and rural communities.

The biscuit bases were quite pale in colour and the chocolate toppings looked quite milky in appearance. The latter also had a tendency to look and feel a bit melted in the heat we’ve been having! The biscuits had an ingrained orange scent too although, unfortunately, one that didn’t waft.

Texturally, this snack was as you’d expect: the biscuit itself was really crispy, if a little dry, but the chocolate really lifted it. They were particularly good dipped in tea as the orange-flavoured chocolate melted and was just lovely.

Speaking of which, the orange taste was delicious and stronger than I’d dare hope for. I have nothing against the flavour of plain digestives but the orange on offer here completely masked that much blander element and produced a very tasty treat.

I hope these will stick around this time!

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

Fox's Jam 'n Cream: Cherry cheesecake

Product name: Fox’s Jam ’n Cream: Cherry cheesecake
Purchase details: £1.00 for a 150g pack or two for £1.00 (Poundworld)
Calories: 77 per biscuit
Country of origin: UK 

Here’s another packet of biscuits from Vinnie the panda’s Tastes of America range! These ‘digestive biscuits sandwiched with a cheesecake flavour cream and red cherry jam’ came in a red wrapper that featured the American flag and pictures of the product. I was looking forward to trying these as I find jammy biscuits are so much nicer with a cream layer...and you can’t go wrong with cheesecake!

My biscuits somehow got a bit crushed but their design was still clearly visible. The digestives, whilst oatmeal in colour, had a shortcake-type design with a swirl border. Within the sandwich, a yellowy cream sat in a flower shape, with a centre of deep red cherry jam topped with sugar.

The biscuits had a rich buttery scent with a hint of custard from the cream layer. Alone, this cream was sweet and smooth, but I did find it got a little lost when combined with the other elements.

The jam accounted for 9% of the overall product and contained red cherry puree. I wouldn’t say it tasted like real cherries but it was certainly reminiscent of some cherry-flavoured sweets. The jam provided a sharp tang on its own but, again, this wasn’t as powerful when eating the biscuits as a whole. 

I didn’t find the digestive flavour very strong and I probably wouldn’t have recognised it if I hadn’t already known it was there. However, its soft and crumbly texture combined well with the stiff jam, providing a crunchy yet chewy sensation.

Whilst the main concepts of a cheesecake were included in these Fox’s Jam ‘n Cream: Cherry cheesecake biscuits, I didn’t think they did a particularly good job of tasting like their flavour inspiration. I enjoyed the presence of the cream layer but it was missing a cream cheese tang so I felt McVitie's Digestives: Vanilla cheesecake creams were more realistic in that sense. However, I much preferred this product to the more similarly-designed Jammie Dodgers Jam'n Custard, and the biscuits were particularly enjoyable when eating the jam and cream centres last!

Appearance: 7.5/20
Aroma: 7/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 7.5/10
Overall score: 7.25/10