Nestlé Aero: Bubbly mousse (orange & choc)

Product name: Nestlé Aero: Bubbly mousse (orange & choc)
Purchase details: £0.50 for a pack of four mousses (Asda)
Calories: 84 per 58g mousse
Country of origin: UK

I tried the white chocolate and mint versions of Nestlé Aero: Bubbly mousse a couple of years ago so, when I saw a limited edition orange version was available, I couldn’t wait to try it. My relatively recent enjoyment of the orange bar helped too, as did the great price!

The packaging’s design was very much linked with the wrappers found on the chocolate bars. There was also an image of a spoonful of the mousse and, although I liked the look of the chocolate swirl, I did think the combination of the consistency and orange colour was a bit unnerving! However, the colours weren’t artificial, and I knew that the orange flavour was also natural. In addition, the mousse part of this ‘orange flavoured bubbly dessert with chocolate sauce’ made up 88% of the product and, within that, 68% was whole milk – not exactly a scary prospect!

In the end, the actual mousse did have a generally attractive appearance, but it really reminded me of Hallowe’en because the chocolate ripple looked a bit like a spider’s web on an orange backdrop. Unfortunately, I hate Hallowe’en with a passion, so this wasn’t a good thing for me!

In better news, the mousse had a nice orange aroma, although it was more subtle than the chocolate bar's scent. I also really enjoyed the way the soft, foamy texture melted in the mouth.

 

Initially, the flavour didn’t grab me. Rather than tasting like orange chocolate, it was like milk with a hint of orange and stronger cocoa hints. I also felt that it was a bit artificial, despite the evidence to the contrary. Thankfully, though, the flavour improved as I went on, and I particularly enjoyed the bits which contained more of the chocolate sauce – I’d never really appreciated before just how important the chocolate is in orange-flavoured chocolate!

On the whole, I thought this was a great product for the calories. The serving size was decent, both in appearance and, despite the air, in weight. I would have preferred a stronger orange flavour with more of a kick but this was still great as an everyday kind of snack.

Appearance: 7/10
Aroma: 7/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.25/10

Nestlé Aero: Bubbly white

Product name: Nestlé Aero: Bubbly white
Purchase details: Two 41g bars for £1.00 (Martin’s)
Calories: 221 per bar

I have big confession to make but, at the risk of all other food bloggers turning against me, I have to stick to my honesty policy...I was one of the people who voted for Nestlé to release a white chocolate version of the Aero bar when there was a Facebook campaign a few months ago. I’m really sorry, guys – I just love white chocolate so much so, for me, the idea didn’t seem ‘boring’ at all!

As it happened, I nearly missed out altogether on trying this limited edition White bubbly that was produced for the UK and Ireland. I searched high and low and, in the end, my Dad came to the rescue when he found it in Martin’s. Since he took advantage of the multibuy offer, I don’t know how much a single bar would have cost, and he couldn’t remember!

The ‘smooth milk chocolate filled with vanilla flavoured bubbles’ featured cream-coloured bubbles on the wrapper but I was a little confused by the description – it didn’t particularly sound like white chocolate. I am a vanilla fan too, though, so I hoped it would still be delicious.

The bar was part of Nestlé’s Cocoa Plan and contained chocolate as the main ingredient – presumably as the centre was largely air! The chocolate contained a minimum of 14% milk solids and produced the same aroma as a standard Aero which, I think, is quite an unusual chocolatey scent.

The shape of the bar was identical to the orange version but the filling was pale rather than orange in colour. Due to the general concept being unchanged, the bar also had the same enjoyable texture where the centre almost collapsed and became chewy under pressure.

Unfortunately, I did feel let down by the taste. The milk chocolate coating had the usual, slightly bitter cocoa taste that Aeros have, but the centre just tasted a bit weird. The first thing I thought of when I took a bite was that it reminded me of margarine – not really the kind of comparison I was hoping to make! However, it did improve greatly as I went on, with this unusual flavour being overpowered by the chocolate itself, although it was still much less chocolatey than a normal Aero. Guttingly (yeah, that’s a word!), it just didn’t taste like white chocolate or vanilla. However, it did taste better when allowing the thick melt to take control, and I actually preferred the mellowed chocolate flavour on offer here to a plain Aero.

I can’t pretend this bar didn’t disappoint me. It was fine but that’s pretty much all it was. Fair play to Nestlé, though, for letting the customer choose the variety. Maybe next time they should go down the ‘choose a Chunky champion’ route that Kit Kat used, allowing people to try before they vote. If this had been real and solid white chocolate, my views would probably be different, but if I’d know this would be the execution before I voted, I probably would have opted for the cappuccino or strawberry versions instead!

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 6.5/10
Taste: 7/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.25/10

Galaxy Gift For You (white bubbly)

Product name: Galaxy Gift For You (white bubbly)
Purchase details: £0.65 for a 26g bar or two for £1.00 (Tesco Superstore)
Calories: 148 per bar 

In the war between Cadbury Dairy Milk and Galaxy, I think I’d die for Galaxy – I love it that much! As a big white chocolate fan, though, it’s always been a source of disappointment for me that Galaxy haven’t branched out into that area. As sad as it sounds, I can honestly say that, since I was a child, there have been many times when I’ve daydreamed about exactly what white chocolate Galaxy would be like! 

I was delighted, a few months ago, when I found an American version in Bold Street Sweets in the form of Dove Cookies & Crème. This delivered the sweet creaminess I’d always imagined, but it obviously wasn’t a pure form of white chocolate due to the bits of cookie and general flavour it was trying to achieve. But wait! Galaxy have finally made my dreams come true by releasing this white bubbly version of Gift For You in plenty of time for Christmas 2013. The only downside I anticipated in advance of trying this product was that the inner chocolate was aerated when, really, I would have loved to enjoy it in a pure, silky Galaxy form. Oh well – beggars can’t be choosers!

I’m not entirely sure where this product was made, but the contact addresses given on the familiar brown-coloured wrapper were for the UK and Ireland so, presumably, it was relatively local. I loved the presentation of this chocolate. Although it came in matt rather than glossy packaging, it had a nice added touch of a shiny silver streak to represent a gift tag’s ribbon and, inside, the chocolate was a fantastic shade for the white variety. The product was made to look like a present and was divided into four non-identical segments, topped with a chocolate bow, and stamped with a Galaxy ‘G’. I loved how thick this chocolate was and was also pleased when I looked inside and saw that the bubbly centre wasn’t as deep as I thought it might have been.

The chocolate smelt of standard white chocolate, with a slightly sickly element, and I couldn’t wait to try it. It tasted like a great piece of chunky white chocolate, and it was creamy and sweet in its own right but, I have to say, I was disappointed that this wasn’t in a Galaxy-like way. 

I love letting Galaxy melt and this product did melt well, even avoiding the bubbliness I was expecting from the aerated centre. It was, though, also great to chew since there was a satisfying crack through the whole depth of the chocolate so, whilst the bubbly filling was slightly softer than the outer edge, it was just as pleasant to bite through.

I obviously had really high expectations for this Gift For You (white bubbly) and this is the only reason why I was slightly disappointed by the end result. In itself, it was a good quality product which tasted lovely, but it just didn’t seem particularly unique in its flavour, like Galaxy milk chocolate is, and I know that if I hadn’t known what I was eating, I wouldn’t have made any association with the Galaxy brand. As a stand-alone product, though, I have absolutely no complaints – apart from the fact that, for the size, it’s not quite worth the price I paid! 

Appearance: 8.5/10
Aroma: 7/10
Taste:  7/10
Texture: 8/10
Overall score: 7.63/10