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

Fox's Party Rings: Raspberry ripple

Product name: Fox’s Party Rings: Raspberry ripple
Purchase details: £0.50 for a 125g packet (Asda)
Calories: 27 per biscuit
Country of origin: UK

I was really excited when I first heard about the ice cream-inspired limited editions of some of Fox’s classic biscuits but it took me ages to track them down. Thankfully, I managed to find them all at an amazing £0.50 a packet in Asda, and the first variety I’m reviewing is the Party Rings: Raspberry ripple.

These excitingly-flavoured ‘iced shortcake rings’ came in colourful raspberry and baby pink packaging which was less ‘busy’ than the standard version but also contained Vinnie the panda. I’ve mentioned before that I found his image a bit unappetising (see here) but he’d had a bit of a makeover, here, and actually looked quite cute with a drop of melted ice cream on his ear!

The packet contained around 20 biscuits that were free of artificial colours, flavours and preservatives. There was no specific mention of raspberries on the ingredients so, what the flavourings contained, I’m not sure.

The rings looked almost identical to one of the standard Party Rings but seemed a tiny bit smaller – I’m not sure if I’m going mad?! To my delight, they genuinely smelt of Mr Whippy ice cream with raspberry sauce, and I couldn’t wait to tuck in.

I was impressed that the flavour was pretty realistic and did taste like raspberry ripple ice cream, although it was so sweet that there was a slight sherbet element too. They were absolutely full of flavour but also pretty sugary so, unusually for me, I would have liked a little bit more focus on the cream rather than the sugar.

Texturally, these biscuits were as standard for Party Rings, but the icing’s surface was a bit rougher on the tongue, and it seemed to add a juiciness to the flavour too.

This was such an interesting twist on a classic and it’s such a shame that it’s only intended to be a limited edition!

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

Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream: Peanut butter cup

Product name: Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream: Peanut butter cup
Purchase details: £2.50 for a 500ml tub (tesco.com)

Calories: 280 per 100ml serving

Given my love of all things peanut butter, I should have rushed out to buy this Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream: Peanut butter cup when it was released, following many consumer requests. However, I wrongly assumed that it wouldn’t be that much different from the Core: Peanut butter me up that I tried about 18 months ago, so I waited for a price reduction and then kept the tub unopened in my freezer for a while. Let me tell you, I’m kicking myself now!

Made by Unilever for the UK and Ireland, this Fairtrade ‘peanut butter ice cream with peanut butter cups’ was a simpler idea to the Core variety since there was no jam. Although I’m a big fan of Reese's Peanut Butter Cup: Miniatures, my memory of the non-Reese’s cups in the Peanut butter me up was that their frozen nature made them a bit hard, which I guess is why I was hesitant to try a version that didn’t have the distraction of other flavours.

The tub featured the cheerful Ben & Jerry’s farmyard design and stated that each serving was the equivalent of two scoops or 86g. With a promising 20% of the product being the cups, the speckled ice cream turned out to be full of rugged chunks that actually made it quite hard to serve. I’m rubbish at scooping ice cream at the best of times but I had no chance of getting a neat portion here!

Despite being frozen, I was pleasantly surprised to find that this ice cream did have a slight peanutty scent. With 9% of the tub consisting of peanuts, and peanut flour also included, I was glad this did manage to come across.

Although 20% of the product was cream, I had been slightly disappointed to learn that the main ingredient was actually water. However, even when melted, the ice cream was quite thick and had a fairly creamy taste, as well as a slight graininess. The peanut flavour was by far the main aspect, though, with the emphasis being on salty rather than sweet tones.

Breaking up these salty hints was the star attraction: the peanut butter cups! I really don’t know what I was worried about because the chunky shells gave way to soft centres which were heavenly. The chocolate added a much-needed sugar hit and the abundance of peanut butter itself was more than I could have wished for.

 
I’m not going to pretend this ice cream was without faults. Personally, I would have liked the ice cream side of things to have had a tad more sweetness or creaminess (if not both!), but this was very good indeed and I did enjoy how the delicious cups were able to take centre stage.

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 6/10
Taste: 8.5/10
Texture: 8.5/10
Overall score: 7.63/10

Ben & Jerry's Core: All or nut-ting

Product name: Ben & Jerry’s Core: All or nut-ting
Purchase details: £3.00 for a 500ml tub (tesco.com)
Calories: 250 per 100ml serving

I’ve been dead good today and not jumped on the bandwagon of commenting on social media about the weather. However, I have used the heat as an excuse to finally open this much-anticipated tub of Ben & Jerry’s Core: All or nut-ting that’s been sat in the freezer for a few months now.

This product, made for the UK and Ireland, featured some of the same elements I loved about the Dough-ble whammy version: it had a clever name, was Fairtrade, and consisted of two ice cream flavours (chocolate and hazelnut) and a separate core (chocolatey hazelnut!). The tub also had the same cool (no pun intended) design that showed the make-up of these sections within the pot.

As previously, a 100ml serving was described as being the equivalent of two scoops, but I hadn’t realised before that this also translated as 85g. I’m not sure if this was a change on the packaging or whether I just completely missed it on the Dough-ble whammy. Anyway, I found this a lot more helpful in terms of my diet plan, and it meant it didn’t matter that I practically chiselled the ice cream out of the tub at points when I was unable to get ‘clean’ scoops.

The difference between each section’s colours wasn’t quite as defined in this variety but they did remain distinct. I loved the jaggedness of the ‘chocolatey chunks’ (3%) too.

As a frozen product, the scent was minimal, but ever-so-slightly nutty. The ice cream itself contained 25% cream so, as you can imagine, it tasted wonderful. The hazelnut side was like a liquid version of the inside of a Kinder Bueno, whilst the chocolate had the exact same rich flavour that was on offer with the Dough-ble whammy.

The core’s (12%) texture remained as fantastic and fudgy as it had been previously. However, it had an additional and incredibly strong hazelnut taste (4% of the whole product was hazelnut paste). It was like a thick, sticky and bitter version of Nutella and it was delicious.

All the elements combined were, unsurprisingly, fantastic. The mix of chocolate and hazelnut was great and the chocolate chunks added extra interest and a further chocolatey kick.

Whether eaten melted or a bit more solid, this was another wonderful product from Ben & Jerry’s. Having loved the Dough-ble whammy so much, though, I must confess that I missed the clumps of cookie dough! 

Appearance: 7.5/10
Aroma: 5.5/10
Taste: 8.5/10
Texture: 8.5/10
Overall score: 7.5/10