Tag: the taste test

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The Taste Test: Mint Tea

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So, I don’t actually drink tea or coffee. I know, I know. However, inconveniently I am also the coldest human in the world. I am always freezing, and if I had my choice I’d live in rooms heated to sauna levels. Whenever the uninitiated walk into our flat they are always horrified by how oppressively hot I keep it. This means that in air-conditioned offices, where other people get to set the temperature to average human levels, I have to wrap myself in a blanket to keep at a stage above hypothermia. Ideally I would be one of those people who sets up an IV drip of tea throughout the day. But I hate tea. It’s just like dirty water, I don’t get it. So occasionally, when it’s really grim, I resort to mint tea. Which is more bearable.

All of this, I realise, is a very bad way of starting off a Taste Test post about tea. What I am basically saying is that I don’t like tea and I am a bad person to recommend what type you buy. Look at it like this: I have no tea loyalty or preconceptions or ideas about what brands are good. It’s like a virgin tea palette. I assumed I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between them. Surprisingly, I was wrong.

Also, as you will see, the nutritional content table is basically non-existent this time. Because it’s pretty much just water. And the prices per 100g are really high because you never buy tea per 100g – a normal box is about 30g or something.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of tea or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Mint Tea

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Mint Tea
per 100g
£
Twinings
3.10
Waitrose Moroccan Mint
7.90
Teapigs
10
Diplomat Aldi
1.25
Tesco
1.98
Sainsbury’s
1.90

A – Sainsbury’s – 3/10

  • Doesn’t actually taste much like mint. A little on the aftertaste, but not so much on the drinking. Also a little artificial and plastic-y. Leaves you with a not particularly pleasant toothpaste kind of feeling.

B – Teapigs – 6/10

  • Immediately smells more minty than A. This comes through on the taste – you have the tingle of mint on your tongue. Definitely more enjoyable but not exactly great.

C – Twinings – 7/10

  • A bit of a mint scent, though not as strong as B. However, more flavour on the taste – less just like water. A little more enjoyable.

D – Tesco – 7/10

  • A different smell to the others – slightly sweeter. A more rounded taste – less like mouthwash than some of the others. Probably my favourite.

E – Waitrose – 4/10

  • A very unusual smell, not in a particularly good way. Carries through on the taste. I really didn’t enjoy it.

F – Diplomat – Aldi – 7/10

  • Smells more like mint. Nothing to write home about, but probably one of the nicer samples overall. A standard mint taste.

Conclusions

So, I still don’t like tea, as you might be able to tell from the rather lacklustre tasting notes. Hey, I thought it was worth a shot.

All the tea samples looked very, very similar, but there was a surprising amount of variation in the smell and taste of each sample. I thought Twinings, Tesco, and Aldi were all decent enough samples – and you can see that there’s a real variation in price between those products.

However, what you’re really paying for here is style, design, and packaging, I think. I was handed the samples ready made, so I didn’t see the aesthetics of the thing. But the more expensive teabags came in fancy boxes and had more packaging, and had those teabag strings and things that stop you losing them in the mug. I think the more expensive brands are as much about the pleasure and ease of the tea ritual as anything else. So if that’s important to you then it might be worth taking into consideration. But… it’s not important to me. So I guess I’d just get the Aldi ones and be done with it. Or have a nice clean glass of water instead.

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The Taste Test: Tomato Ketchup

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I thought ketchup would be a good subject for The Taste Test because it’s one of those products where there is a clear brand leader. Most people are probably accustomed to just habitually buying Heinz and paying more money for it, me included. But I suspected that this would be one of these tests where, actually, the cheaper own brands had a lot to offer. Read on to see if I was right…

I can actually take or leave ketchup.  I know some people are completely evangelical about it and eat it on everything, but I have no strong feelings. It’s alright on chips. I can live without it. Do any of your guys have an obsessive love for a particular condiment? Please don’t shun me, ketchup-lovers.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of ketchup or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Tomato Ketchup

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Ketchup
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Sainsbury’s
0.13
95
0.5
19.9
2.3
1.9
0.97
Heinz
0.33
102
0.1
23.2
1.2
1.8
Essential Waitrose
0.13
103
0.2
23.4
1.4
1.2
1.45
Aldi Bramwell
0.08
108
1.0
23
1.2
1.3
1.7
Wilkin & Sons
0.69
182
0
41
1.5
1.2
Tesco
0.16
110
0.4
23.6
0.9
1.3
1.3

A – Waitrose – 5/10

  • Runny, slides on the spoon, separating a little bit. Smells tomatoey and slightly acidic – how I’d expect classic ketchup to smell. Quite an acidic taste. Tomato flavour is there but tastes a bit tinned.

B – Aldi Bramwell – 5/10

  • Very smooth. A less sharp and distinct smell than A, but a sharpness on taste and not much more than that. A bit too acidic, but not bad. Nondescript.

C – Wilkin and Sons – 8/10

  • Holds its shape well. Smells different to previous samples – not as sharp, more like tomato. Tastes rich and sweet, with a good balance of acidity and a nice texture. More of a tomato sauce taste than classic ketchup.

D – Tesco – 4/10

  • Holds shape well. Smooth and firm. Tastes very sharp – the sharpest sample. Too acidic and vinegary for me.

E – Sainsbury’s – 6/10

  • Smooth and mild. Doesn’t taste particularly sharp, but not dull either. A bit sweeter than some of the other samples – well balanced. Pleasant enough.

F – Heinz – 7/10

  • Tastes the nicest in terms of standard ketchup. Not too sharp or too sweet. Nothing to write home about, but a good example of a classic ketchup that’s well balanced and nice to eat.

Conclusions

Huge amounts of ketchup smell surprisingly nice. I was not expecting it to, but the savoury tomato scent made me hungry.

So, funnily enough, I actually did think that the Heinz ketchup was the nicest of the standard samples. The Wilkin and Sons was my actual favourite, but that was a very different style of product, and would probably be good for different things. If you’re just dunking chips, though, the Sainsbury’s own brand would do the job very well too. It’s worth noting that, gram for gram, Heinz is well over twice as expensive as the Sainsbury’s offering…

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The Taste Test: Honey

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Honey is one of those things that I always have in the cupboard, but haven’t ever really thought about that much. I sometimes have it on toast, drizzled over baked goats’ cheese, or use it in baking. It’s great in tea with lemon and fresh ginger. I use it in salad dressings. But I’ve never been too discerning about what brand I buy.

This was an interesting test, and tricky in a way, because there are so many different types of honey. So many. Different flowers, different fruits, different sets and consistencies. I have avoided set honey and manuka honey for the sake of consistency, but I am aware that the samples don’t exactly correlate. Some of them are based on specific flowers and so on. But it’s really tricky to find six different samples of exactly the same breed of honey, so just go with me on this.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of honey or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Honey

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Honey
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Sainsbury’s
0.29
329
0.5
81.5
0.5
0.5
0.03
Waitrose
1.17
307
0
76.4
0
0.4
0.03
Rowse
0.84
329
0.5
81.5
0.5
0.5
0.03
Aldi – Everyday Essentials
0.29
328
0.5
82
0.5
0.5
0.01
Wilkin & Sons
1.51
355
0
86
0
0
0
Hilltop Honey
1.76
333
0.5
83
0.5
0.5
0.02
Tesco Finest
0.88
326
0.1
81.0
0.1
0.5
0.01

A – Rowse – 6/10

  • A deep amber colour. Fairly thin, very runny. Doesn’t smell like anything other than generic honey. Tastes quite floral – nice depth of flavour, not just pure sugar on the palate.

B – Aldi – 5/10

  • Lighter, a pale gold. Thicker and more viscous than A. Tastes sweet – generically sugary rather than carrying a specific flavour.

C – Wilkin & Sons – 7/10

  • A pale yellow gold. Much thicker than A or B, really coats a spoon. A interesting, complex scent. Sweet, but with an interesting flavour – elements of citrus. Enjoyable to eat.

D – Hilltop Honey – 7/10

  • The palest honey by far, almost clear. Medium thickness. Great taste. A bitter backnote against the sweetness, which gives it a complex and rounded flavour.

E – Tesco Finest – 3/10

  • One of the darkest, a rich orange. Thick, clinging to the spoon. A very distinctive taste, which I personally did not like. What I thought was an odd and unpleasant flavour – a sourness.

F – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

  • Mid golden colour. Quite thin. Smells lovely. Quite a lot of flavour – a floral taste.

G – Waitrose – 3/10

  • One of the darkest and thickest samples – really clings to a spoon. An odd smell and taste, which I found really quite unpleasant.

Conclusions

E (Tesco) and G (Waitrose) were notably different to all of the other samples. The rest were all subtly different from each other, but enjoyable in their own ways. All of those would be fine for eating, using in baking, or anything you might choose to use honey for. This might be one of those matters of personal taste – I’m not sure if any of these were objectively bad – but I certainly wouldn’t buy samples E or G again. They had an incredibly strong taste and smell, and I can’t imagine what I would use them for.

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The Taste Test: Mayonnaise

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I am opening 2018 with a special Taste Test post. This is the first session for which I have had brought in a consultant. A specialist, if you will. My lovely friend Daisy is excellent in all respects, but kind of weird in that her favourite food is mayonnaise. ‘How much can a person really like mayonnaise?’ you might wonder. A lot, is the answer. I am not a mayonnaise expert, and there were a lot of samples to get through, so I brought in Daisy to do the heavy lifting on this one. Also I wasn’t as delighted with the concept of eating a whole load of mayonnaise as she was.

And we ate the mayonnaise on bread. We’re not animals.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of mayonnaise or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that we tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making our notes we didn’t know which product came from which shop. We sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when we learned which who had made product A, B, C and so on.

The Blind Taste Test: Mayonnaise

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Mayonnaise
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Hellmann’s
0.75
721
79
1.3
1.1
1.5
Wilkin & Sons
0.92
748
81
3.5
1.8
1.27
Tesco
0.22
691
75
2.5
1.5
1.0
Waitrose
0.24
685
73
5.9
1.1
1.1
Sainsbury’s
0.23
677
73.2
3.5
1.0
0.9
Bramwell (Aldi)
0.12
722
78
3.9
0.8
0.96
Delouis
1.00
741
80
0.6
2
1.7

A – Tesco – 6/10

  • Looks very standard. Smells pretty lemony. Quite creamy, but fairly bland and a bit too oily. A bit of sharpness and a lemony flavour, but not salty enough. Fine, perfectly edible, but not very exciting.

B – Aldi – 3/10

  • Neutral colour. Thicker consistency than A. A bit of a strange taste – sour, but not in a good way. Not very pleasant to eat.

C – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

  • Tastes milder than the first two options. Quite light and quite creamy, but a good level of sharpness and salt too. Generally a pleasant sample, and good to eat.

D – Waitrose – 6/10

  • A very sharp smell, almost vinegar-y, that carries through on the taste. Light in texture, not oily. Not bad at all, but worth bearing in mind that it’s very sharp, so depends what you want to use it for.

E – Wilkin and Sons – 3/10

  • A very odd taste – weirdly sweet, especially in comparison to the other samples. Not enough sharpness, very cloying. Very different to the others.

F – Delouis – 8/10

  • Most visually different – very yellow, like butter. Tasted completely different to the other samples. A good lemon flavour, and really tasted like it contained real eggs. Interesting, complex. Good level of saltiness too.

G – Hellmann’s – 5/10

  • Looks very white. No particular smell, and that carries through to the taste – nothing distinctive. Nothing wrong with it, but very dull. A good vehicle for other stuff.

Conclusions

I didn’t know if I would be able to taste the difference between the different types of mayonnaise, as it’s not something I eat lots of or feel particularly strongly about, but actually the samples were all really distinctive, so this was more interesting than I thought it might be.

So, two favourites here. If you’re looking for a good, cheap, standard option, then Sainsbury’s own is your winner. We both preferred it to Hellmann’s, and it’s less than half the price of the brand leader. If you’re looking for something a bit special to go alongside something fancy, then the Delouis is delicious and was the favourite sample for both of us. It’s also by far the most expensive option. Sometimes these experiments are surprising and the cheapest thing is the most delicious, but sometimes you have to pay for quality.

Also, at the risk of invalidating this entire post, homemade mayonnaise is delicious, and actually pretty simple to make. Just saying.

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The Taste Test: Mince Pies

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Not going to lie, this was the best morning. I had mince pies for breakfast. Outside there was a carpet of perfect snow. It was still falling past the windows in a picturesque manner. Mince pies smell amazing. Especially six of them.

Now, the observant among you may notice that three of the mince pie samples are from Waitrose. Normally I try to spread the purchasing of Taste Test food out in a more effective way. But what can I say? I walked into Waitrose, I must have blacked out, and when I left I was clutching three different boxes of mince pies. And some other stuff. It happens fairly often, to be honest. I thought about leaving one of them out, but they were different. I wanted to try them all. Look, I don’t have to justify this madness, okay? This is my crazy series of random experiments.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of mince pies or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Mince Pies

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Mince Pies
100g
£ – per pie
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Waitrose -All Butter Mince Pies
2.50 pack, 42p per pie
391
14.6
60
3.3
3.3
0.25
Aldi – Cognac Steeped Mince Pies
1.49 pack, 25p per pie
361
11
59
2.6
3.8
0.1
Tesco – All Butter Mince Pies with Cognac
2.00 pack, 33p per pie
401
16.7
56.2
2.7
5.0
0.2
Essential Waitrose Shortcrust Mince Pies
1.00 per pack, 17p per pie
423
17.7
60.1
3.4
4.0
0.25
Heston from Waitrose Spiced Shortcrust Mince Pies with Lemon Twist
3.00 per pack, 75p per pie
365
12.7
58.3
2.0
3.3
0.40
Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference All Butter Mince Pies infused with Brandy
1.50 per pack, 25p per pie
389
13.8
61.9
2.0
3.2
0.33

A – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

  • The only one with an incomplete lid – a star-shaped piece of pastry. Very crumbly when you cut through the pie, doesn’t hold together fantastically. Lovely smell, definitely get the booze. Nice pastry, with good crispness and sugar on top. The mince meat has good texture, with chunks of fruit. A good mince pie, but not exceptional. Solid option.

B – Waitrose – 6/10

  • One of the plainest in appearance. Not quite as well filled as A – significant gap between the filling and top of the pie. Holds together well when cut though, doesn’t crumble apart. A smoother mince meat than A, with less interesting texture, and a less buttery and flavoursome pastry. Not bad, not great.

C – Aldi – 7/10

  • Pretty snowflake pattern on top. Crumbles when cut through, doesn’t hold shape. Pastry not hugely buttery. Nice filling, with a good flavour, and a hit of booze. Definitely enjoyed eating it.

D – Waitrose Essential – 3/10

  • Plainest in appearance. Cuts well, doesn’t fall apart. Mince meat is very smooth, like a paste, and doesn’t taste as nice as the others – quite sharp. Pastry is very powdery, tastes cheap, disappears in the mouth. Didn’t like it.

E – Tesco – 8/10

  • A lovely crispy sugary top. Pies holds together well when cut. Tasty pastry. Mince meat is good – plainly visible different fruits and textures, with a good balance between sharpness and sweetness, and noticeable alcohol.

F – Heston – 9/10

  • This is advertised as a mince pie but looks almost like a tart. It has a crumble sort of topping rather than a normal pastry topping, and is larger and shallower than the others. It almost seems unfair to judge it alongside the other samples as it’s incredibly different. The thin layer of mince meat balances well with the top and has a great citrus flavour. It’s also finished with icing sugar. It’s really tasty, but not a traditional mince pie.

Conclusions

God, mince pies are great, aren’t they?

A bit of an odd one this week, which is my own fault for getting a weird Heston product. But I couldn’t help it – I was intrigued. So it’s messed up my results. My favourite thing to eat from all the samples was the Heston Spiced Mince Pie with a Lemon Twist, which was unusual and really tasty. But if we’re being strict about the mince pie criteria, my winner was the Tesco Finest All Butter Pastry Deep Filled Mince Pie with Cognac. That would be my pick if you’re looking for a more traditional offering.

The only one I actively didn’t like was the Waitrose Essential sample – although it’s worth noting those were 17p per pie, while the Heston ones are a whopping 75p per pie. So I guess you get what you pay for here. The Sainsburys and Aldi pies were also completely acceptable.

Yes, I know, there are loads more types of mince pies, but I simply cannot try everything! If you want to buy stuff for me to taste then I am cool with that. Just saying.

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The Taste Test: Butter

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Butter was actually another suggestion for a Taste Test post from a friend. It’s great: these days people just suggest products to me so I no longer have to come up with all the ideas myself. Crowd-sourced creativity. Anyway, butter is an excellent idea for one of these posts, because it’s the sort of thing I tend to buy without thinking and so it’s always good to explore what other options are out there, and challenge my unquestioned assumption that my preferred butter is a solid choice.

It should be noted that I go through a fairly serious amount of butter. There is a butter shelf in the door of my fridge which is, at all times, filled with a frankly shocking number of packs of butter. This is because I bake most days, and therefore have the basics in stock at all times (you should see the ‘baking cupboard’). So I have a vested interest in this.

Of course, when you’re baking with butter, you won’t massively notice the difference between different brands (although you definitely notice a difference between butter and fake butter). But when the quality of your butter really matters is when you are eating it on toast. I bake a lot of bread, and there are few things more delicious than a generous hunk of bread, warm from the oven, spread liberally with soft salted butter.

All these butter samples are salted, by the way. Partly for consistency, and partly because I never buy unsalted butter. And I ate it with bread, because even I can’t eat straight butter.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of butter or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Butter

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Butter
100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Waitrose
0.80
725
80
0.5
0
0.7
3.0
Trewithen
0.61
744
82
0.6
0
0.6
1.8
Isigny
0.80
725
80
0.5
0
0.7
2
Aldi Everyday
0.54
737
81
0.8
0
0.6
1.7
Lurpak
0.80
739
82
0.7
0
0.6
1.2
Tesco
0.64
745
82.2
0.6
0
0.6
1.5

A – Isigny Ste-Mere – 6/10

  • Quite noticably salty – a bit too salty, even for me, and I have a salt-tooth. A nice creaminess to it, but also seems a bit oily. Not bad, but not particularly interesting.

B – Aldi – Everyday Essentials – 5/10

  • Lighter in texture than A, and much less salty – kind of disappears in your mouth. A little saltiness at the end but no real flavour.

C – Waitrose – Brittany butter with sea salt crystals – 8/10

  • One of the thicker and more lightly coloured butters. Pleasantly creamy. A nice level of salt for my tastes. Has a noticeable ‘real butter’ taste.

D – Trewithen Dairy Cornish Butter – 7/10

  • Enjoyable to eat – a nice flavour to it and a good level of saltiness. My second favourite choice.

E – Tesco – 5/10

  • Very light, another butter that disappears in your mouth. A little salt on the finish but not much on the actual eating. Not quite enough flavour for me.

F – Lurpak – 5/10

  • A little oily, and a little bland. Not salty enough for me, although bear in mind I have a high salt tolerance.

Conclusions

First conclusion: bread and butter is tasty. I should stop with all the fancy stuff and eat more bread and butter.

None of these were terrible. If I was just eating nice bread with nice butter then, I’m afraid, I’d definitely go for the Waitrose option here, which is on the expensive end (although tied for most expensive with two others, including Lurpak, who are a big brand and which I found disappointingly bland). That said, my second favourite was Trewithen, and that was the second cheapest option.

If you’re buying butter to eat on bread, then go for the nice stuff. If you’re just cooking with it, it doesn’t really matter, because they are all fine. I still wouldn’t buy fake butter though.

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The Taste Test: Cornflakes

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I don’t actually tend to eat cereal, but someone suggested cornflakes for a Taste Test post, and it seemed like a good idea. It’s exactly the sort of thing where there is a dramatic price variation between different brands, but it’s unclear if that’s actually reflected in the quality of the product. I mean, cornflakes are just cornflakes. Aren’t they?

Also, a side effect of this project has been that I ended up with a lot of cornflakes in my kitchen. Really, a lot. And for those of you who do eat cereal, where do you store those boxes? They are huge. They take up pretty much all of the counter in my tiny tiny kitchen.

Anyway, I’ve basically spent the last couple of weeks coming up with inventive ways to use up cornflakes. Did you know that you can use cornflakes as a crumb coating for fried chicken? And that it’s actually super delicious? So delicious that I might actually consider buying more cornflakes solely for this purpose when I have used up all the ones I already have. Also, I had biscuits left over from last week, so I combined the cornflakes and biscuits (and other stuff, obviously), and made tiffin. Let me tell you, chucking a couple of handfuls of cornflakes into a tiffin mix is a truly excellent idea. It sort of makes the finished product a cross between a tiffin and one of those cornflake nest cake things you ate at Easter as a kid. In other words, really tasty. And worryingly addictive.

Did you know they add loads of extra vitamins and minerals to cornflakes, by the way? I did not know that, but if you look at the pack they have added B12 and iron and all sorts. I feel super-healthy after eating all that cornflake tifin and cornflake fried chicken.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of cereal or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Cornflakes

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Cornflakes
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Waitrose
0.21
385
1.1
84.6
3.1
7.6
0.74
Tesco
0.8
385
1.1
84.6
3.1
7.6
0.7
Sainsbury’s
0.33
381
0.7
84.7
2.3
7.8
0.80
Kellogg’s
0.39
378
0.9
84
3
7
1.13
Aldi – Harvest
0.15
379
1.6
82
3.4
7.2
0.56

 

A – Aldi (Harvest)

B – Sainsbury’s Organic

C – Waitrose

D – Kellogg’s

E – Tesco Everyday Value

Conclusion

Wait, no comments? No breaking down into A, B, C and so on? No. You know why? Probably yes, you do.

All of these samples of cornflakes tasted exactly the same to me. Pleasingly crunchy, a little bit sweet at the end, fairly bland, as you would expect cornflakes to be. I started off eating them dry, to make sure I was getting the taste testing experience without interference, and then I tried them all with milk. They all tasted the same.

So the moral of the story is that you might as well buy the budget version. The cheapest – Tesco Everyday Value – are 40p and the most expensive – Kellogg’s – are £1.75.

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The Taste Test: Chocolate Digestives

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We’re back! And we’re back with biscuits. I thought I’d ease us in with something classic and beloved. And who doesn’t love a chocolate digestive? If you answered ‘me’ to that, then there is no place for you here, I’m afraid. This taste test post will not be to your liking.

This is one of those taste tests where there is a clear brand leader. When you think of chocolate digestives, you most likely think of McVitie’s. I certainly do, anyway. And before I got into this taste test mentality, it never would have occurred to me to try another brand. I’d just automatically go for the one I knew. But it’s definitely something that’s worth thinking about, considering the McVitie’s biscuits are more than twice as expensive as the Aldi version. Are they twice as delicious? Find out below.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of chocolate biscuit or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which who had made product A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Milk Chocolate Digestives

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Milk Chocolate Digestives
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Tesco
0.20
511
25.8
61.6
2.6
6.9
0.8
Sainsbury’s
0.21
499
23.0
65.1
2.4
6.6
0.78
Waitrose
0.23
498
23.7
63.3
2.9
6.5
1.00
McVitie’s
0.33
495
23.6
62.2
3.0
6.7
1.0
Belmont – Aldi
0.15
485
23
62
2.5
7.0
0.6

A – Tesco – 6/10

  • The chocolate looked slightly darker on this biscuit than the others. The biscuit itself was very crumbly and soft, going to crumbs in my hands if I applied pressure. Maybe a bit too soft – you want a bit of crispness with your biscuit. But a decent thick layer of chocolate and tasted perfectly fine.

B – Sainsbury’s – 6/10

  • Immediately more snap than A. Much crisper. However, it felt like a thinner layer of chocolate than A – basically, the opposite to A in terms of biscuit/chocolate. Both had flaws, but both decent biscuits.

C – Waitrose – 7/10

  • Thicker chocolate than B, and a good crispness to the biscuit. The biscuit itself also had a slight hint of saltiness to it, which offset the sweetness of the chocolate well. My second favourite.

D – McVitie’s – 6/10

  • Like B, a thinner chocolate, but tasted fine. A decent snap to the biscuit – probably the second crispest of the bunch. Nothing too exciting though.

E – Belmont for Aldi – 8/10

  • A satisfying, thick layer of the chocolate. A good snap, not falling apart, didn’t have loads of crumbs coming off it. The crispest biscuit of them all, with plenty of flavour and an oaty texture. More texture than any of the other biscuits. My favourite.

Conclusion

At first glance, all of these biscuits looked pretty similar – maybe the chocolate on A and E was shade darker than the others, and it was spread a little differently on all of them. But, in essence, much of a muchness. However, when you got into the tasting there were significant differences. It turned out the the Aldi offering, by far the cheapest by weight, was my favourite.

The other thing to note, though, was that none of these were terrible. They were all perfectly decent and edible chocolate biscuits. And, really, even a chocolate biscuit that’s just ‘reasonable’ is still a chocolate biscuit. The main thing to note, though, was that the most expensive brand leader was certainly no better than the bunch. Next time you’re buying chocolate digestives, you might as well get the cheaper option – they’re really just as good and, in some cases, better.

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The Taste Test: Peanut Butter

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I’ll be the first to admit that I got a bit carried away with this taste test. It’s peanut butter, okay? It’s special. Some of you will understand and agree, and some of you will think I’ve lost my head. Never mind. We can’t all be right. James is a bit lukewarm about peanut butter, which is probably a good thing, really. His restraining influence is what stops me from having peanut butter at all three meals in a day. I mean, it’s a miraculous ingredient when you think about it. It can be used to good in savoury or sweet dishes. It’s also perfectly lovely on its own. Eaten by the spoonful. From the jar. No, you have a problem.

Anyway. Apart from liking crunchy peanut butter (because obviously), I’m not massively loyal to one particular brand. I like trying out new varieties. This is probably why I got a touch carried away and ended up buying, um, eight samples instead of the usual five. I just kept seeing jars of the stuff everywhere and thinking ‘Ooh, I’ve not tried that one yet!’ I am, unfortunately, a greedy and impulsive food shopper.

It was actually a great call for a taste test though (thanks Phoebe!) because there’s so much variety between different brands of peanut butter. Who knew!? Considering peanut butter is basically just blended peanuts, there’s a lot of different ways to make it, depending on ratios of peanuts to oil to salt. By the end of this taste test, I was slightly lost in the peanut butter wilderness. But very happily so.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of peanut butter or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Peanut Butter

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Peanut Butter
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Meridian
0.71
596
46
11.6
8.5
29.6
0
Whole Earth
0.79
643
54.3
7.4
6.7
27.7
1.1
Waitrose
0.59
619
51.0
5.8
9.9
29.4
0.8
Sunpat
0.69
671
48.7
14.5
7.3
24.8
1.0
Pip & Nut
1.02
622
49
13
27
0.51
Grandessa – Aldi
0.29
612
49
15
7.2
25
0.81
Pic’s
0.92
590
48.4
9.6
7.7
30.3
0.5
Tesco
0.38
634
53.4
9.6
9.2
24.2
0.7

A – Whole Earth – 8/10

  • Very firm, reasonably dark in colour. Not separating. Crunchy, but with very small pieces of peanut – flakes rather than lumps. Includes little pieces of peanut shell, which give it a nice roasted flavour. Good level of saltiness. Nice peanut butter. Maybe a bit too thick.

B – Sunpat – 7/10

  • Much more golden and visually a bit chunkier than A. The bigger bits of peanut and suspended in a much lighter, creamier mixture, while A was almost a paste. Doesn’t coat your mouth or taste claggy – melts away. Flavour not as nice as A, could be saltier, but lovely texture.

C – Pic’s – 6/10

  • Quite separated – oil puddling on the spoon. Mixture left holding together well. Coats your mouth. Small-ish chunks of peanut. Not quite as much flavour as A and B, not salty enough.

D – Grandessa – Aldi – 7/10

  • Dark golden in colour, holding itself together very well – very firm texture. Creamy, with a nice saltiness. Not too claggy but not disappearing or melting away. Good chunks of peanut. A nice middle ground.

E – Tesco – 6/10

  • Very pale, maybe the palest. Holding itself together well, no separation. Big chunks of peanut. Quite salty, but also a bit sweet, compared to the others. Fairly creamy. Stays in your mouth a little, but not claggy.

F – Pip and Nut – 5/10

  • Interesting – looks completely different to almost all the others. Not just separation, but a very loose texture altogether. The peanuts taste really good, but it’s too runny – you want it to stay in the mouth more. Peanut butter needs more heft than this!

G – Waitrose – 6/10

  • Golden, quite dark, holding itself and keeping shape on spoon well. Both creamy and light, with a good mouth-feel. Not as good a flavour as some of the others, but a nice texture.

H – Meridian- 4/10

  • Big chunks of nut, quite a lot of separation, quite dark. Very claggy, coats the mouth. Not very much flavour – doesn’t taste salty enough, or even strongly enough of peanut.

Conclusion

So my winner here was Whole Earth – near the middle of the road, pricing wise – with honourable mentions to cheaper Sunpat and much cheaper Aldi. I was worried that with eight samples I would be completely overloaded and lose track, but actually, they were all incredibly different.

The interesting thing to note is that, for me at least, this was not a taste test where the most expensive products excelled. Generally, the pricier peanut butter has much nicer packaging, and also boasted more natural ingredients. However (sadly?) healthier here did not equate to tastier. Whatever they put in cheap peanut butter – lots of salt and oil, I’m afraid – just tastes better to me. Maybe I have an unsophisticated palette, but something like Pip and Nut, which had a great flavour, let itself down by being almost watery. You can see very easily from the sample on spoon F – you’d need to ladle this stuff onto your toast rather than spreading it.

Meanwhile, the stuff I thought tasted best – A, B, and D – all held its shape well on the spoon. I don’t know if this is a controversial opinion (I might get comments crying ‘no!’) but I actually like my peanut butter to coat the mouth a bit, and have a bit of weight and texture. If it just melts away then, well, you don’t get to enjoy the delicious peanut taste for long. And that’s sad. In a world so full of disappointment, let’s enjoy the things we do still have power over. Let’s get the cheap, sticky, delicious peanut butter.

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The Taste Test: Hazelnut Chocolate Spread

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This ‘hazelnut chocolate spread’ taste test is really, let’s face it, the Nutella taste test. Everyone calls hazelnut chocolate spread Nutella, even if it’s not technically the Nutella. But, if I’m honest, I’m a bit fuzzy on the legality of just calling this collective group of spreads ‘Nutella’ when only one of them actually is the real deal. And even though I seriously doubt anyone in any position to care about any of that is reading this blog, I still feel I should err on the side of caution.

So then: the hazelnut chocolate spread taste test, as I promised you last week. Just go with it.

Really, this post is for my brother. He’s two years younger than me, and when he was a teenager he survived pretty much exclusively on Nutella on toast, Pot Noodle, and jacket potatoes covered in cheese. If he’s reading this then he’s possibly protesting vehemently at this slander of his teenaged dietary habits, and perhaps I am exaggerating. But not by much. Anyway, this is my blog, and I think Max is less able to go suing people than Nutella are, so I can say what I like. Those are the three things I remember him eating most. Consequently, pretty much all the drinking glasses in our kitchen when we were growing up were ex-Nutella jars.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of chocolate spread or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Hazelnut Chocolate Spread

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Chocolate Hazelnut Spread
per 100g
£
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Sainsbury’s
0.60
555
34.5
53.5
3.0
6.0
0.13
Waitrose
0.43
571
37.2
51.5
3.0
6.0
0.1
Nature’s Store
0.64
539
31.0
59.3
3.9
3.8
0.1
Aldi – Nutoka
0.29
565
36
51
3.1
6.2
0.09
Nutella
0.80
546
31.6
57.6
6
0.11
Tesco
0.38
551
34.0
54.0
2.9
5.7
0.1

A – Nature’s Store – 5/10

  • A looser mixture, sliding down the spoon, but looks nice and shiny. Tasted immediately very sweet, and felt quite thin and insubstantial in my mouth. Tasted more like cocoa powder than chocolate.

B – Sainsbury’s – 8/10

  • A bit of shine, but not much. Immediately nicer than A – thicker, richer, with a more pronounced chocolate taste and a pleasant texture. Hazelnut flavour coming through well too. Really tasty.

C – Waitrose – 7/10

  • Looks less shiny than the others. Obviously thicker, with more texture – not as smooth as other samples. You can taste the hazelnuts coming through, but it’s a bit too sweet.

D – Aldi – Nutoka – 5/10

  • Quite matte, quite thick, holding itself on the spoon. Tastes very smooth, quite sweet. Fairly unremarkable but not very strong hazelnut taste, and a bit of a cocoa powder aftertaste.

E – Nutella – 7/10

  • Shiny and smooth, moving around quite a bit on the spoon – one of the thinner products but very obviously spreadable. Tastes very creamy and smooth, with hazelnut and chocolate flavours coming through.

F – Tesco – 6/10

  • Thick and firm, very creamy and smooth. Quite sweet though, and not much of a flavour of hazelnut.

Conclusion

Oddly, I have never been a massive hazelnut chocolate spread person. You’d think I would be. But I think I was put off by over-exposure as a teenager. These days I tend to use it in baking (Nutella brownies, anyone?), but not in much else. I do think, in baking, it would make a difference which spread you used here. There was lots of variation in appearance, texture, and flavour between the samples.

It’s worth noting that the Nutella was by far the most expensive product – unsurprisingly, as it’s the brand leader in the world of hazelnut chocolate spread. And it was good. You can see why everyone likes it so much. But I honestly did slightly prefer the Sainsbury’s own brand offering, and if I need hazelnut chocolate spread for anything in the future then that’s the one I am going to go for.