Tasty Treats From Tobermory! (Island Bakery Organics Lemon Melts)

Member Name: Machair1

Product:	Island Bakery Organics Lemon Melts
Date:	02/04/09 (125 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Delicious and organic.

Disadvantages: Expensive

One of my great passions is trying to buy products which are organic. If the company also originates from a place where it is harder to find employment, and to make a success of a business idea, due to transport costs and employment issues in rural isolated communities, then so much the better.

It was with great delight that I recently discovered the tasty biscuits which are produced on The Isle of Mull, which is off the cost of Oban in Western Scotland. One of my favourite flavours of these is Lemon Melts which are one of the most delicious biscuits I have tasted in a long time.

The company was set up by husband and wife team Joe and Dawn Read who met at university. Joe was raised on Mull and so together they went back with their geography degrees in their hand to set up an organic bakery from scratch. Initially this consisted of setting up a unit in the back of an empty garage, and here they would make products for their newly created deli and bakery shop in Tobermory. At first this was mainly bread and it was the aim to supply neighbouring islands, but later the business expanded filling a gap in the market which they had identified to create biscuits with a home made taste from natural ingredients.

The lemon melts I purchased from an online fair-trade company called Simply Fair but you can obtain these from many local farm shops, health food stores, and online whole foods companies. Also from www.realfooddirect.co.uk. I paid £3.40 for my box which is pricy for a biscuit but as I only eat these occasionally I think they are worth it for the treat factor!

The box looks lovely with a little highland cow logo, and the rest is a vast expanse of bright sunny yellow with a picture of the biscuits inside. The biscuits are half coated with a white chocolate icing, and each one looks slightly different to the next reflecting their home baked production methods. The packet contains 12 of these little beauties in three separate baking cases. The smell is divine due to the lemon oil (which they extract from the peel of organic lemons) they use which gives an intense lemon flavour. The taste is absolutely wonderful. Melt in the mouth shortbread with a half covering of this lovely white chocolate icing. These taste like they have never seen a commercial setting in their lives, but could have just come out of your oven this afternoon.

What I love about these biscuits is that they are organic, none of the ingredients have ever seen a pesticide, or a chemical in their lives, and because of this you know that the farmers who grew the ingredients have also got a responsibility towards preserving wildlife habitats for birds and insects. I think it is also important to note that these are made by sourcing ingredients as close to home as possible, and that if anything is needed from abroad such as in the case of these biscuits lemon oil, which they obtain from Sicily, it is never air freighted but goes by surface. They have to include palm oil which you may know has had a bad press lately due to the way its production has been threatening parts of the rain forest, where deforestation in places like Malaysia and Indonesia have threatened the habitat of the orang-utan. The company state that they need to use some palm oil to make their biscuits as they need a solid vegetable fat and want to avoid hydrogenated, so they buy this from sustainable sources, grown on plantations that have not been created from tropical forest clearance.

The only ingredients in these are wheat flour, white chocolate, vanilla powder, sugar, butter, palm oil and lemon oil and a little sea salt. So this is a simple list with no E numbers in sight.

An added bonus is that inside their packets is an ongoing competition to win a weekend on Mull each year so you might just get a treat a bit more than a biscuit. You'll have to photograph yourself eating them in a stunning or different location though!

Scottish Food and Drink Excellence Awards 2006 saw them winning two awards so the company goes on from strength to strength.

The biscuits are also available in handy packs of two which I also buy as I think this really provides a lovely treat without having to store the rest reducing the temptation to tuck into too many!

So now all that remains for me to do is to work my way through the rest of the range and I have made a start! Next on the list Organic Chocolate Lime Biscuits........that's another review!

Summary: A delicious biscuit from a beautiful part of the world.