No whining from me! (Maynards Wine Pastilles)

Member Name: davidbuttery

Product:	Maynards Wine Pastilles
Date:	26/10/09 (67 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: lovely, fruity taste and very inexpensive

Disadvantages: not vegetarian, wrapper feels a bit cheap'n'nasty

Oh dear, another confectionery review from me... ah well, it's only a couple of months until Christmas, so that's my (feeble) excuse! Maynards have been around for a very long time indeed - since the late 19th century, in fact - although these days they are part of the massive Cadbury Trebor Bassett empire, itself at the time of writing under threat of takeover. Maynards are surely best known for their tremendously popular Wine Gums, but a few years ago they decided to launch a few other products, and these Wine Pastilles (a 2001 introduction) are an example of this slight expansion.

You can buy Wine Pastilles either in a bag weighing 180g, as illustrated here on Dooyoo, or in a smaller 52g roll - a similar choice to that offered with Wine Gums, as it happens. Either way, you get the same sweets. I bought a 52g roll from Tesco for 40p, which seems fair value; local corner shops are likely to charge a little more, though you may have trouble finding Wine Pastilles in smaller shops. The tube itself is a startling fluorescent green colour, which really makes it stand out on the shelf, with the traditional large, multicoloured Maynards logo. I like it, and think it looks friendly and welcoming.

I can't imagine that many people check the nutritional information panels on sweets, but for the sake of completeness, a roll provides 170 kcal, which works out at 325 kcal per 100g; that's quite a lot less than the average chocolate bar, incidentally! The ingredients list throws up some surprises: don't eat Wine Pastilles if you don't like the thought of extracts of black carrot (whatever that might be), turmeric, spinach and even stinging nettle. But no, the sweets won't sting your mouth! Sadly, vegetarians will be unable to eat this product, as it contains bovine gelatine.

Unwrapping the tube can be slightly fiddly, because the wrapper is *so* shiny and plasticky that if your hands aren't completely dry it can be somewhat slippery. However, unlike a lot of packaging these days, the roll simply unwraps, and once the glued bits are pulled apart no actual tearing is necessary. Inside is a row of 12 multicoloured sweets, in five fruity flavours - strawberry (coloured red), blackcurrant (black), lime (green), lemon (yellow) and orange (er... orange). Oddly, I had four blackcurrant ones in a row near one end, but I imagine that the order is random and so this was just a coincidence.

The smell is fruity and pleasant, but not overpowering, so it's on to the tasting itself. If you're used to Rowntree's Fruit Pastilles, then the initial sensation on popping a Wine Pastille into your mouth will be eerily familiar: the sugar crystals coating the outside, the fairly resistant consistency of each sweets, and - above all - the absolute inability simply to suck one. You just can't help but chew! However, after it's been in your mouth for a while, the sweet softens appreciably and the fruitiness comes through strongly. This is (as you might expect) extremely reminiscent of the taste of a Maynard's Wine Gum. If you like those, as I do, you'll find Wine Pastilles very tasty indeed.

Maynard's Wine Pastilles really ought to be better known than they are: I still encounter people who've never heard of them, let alone actually tasted some. The cross between a fruit pastille and a wine gum (no capital letters here as I'm speaking generically now!) is actually extremely successful, and the well-established and popular Maynard's taste is precisely what you would expect. It would be nice if they could use a vegetarian substitute for the gelatine, but if this is not a concern for you then Wine Pastilles come highly recommended.

Summary: A successful blend of two tasty sweets