Bland Boring Blackcurrant (McVities Jaffa Cake Blackcurrant)

Member Name: faders321

Product:	McVities Jaffa Cake Blackcurrant
Date:	01/09/08 (72 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Different to orange

Disadvantages: Not as refreshing

I love Jaffa Cakes and I normally buy Tesco Value ones because they are a lot cheaper than McVities brand however when I saw the new McVities Jaffa Cake Blackcurrant I just had to try them. As far as I know no other brand makes the blackcurrant flavoured ones so I thought it would be worth a try buying them even though they are a lot of money at 70p for just 12 when you can get 24 Tesco Value orange filling ones for 50p.

They come in a rectangular box which looks pretty much the same as the Original Jaffa Cakes but where Jaffa Cakes is written across the front it is in purple rather than orange as is the rest of the writing on the front of the packet. It also has the McVities logo on the front. On the back of the box are the ingredients and nutritional information. Inside the box the 12 Jaffa Cakes are wrapped in clear plastic to keep them nice and fresh and to stop the sponge part from going stale.

Now then I'm sure that most people know what a Jaffa Cake looks like because 90% of people will have eaten one at some point and all the brands look pretty much the same. It is made from a layer of soft golden sponge with a blob of jelly like substance in the middle, this is traditionally orange but in this case it is actually purple. Then on top of this is a layer of chocolate which has a nice bumpy texture and reaches all the way over the blackcurrant centre to the very edges of the sponge, thus sandwiching the blackcurrant in the middle.

These don't smell as I had expected, I have always found that the Tesco Value version have a stronger smell than McVities so I don't know why I was surprised that this blackcurrant flavour didn't really smell of much. What little smell it did have wasn't blackcurrant, it was something sweet though. The sponge is nice and soft and ... well... spongy, it had a slightly sweet taste but nothing strong which is good. The chocolate is thicker than in other brands and melts nicely, it too has a sweet taste. Now then, I always found that the best bit in the original Jaffa Cakes was the orange flavouring in the centre, so I tried the blackcurrant bit expecting it to be really good. I was, however disappointed. I admit that it did taste of blackcurrant but it wasn't anywhere as near as refreshing as the orange flavour normally is and it tasted kind of sour. The sourness did take away a little of the sweetness from the chocolate but instead it left a sour taste in my mouth, very disappointed.

The ingredients, for those who have food allergies are:

Glucose-fructose Syrup, Plain Chocolate (20%)(Sugar, Cocoa Mass, Vegetable Fat, Butter Oil, Emulsifiers(Soya Lecithin, E476), Cocoa Butter, Dried Skimmed Milk,Natural Vanilla Flavouring),Sugar, Wheat flour, Whole Egg, Water, Dextrose Monohydrate, Glucose Syrup, Concentrated Blackcurrant Juice (6% Blackcurrant Juice Equivalent), Citric Acid, Humecant (Glycerine), Vegetable Oil, Acidity Regulator (Sodium Citrate), Gelling Agent (Pectin), Raising Agents (Ammonium Bicarbonate, Disodium Dishosphate, Sodium Bicarbonate) Dried Whole Egg, Natural Colours (Anthocyanin, Curcumin), Natural Flavourings.

You can eat Jaffa Cakes in one of three ways; you can be polite and bite into it which allows you to taste all the different parts together. Alternatively you could be a bit piggy and put the whole thing into your mouth at once, I really don't like doing this but I've seen my husband do it a couple of times before. Last but not least you can have some fun trying to scrape off all the chocolate with your teeth first, which is quite easy as it is so thin, then peeling off the orange and putting it to one side, munch the sponge and finally eat the refreshing orange centre. That is a lot of fun but you can end up with chocolate crumbs everywhere if you're not careful.

Overall I was not impressed with this Jaffa Cake and I will; be sticking to the original orange flavour in the future as this was rather bland and didn't give the refreshing orange lift that the originals do. Plus blackcurrant and chocolate, not such a good mixture. I give them 4 out of 10 for effort.

Summary: I don't think I'll be buying these again