Are you feeling a 'Revel'? (Mars Revels)

Member Name: stebiz

Product:	Mars Revels
Date:	29/07/09 (40 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Different Centres, Different Size Packets

Disadvantages: Not the healthiest of snacks

I first encountered revels when I was a youngster, in the 1970s, although I believe they have been about since 1967. The revels themselves are chocoaltes with many different centres. The flavours originally consisted of Orange Creme, Coconut, Toffee, Peanut, Galaxy Counters and Maltesers. My favourites certainly used to be the soft orange ones and the Galaxy Counters. However, the coconut centres were later replaced with coffee creme, and the peanuts with raisins. (source bbc.co.uk) The coffee creme is my least favourite although I think replacing the peanut with raisin was a superb idea.

Back in November 2008 Mars came up with, what I can only describe, as a unique marketing campaign. It asked consumers to vote on their least favourite revel. The marketing campaign cost a mere 2 Million pounds and in total 250,000 consumers voted. The result didn't surprise me either with 41% voting for the exclusion of coffee flavour.

In return as a sales ploy Mars agreed to bring in a new 'surprise' flavour for a limited period only. It didn't say what it was. It was upto the consumer to find out. The mystery flavour turned out to be strawberry but was quickly replaced by coffee again in January this year - sadly!!

As you would expect with chocolates, the packs come in many different sizes. The one I am polishing off whilst writing this review is the 100g packet. I think these are the right size for a grown up fella. They do also do them in 35g, and 85g and 140g and 240g. There is no mention on their website about the 100g bag but I can assure you they do exist!!

The pack I have looks exactly as it is in the picture, just wider, and has the treatwise warning in the corner confirming that there is a yummy 168kcal in the packet. However this is for a standard 35g bag - but this isn't a standard 35g bag, so why not explain that!!!

Per 100g (this bag) actually contains a whopping 480kcal

Protein 5.1g
Carbohydrate 67.5g
of which sugars 63.8g
Fat 21.1g
of which saturates 11.6g
Fibre 1.0
Sodium 0.11g
Salt 0.28g

The ingredients aren't much better

Sugar
Skimmed Milk Powder
Cocoa Butter
Raisins
Glucose syrup,
Cocoa Mass
Sweetened Condensed Milk
Vegetable Fat
Hydrogenerated vegetable fat
Lactose
Whey powder
Milk fat
Invert sugar syrup
Barley malt extract
Emuslifiers (soya lecithin E492)
Wheat flour
Salt
Modified Starch
Raising Agents (E341,E500,E501)
Dextrin
Flavourings
Citric Acid
Pectin
Vegetable Oil
Acidity Regulator (E331)
Colours (E104,E122,E124,E132,E160a,E163)
Starch
Glazing Agent (carnauba wax)
Milk chocolate contains milk solids 14% minimum

Suitable for Vegetarians

Well these chocolates are absolutely delicios. You never know which one you are likely to pick up. However until this review I really did not know the sheer amount of E numbers in there. Is it really necessary Mars? Although I love these I am more likely to steer clear more in the future, for this reason alone.

Summary: Treat yourself from time to time!!