Percy Pig Juice

Oh come on! Enough already Percy! We've already eaten your face, tail, wife, children, 'pals', your nose and your tail - and now we have to drink your juice?!?

Are Marks and Spencers so determined to literally squeeze every last drop of cold hard cash out of your poor withered body?

By the way "M&S", I'm assuming this fruit juice IS suitable for vegetarians, although you will note that this Percy does NOT sport a green ear on the carton.

MARKS AND SPENCER YOU ARE CONFUSING ME WITH YOUR PINK EAR / GREEN EAR MIXED MESSAGES. You promised me that only green eared Percy's were pork free. It's a simple rule that you set yourselves, so keep to it. All I am asking for is consistency. DOES THIS JUICE HAVE PORK IN IT OR NOT?

If I was a vegetarian and I wanted some Percy Juice, I would have no other option than to pour a bag of Veggie Percies into a blender and drink the results. That would be the only way to be sure I was getting a completely non-gelatine experience.

This grape and raspberry juice is 'partially from concentrate', has no added sugar and tastes entirely of grape. It does not taste like the sweets.

I do like the drawing of Percy on the front though. He looks contented.

Percy Pig Grape and Raspberry Juice, £1.49 for three (SUITABLE FOR VEGANS)
Gobble Monkey says: 3 out of 7

While we're here, let's take a look at some other new products on the market:

KITKAT CARAMEL:

I assume these are new. I haven't seen them before. They do have the pleasing 'old style' foil and paper packaging though.

It would be difficult to make a KitKat any WORSE than it already is (God knows they tried with the ORANGE one and the sick, sick 70% Dark one), so well done Nestle for finally working out that caramel makes ANY biscuit 10 times nicer.

Hey, I've got another good idea for you Nestle - why'll you're at it, why not replace the CARDBOARD you currently pretend is wafter with some lovely shortcake? HMMMMMMM? And rename it a TWOX.

Shockingly, there is no actual layer of caramel in these (unlike the KitKat Caramel Chunky), just caramel flavouring. Well done Nestle, you even managed to mess that up.

KitKat Caramel, Nestle, £1.29
Gobble Monkey says: 3 out of 7

SKITTLES: "Crazy" Cores:

With these, the outer coating is one flavour while the "crazy" core of the Skittle is another.

The "surprising flavour combos" are:

Mango/Peach, Cherry/Lemonade, Melon/Undisclosed 'Berry',
Blue Raspberry (MY FAVOURITE SORT OF RASPBERRY)/Lemon and Strawberry/Watermelon.

They are delicious.


If only nature could make these proper flavours by itself instead of boring ones like carob or salad. Luckily Skittles have managed to surpass nature (AND THEREFORE GOD) and improve on his lame original so-called-natural flavours by combining them and making them blue.

Check out the "crazy" instructions on the packet - the absence of an exclamation mark leaves them curiously bland, and it is fun to say them aloud in a dour, sad voice. TRY IT. (Sadly I disobeyed the instructions and therefore my imagination has NOT been released.)

Skittles Crazy Cores, £1
Gobble Monkey says: 6 out of 7

McVities medley:

Remember the crushing disappointment of finding a Tracker bar in your school lunchbox instead of a Trio? Well meet the new Tracker - the medley.

These have been around a couple of months, but I've been avoiding them. In their wisdom, McVities have decided to ignore basic grammatical rules and write medley with NO capital letter, instantly making them 10x more quirky than their erroneously named Quirks.

medlies (medleys?) are full of OATS. Who puts OATS in a bar anyway? An OAT has no place in the world of snacks. I don't like OATS, I like sugar and chocolate. An OAT is one of nature's previosuly mentioned boring flavours.

(I did not taste the nut one because I don't like nuts. Yes, that's right I am a monkey and I don't like nuts. When's the last time you saw a monkey eating nuts anyway? If you think a blog about sweets should not be written by someone who doesn't like nuts is wrong, then go and read this instead).

P.S. medley's (medlies) are surprisingly nice, despite high OAT content. (Luckily the oats are smothered in sugar and chocolate.)

McVities medley, £1.80 for six
Gobble Monkey says: 5 out of 7

KINDER EGG:
In a final slap in the face, Kinder have gone and changed the one constant in my life, the one thing i thought I could always rely on... the yellow plastic inner egg.

Now it flips open, retaining it's top half like a lid, rather than splitting into two halves. This takes away the satisfying pop out you got when biting it open with your teeth, BUT I must admit it is better. Sometimes, change is good.
BUT ONLY SOMETIMES DON'T CHANGE ANYTHING ELSE PLEASE.