Cadbury Marvellous Creations

Now, imagine eating a handful of jelly tots quickly followed by a handful of chocolate. That would be a time consuming way of eating a fairly disgusting snack, wouldn't it? Well, Cadbury's best chocolate technicians have managed to cut that time from 5.5 seconds to roughly 2.3 seconds - thereby saving you 3.2 seconds.

It's basic science - they've simply chucked in a load of jelly and smarties into their Dairy Milk and called it "Marvellous Creations: Jelly Popping Candy Shells Covered in Delicious Cadbury Dairy Milk".

(Unfortunately they've also chucked in some popping candy. Note to Cadbury: NO ONE OVER THE AGE OF SEVEN LIKES POPPING CANDY.)

I like the name "Marvellous Creations" though. It's very modest. I'm thinking of renaming this blog "Really Good Gobble Monkey" or "Excellent Sweet Blog". Anyway, in case you were thinking it's a bit rich of Cadbury to decide themselves how "marvellous" their product is, STOP PANICKING.

On the back of the packet, Cadbury explain they have something called a "Joy-o-meter" at their headquarters that measures the "levels of marvellousness" of their chocolate. The exact specifications of this Joy-O-Meter are NOT explained, but I think we should trust them. It's not like it sounds made up or anything.

After all, they named it after the location of their HQ, which Cadbury claim is based somewhere called "Joyville", see?

Joyville sounds brilliant, doesn't it? I bet it's just like Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory. Oh yeah, close your eyes and picture the chocolate rivers and orange dwarf slaves! Here's a picture of Joyville from the Cadbury marketing campaign:

Joyville

Sadly, I looked it up and in reality, Cadbury's head office is Uxbridge Business Park, Uxbridge. Here's Uxbridge Business Park, Uxbridge:

Uxbridge Business Park, Uxbridge

WHERE ARE THE CHOCOLATE RIVERS?! 

But listen, if Cadbury's were honest about their HQ, then they'd have to rename their Joy-o-Meter "Uxbridge-Business-Park-O-Meter" which would be confusing for everybody.

So best not worry about it. ANYWAY, squares are boring, right? Straight lines are for losers, we all know that. Why not get rid of all square shaped things and replace them with random shapes? That would be more fun, wouldn't it? NO BECAUSE HOUSES WOULD FALL DOWN.

Well, putting jelly into chocolate wasn't quite mental enough for Cadbury, so they went even further and made the chocolate 'squares' in Marvellous Creations all squiggly. What have they been putting in the tea at Uxbridge Business Park, eh?! Those guys are cray-zee.

BONKERS

The 'squares' have different textures on them too - one's a bit wavy, one looks a bit like it's been sitting on grass for too long, one has 'Cadbury' written on it. Don't worry, they all taste the same.

In truth, whisper it, the irregular-shaped pieces are a genius move by Cadbury - fine, the textures make no difference - but the different shapes mean you get a varied amount of jelly/candy shell etc in each piece, ensuring you'll keep going back for more.

Unfortunately, while the jelly pieces make a surprisingly pleasant addition to the chocolate, the popping candy is a step too far and pushes the bar into novelty territory. However,  the other new bar in the Marvellous Creations range, Cookie Nut Crunch, is amazing.

It's probably the most moreish chocolate I've ever eaten in my life - and I don't even like nuts.

It really sends the Uxbridge-Business-Park-O-Meter off the scale. (IF THE SCALE WAS A MARK OUT OF SEVEN AND "OFF" MEANT A SCORE OF SIX)

Marvellous Creations: Jelly Popping Candy, Cadbury, £2.49
Uxbridge-Buisness-Park-O-Meter says: 3 out of 7

Marvellous Creations: Cookie Nut Crunch, Cadbury, £2.49
Uxbridge-Buisness-Park-O-Meter says: 6 out of 7

Bassetts Jelly Mascots

Hello! Look, Bassett's have made some jelly sweets especially for the Olympic Games in June. HERE THEY ARE:

They are jellied versions of London's Olympic mascots Wenlock and Mandeville, who are officially described as "two drops of steel with cameras for eyes"

Their story is that classic fairy tale of two drops of steel who are rescued from the last girder used to build the Olympic Stadium (the camera eyes are not explained in the story).

Their names are taken from some boring places in the UK that have some tenuous historical connection to the Olympics. Kids love boring places in the UK with tenuous historical connections to the Olympics almost as much as they love drops of molten steel.

WITH CAMERAS FOR EYES.

(They had to add the camera for eyes bit as someone on the design team was worried that characters based on bits of metal might be a bit, well, dull. And thank God they did! Imagine if Wenlock and Mandeville just had NORMAL eyes! I wouldn't have been able to get on board with that at all.)

So what happens when you take a blob of molten steel with a cycloptic eye camera and turn it into jelly*? THIS: 

What is that? What am I supposed to think about that? That I'm about to eat a jellied version of a drop of molten steel from a girder that went on to be used to make a building somewhere? YUMMY. And you thought Rowntree's Randoms were random. (They aren't)

Anyway, here's the mascot from Euro 96 when England held the European Football Championships:

Look at him - a lion, a nice friendly recognisable lion with a kind lion face. He's called "Goaliath" which is a real name plus has an amusing football related pun in it. But sadly in 1997 all lions were subsequently deemed racist. In fact, all cuddly animals were banned from being used as mascots in the UK after all of them were found to have some connotations of evil, antisemitism or just "didn't reflect our core values as a nation". The only safe, inoffensive material to base a mascot on was found to be steel girders.

That's why we got these two. PHEW!

In the future, I hope all symbols, mascots, logos and cereal-box characters will be reduced to shapeless proto-forms which don't resemble any recognisable object or carry any any preconceived associations.

So here's my idea for a mascot for the 2016 games. They can have this for free:

He's called Olympic Bob and he represents fair play and a conscientious attitude to picking up litter.

(P.S DON'T WORRY HIS EYES ARE CAMERAS)

Bassetts Jelly Mascots, £1
Gobble Monkey says: 2 out of 7

*i think I heard this question asked on University Challenge once.

Rowntrees Sour Faces

GOBBLE MONKEY LOVES SOUR SWEETS.  That familiar, almost painful, tingle that stabs the back of your jaw when you chew on a Tangfastic Sour Cherry is a small pleasure akin to licking a battery.

If you like sour sweets too, things have been simplified for you. Just choose your favourite of the following three things:

                                                                                     FACES
                                                                                MONSTERS
                                                                                   DRINKS

(which are the basic choices you can apply to most things in life really.)

Before you rush into a decision, here's the lowdown:

FACES:

Rowntrees have followed up their non-random 'Randoms' with these even less random 'Sour Faces' - jellied eyes, mustaches, noses, glasses and lips for people who like eating faces.

They just get away with mustaches and glasses, but i would question whether a bow-tie really counts as being part of a 'face'. Therefore I would rename Rowntrees Sour Faces as 'Sour Faces with Additional Sour Face & Neck Accessories.'

Anyway, there is some fun to be had with making the faces of various sour faced celebrities from the sour face parts and sour face/neck accessories.

                                                                                QUITE SOUR

                                                                       SOUR AS A LEMON

                                                                             VERY SOUR

(I cheated with that last one and used part of a cola bottle.)

MONSTERS:

Check out this open letter from the Haribo Head Office on the back of the packet of their 'Super Sour Monsters'.

They make it sound like 'GoldBear' is a mentally deranged loose cannon, allowed to wander freely round the Haribo factory, randomly making potentially fatal decisions over the sweet recipes.


"Hey, what's GoldBear doing over by the Tangfastics with his pants down?"
"Oh ha ha don't worry that's just Goldbear being a little bit naughty again!"

DRINKS:

Look at the (horrible) drawing of the sour cola bottle on the Fruit-tella 'Sour Drinks' packet. He's been driven INSANE by how incredibly sour he is, biting off his own tongue just to stop the sheer sourness of his very being.

These must be REALLY sour, right?

To find out I carried out the Gobble Monkey Sour Tongue Time Test. How long could each sour sweet remain on the tongue before it became too painful?

After the 'Children's Farm' fiasco, this is another huge embarrassment for Fruit-tella. They could get done under the trade descriptions act for this. I demand the word 'sour' is dropped from all future packaging, leaving them just called 'Drinks'. (Which will teach Fruit-tella for coming up with such lame unimaginative names for their products.)

'Sour' Drinks are the least sour things you will ever eat. (Unless you soak them in vinegar for an hour before eating. Then they are SLIGHTLY sour. Maybe that is what you are supposed to do.)

Ultimately, Faces may be slightly more sour than Monsters, but the latter's depth of flavour and superior chewiness gives them the edge.

Rowntrees Sour Faces, £2.49

Gobble Monkey says: 4 out of 7

Haribo Super Sour Monsters, £1

Gobble Monkey says: 5 out of 7

Fruit-tella Sour Drinks, £1.99

Gobble Monkey says: 1 out of 7

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HARIBO: Tangfastics

Sour sweets are all the rage these days, but Haribo's Tangfastics have always been the Sultans of the Sour Kingdom.

SIDE NOTE: I do not understand the name 'tangfastic' - OK they are tangy and they are fantastic, but surely that would make them 'tangTASTIC'?
(by the way if you enjoy Tangfastics then don't ever look up the definition of the word on Urban Dictionary.com)


So here are the classic Tangfastics:

Best are the Sour Cherries, followed by the Crocodiles, whose soft foam backs offset their sour jelly topping perfectly. (Sometimes there is also a very small Gummy Bear, but not today)

BUT NOW the German masterminds at Haribo have introduced a new LIMITED EDITION extra sweet into the Tangfastic family - The Rhubarb and Custard Splat.

Look how excited the Tangfastic gang are about welcoming the new edition. So thrilled is the Haribo bear, he cannot even bring himself to look at it. The Sour Cherries are grinning wildly. One Cola Bottle is trying it on already with a cheeky wink, while the other is wetting himself with anticipation. The Key/Dummy, who has even donned a bow tie for the prestigious occasion, is throwing his hands up in sheer jubilation. Only the Crocodile is able to contain himself, looking on with a gaze of muted adoration.

I must admit if I was a Haribo Tangfastic I would join them in their celebration. The Rhubarb and Custard Splat is a triumph. The intense flavour hits you straight away and will linger long after you've swallowed the remains of its gummy goodness - very much like a chewy, acidic version of the classic Rhubarb and Custard hard boiled sweets from giant plastic tubs in the newsagents of old. They're not the sourest of the Tangfastics - that honour remains with the Sour Cherry - but I would be so bold as to suggest it takes their crown as the Best Tangfastic.

The only drawback was that there was just ONE Rhubarb and Custard Splat in my packet. Madness.

Haribo Tangfastics inc. Limited Edition Rhubarb and Custard Splat, £1
Gobble Monkey says: 6 out of 7
Sour Rating: Medium/High