Foster’s Stem Ginger and Spice Biscuits [By @SpectreUK]

I’ve always thought that ginger is one of those flavours that epitomises the taste of winter. These Foster’s Stem Ginger and Spice Biscuits were baked with stem ginger chunks. Made in Market Harborough, in Leicestershire, there were twelve biscuits in the box which weighed 200g. Produced in an environment that handled nuts and sesame seeds, other allergy advice on the box exclaimed that these biscuits contained wheat, gluten, milk, oats, mustard, and eggs. Suitable for vegetarians, the ingredients of these biscuits included; wheat flour, sugar, vegetable oils, salted butter, stem ginger, partially inverted refiner’s syrup, rolled oats, free range eggs, ground ginger, mixed spice (coriander, cassia, cinnamon, mustard, caraway, dill, fennel, pimento, cardamom), milk powder, and salt. Faced with such an unfathomable amount of mixed spice for my taste buds I was a little bemused at what these biscuits would taste like. There was a strong smell of spiced ginger, oats and a syrup sweet smell on opening the box. These biscuits had a brawny taste of ginger too, with an indistinguishable mixture of spices merged perfectly with a delightful melt in the mouth oats flavour after a decent initial crunch. I thought these biscuits were gorgeous, totally moreish and could easily be enjoyed any season of the year.

By Spectre

Jamie's Christmas Mulled Wine Sugar Dusted Mini Mince Pies (Boots) [By @cinabar]

After the various dusted finishes that Mr Blumenthal uses on his mince pies, I was quite intrigued when I spotted these ones from Jamie Oliver. These mini pies are dusted with a pretty pink sprinkle of mulled wine sugar. Sadly they come pre-dusted, which meant that there was no choice on how much sprinkle to put on, and some of the pies had uneven amounts as the boxes were standing on their side in Boots. That’s a curiosity in itself; these were indeed purchased from Boots (as in Boots The Chemist). To be fair I know Boots has a good selection of lunchtime foods, and even a meal deal with sandwiches etc, but I’m still not sure that if I was after purchasing some mini mince pie canapés Boots would be my first port of call! Either way, I spotted them as I was stocking up on cold medicines and nail wraps, so my purchases were a little eclectic by the time I got to the till!
Once I was home Spectre looked at them and frowned. I’m not sure he gets the idea of delicate looking canapé sized extra small mince pies. If mince pies need to change shape, Spectre would prefer bigger rather than smaller. I did explain that he could eat two (or three) to compensate, but to be honest he does still have a point. The problem when you change the size of something like that is that you mix up the ratios. The pastry stays the same thickness, so you end up with less space for mince. I much prefer mince to pastry, and the pastry exists as a mechanism for holding the filling, rather than something I get excited about. I know some people love pastry, and if you are in that category I can say the pastry was really good. It was buttery and sweet, and soft and flaky and it melted in the mouth. It was in summary excellent pastry, but there was lots of it, and it diluted the flavour of the mince. The mince was nice, it had a slight tang and a hint of seasonal spices, but I would have liked a larger serving of it. I was aware that there was a nice gentle Christmas spice to the pie, but I couldn’t quite pick up on anything specific by the way of mulled wine sugar. I even deliberately licked one just to check, but it was mostly sweet and not that flavoursome.
I don’t mean to be negative with these pies. If you bought them and served them as canapés or with a coffee to visitors nobody would complain at all. Those that like pastry may even love these. It’s just that for my taste buds I need a hard hit of tangy mince, loads of citrus and a good helping of Christmas spice so I can’t beat the Heston version. I know I shouldn’t compare everything to them, but I am at a stage where everything else is starting to look inferior.

By Cinabar

Laughing Cow Light – With Blue Cheese [By @cinabar]

I thought this was quite an innovative product idea when I first saw it. I do like having triangles of cream cheese in my lunch box, they make an easy lunch time snack, particularly spread on a couple of Ryvita. Having said I don’t think I’ve ever seen a blue cheese variety before so was looking forward to trying out the new one in the Laughing Cow range.
The packet clearly shows a big chunk of veined blue cheese on the box, and so I was a little surprised when I unwrapped the first cheese to find that it was plain creamy white through and through. When I thought about it, this made sense. After all adding the veins to a cream cheese does sound rather difficult if you think about the cheese making process, but still I had sort of expected to see a little colour.
I got on with spreading the cheese on a Ryvita and tucked in. The flavour was creamy, and the base taste of the regular Laughing Cow cheese shone through. The blue cheese flavour wasn’t too strong, but added a pleasant tang to the cheese that I really enjoyed. I like blue cheese, I know it’s a bit of an acquired taste, but I think it adds a lovely complexity to the cheese, so this is one I will be buying again. As I said if you are worried about the blueness being overpowering don’t, it adds just a good light does of flavour staying on the safe side. I would also recommend adding a sliced tomato to the mix as the flavours just complement one another perfectly. It’s also really low calorie as each cheese triangle has just 25 calories, but it still makes a tasty snack and adds a little gourmet style treat to lunch times.

By Cinabar

My Cat's Advent Calendar (by @NLi10)

As pointed out earlier in the week the Advent calendar is nice no matter what your age.  In early November our local pet shop had this which proved that species should not be a limiting factor either.

This is an Advent calendar full of the highly-additive for cats Dreamies - which are made by the same people as Mars and feature adverts of cats jumping through brick walls.  As the calendar doesn't make the shakey-bag noise that attracts the cat and was sealed in foil it has been ignored by them until Dec 1st.

Here we see Duchess trying to figure out where the Dreamies are - they are hiding in the little deep pot.  I sprinkled some over the calendar and shared the rest out with the other two cats.

To me this was the end of it until it was time for the 2nd door, but opening the seal had unleashed the smell of 23 days worth of cat treats and Duchess was determined to find her way into the other doors (and poked her nose into the original hole just to check).

I think that she is convinced that she should be allowed to have them all at once - from the effect that a months supply of Mars bars would have on a human I'm guessing this isn't wise...

This has opened me up to the idea of edible advent calendars that don't contain chocolate.  Wouldn't it be good if there was one with a different retro sweet behind each door ( www.aquarterof.co.uk and www.thegobstopper.co.uk take note!).  This would be great as you'd have a fancy boiled sweet to suck on the way to work, or some liquorice or bubble gum and all the doors would be odd shapes to allow for packets of sherbet and other delights.  Surely that must be possible - even someone mainstream like Bassets could do one with all their varieties.

I'm not sure exactly what the cats would be counting down too as Christmas is a day where they are largely left to their own devices, but they do get a pull back and go mouse to play with for the final day.  I'm not sure that will be as popular as the edible surprises though, but we shall see.

Special Oatmeal Stout (@TebayServices Westmorland Service Station) [By @SpectreUK]

This Special Oatmeal Stout was brewed by the Coniston Brewing Company in Cumbria. I have previously enjoyed their CAMRA Supreme Champion Beer of Britain 1998 called Bluebird, so I was really looking forward to trying this stout. I noted on the label that this beer was best drunk at 58 degrees Fahrenheit in a pint glass at the Black Bull Inn, in Coniston. However, I am based in Wolverhampton, in the West Midlands, so had to cope with whatever degrees Fahrenheit our fridge decided it was running on that day and my trusty pint sized pottery beer mug.

At 4.5% volume this stout was brewed with Coniston Brewery’s local Lakeland water, Challenger Hops, roasted Crystal and Pale malts, yeast and sugar. The label stated that oats were used in the grist, which is grain that has been separated from its chaff in preparation for grinding, to give this stout even more of that heavy filling feeling that stouts are common to, whilst enhancing the roasted barley flavours and giving the beverage a smoothness that I was certainly looking forward to sampling. On opening the 500ml bottle there was a malty dark chocolate smell with a smidgen of coffee. First taste displayed the expected hoppy bitterness that the mere mention of Challenger Hops promised, with an added dominance from the Pale malts morphing into a dark chocolate flavour that ended with a bitter twang of coffee. This flavour journey of bitter hops, roasted malts, succulent chocolate and rich coffee smoothed out to a luxurious chocolate malt aftertaste. This was a beautiful bitter black gold stout that deserved an award of its own. There was something about this lip smacking, warming, belly rubbing stout that left me fulfilled, comforted in the dark bosom of heavenly stout with a lesson that all master brewers can learn from, and yet wanting just one more bottle to make sure... well, maybe just another after that.

By Spectre