Bounce Energy Balls - coconut & lemon; almond & kale (@NLi10)

Holland & Barrett are a great store for little healthy snacks - and I always meant to pick up more of this Bounce Energy Ball range - so while they had a 2 for one deal on I picked a few up.

I’m using my Guatemalan snack people for scale.

First up we have coconut and lemon protein crush.  As long as we understand that energy and calories are essentially the same thing and that most seeds and nuts are protein then we can ignore the blurb and dig right in!

Here we see that its quite a pale flat ball, but its covered in the coconut and it goes pretty deep too.  The lemon flavour is certainly present but it’s not as ‘lemon drizzle cake’ as I expected. It’s not quite bitty enough for me and has quite a flat texture, but it’s really nice and fills the ‘7pm and still at work’ gap nicely.

From another evening we have the newer V-life packaging of the Bounce range.  I think this is more a rebranding than a separate range as it’s the same kind of thing. 

The Guatemalan snack people are worshiping the kale here - although you can’t really taste it.  This is more of a ‘bird feeder’ ball than the other having a lot of different textures and tastes and it’s a lot more fun to chew because of it.  The flavour isn’t quite as sharp as the previous one though so both have their pluses.

Both are good purchases - especially at the discount rate - and I’ll keep a supply on hand.  They are all quite samey so it’s not worth reviewing every single variety, but I’m bound to get through them all eventually!

Tom Yum Noodle Pot (Marks and Spencer’s) By @SpectreUK

I first found out I love Tom Yum noodle soup from a Thai restaurant in town. They made the best Tom Yum soup I've ever eaten, and it's sadly never been surpassed. As far as I could tell it was made with coconut milk. It had small pieces of chicken, diced Spanish Onion, a chopped tomato, button mushrooms, baby sweetcorn, a few noodles and a couple of pieces of hot red chilli. I tried to emulate this with these ingredients myself. I used to make Tom Yum soup from paste I found at a Chinese market, but without the coconut milk. I used to use all the paste and a huge amount of ingredients filling a large saucepan with Tom Yum soup, which would take ages to eat and appealed to my Scooby Snack greediness. The pot noodles flavoured with Tom Yum paste since have been a welcome gap, but non-the-less, not to the restaurant's standard and no coconut milk in sight.

This Tom Yum Noodle Pot was produced for Marks and Spencer's. I opened the cardboard pot and peeled back the plastic lid to find a solid block of egg noodles and a sachet full of dark brown goop, which I presumed was the Tum Yum paste. The instructions on the label stated to add the dark brown goop (paste) and then freshly boiled water. It stated for a more 'intense flavour' to add the water to the 'lower fill line', but I couldn't see that for the solid egg noodles. I did, however, add the water to the top of the noodles instead of the line at the top of the cardboard pot. I poured the freshly boiled water over the brown goop (paste) to make sure it dissolved into the noodles instead of sitting on top of them. I replaced the plastic lid for a few minutes, a little longer than the suggested two minutes, but I had to make a sandwich…

The noodles had softened and soaked up much of the brown liquid soup. The egg noodles and added sweetcorn had mixed well with the Tom Yum paste and hot water. It certainly was tasty and had a Tom Yum ring to it, but I couldn't help wishing I'd added more water for a wetter soup, rather than liquid that had all been soaked up by the noodles. Having said that, there was more liquid at the bottom when I ate most of the noodles. I also found that much of the brown goop (paste) had accumulated there with all the diced cabbage. This made for a very 'intense' end to this Tom Yum noodle soup!

I may have to go back to that restaurant some time, either that or find some Tom Yum paste from a Chinese market, and this time some coconut milk, and have a bash again myself…

Information on the pot;
The 99g pot had 322 calories, with 8.2g of sugar, 5.6g of fat and 3.43g of salt. Please see photographs for the ingredients.

Overnight Oats - Red Apple - Quaker Oats (@Morrisons) By @Cinabar

I love porridge, and have switched to having this for breakfast, call it the call of Autumn. I like to take the pots where you just add water and stir, simple for me to take to work and eat while browsing my email. I noticed that in the same section were some pots of Overnight Oats, which are very on trend at the minute so I thought I’d see what all the fuss is about.

It turns out that I don’t plan breakfast too well, and it took me a few days to remember I needed to prep these in the evening. The pack suggests that the oats should have milk added to them for between 2 and 12 hours and be refrigerated, you then eat it cold in the morning. I added the milk to the dry mix and left it to soak. The next morning I took it out, and sat down to give it a try with my morning coffee. The first thing to note is that this does need to be eaten at home as the soaking overnight can’t really be achieved at a work office, neither can the transportation of it after its been soaked.
I was a little wary of how this was going to work, but was pleased to see it had a least become moist and wasn’t solidified! The texture was much better than expected, and although it wasn’t a smooth as porridge, it was still much closer than I thought it would be. I could still pick up on a powdery edge to the texture, but it was mild. I liked the flavour, the Overnight Oats had been flavoured with Red Apple, and this gave it just enough natural sweetness to make it enjoyable. I have to admit though this was far tastier than I imagined, and it is a major trend, I’m not really a convert. Give me a hot bowl of hot porridge any day over this.

Nestle Whip - Delightful Mint (PoundLand) By @Cinabar

I am a big of fan of Nestle’s Walnut Whips, they are a lovely combination of chocolate, nut and soft mallow. I love to pick them up as a treat and keep an eye out for their blue boxes, particularly at Christmas. What caught my eye this time was a green box, and a Delightful Mint edition. There is no “new” label apparent on the box, but I haven’t seen it before so I’m pretty sure it is.

The name of these chocolates is usually “Walnut Whip” but it has been shortened to just Whip as there are no nuts on top. I get that mint might not go well with walnut but I couldn’t help thinking the Whips looked a little bit naked, and could have done with some kind of decoration on top.
The chocolate is also dark chocolate, and not the usual milk I would expect from its nutty brother. Dark chocolate and mint though is a classic combination, think After Eights and those of us who are a little bit older the epic Pyramint.

The chocolate on the Whip is good and thick and still sweet despite the darker nature of the chocolate. The filling is lovely and fluffy, as you would expect from a product called Whip. The flavour is minty, and the tones of peppermint work well with the chocolate. Sweet and refreshing, and it made a really tasty treat. I really enjoyed this, I felt for my tastes the mint flavour could have been upped a notch, but ultimately this was a minty delight. Also the closest thing to a Pyramint I have seen in years, and if you don’t know what I’m talking about google it!
I have also picked up a box of the (new) Caramel version of Nestle Whips, and I’ll be writing about those very soon.

Hello Kitty, Candy Kittens & Spooky Plates @CANDYKITTENS_UK (@NLi10)

I know it's not Halloween yet, but sometimes you see something that's really perfect for trick or treaters and you have to share ahead of time.

Holland & Barrett have lots of really healthy treats with which you can disappoint Trick Or Treaters on the night (mmm Carob) but here I found something that I'd actually be happy to finish if no one came round, tucked on the bottom shelf in my local H&B store.

I think this bag was about £3 (I really must take more pictures of things on store shelves!) which seemed a little steep but as my sister likes Hello Kitty and we were visiting that evening I decided it was too good to pass up.

These are also Vegan, veggie and gluten free so you aren't going to have any parents complaining that little Johnny swelled up like a balloon after you gave him mysterious sweets.

They are also all natural flavours and colours (which is what you'd hope from something that is mostly sugar). I always hope for things that say 'all supernatural flavours/colours' but I've yet to see this.

It's official Sanrio licensed stuff which explains the slightly higher price.

Spooky Plate Ghost approves!  As you can see they are nice little cat head shapes (!) with CK for Candy Kittens on them which is a nice touch, but I'd expected more HK branding inside.  Not really disappointed though because these tasted great! The texture is much more to my liking than 'normal' jelly sweets and are similar to gummy things I had in my childhood (I'm sure that my parents avoided the gelatine back then too), and the flavour is strong but not overpowering.  

These are something I'm hoping to buy again (I got the last bag!) before Halloween but as I ate these in September I've got a few weeks yet before I need to pick them up.  I'm not sure how easy it is to hand these out at the door, but a bag on the table with four of us eating them lasted all night with a few left over so it's a decent sized portion.

Well worth hunting for, especially if you have vegan/gluten free ghouls to feed or just like the Hello Kitty style.