Easter Egg Round Up

[Pam]

This months edition of Foods Matter magazine (subscription only) has done a Easter Egg taste test, but hasn't scored them this time, as all were found to be satisfactory. Eggs available are:

D&D chocolates - mail order or internet order - eggs start off at £3.99 and they also do mini eggs, bunnies, animal shapes etc. D&D also do Carob eggs and bunnies. www.d-dchocolates.com (http://www.d-dchocolates.com)

Stamp Collection - Easter bunny £3.49 from Tesco, Waitrose and Sainsbury www.buxtonfoods.com (http://www.buxtonfoods.com)

Green & Black - Go for the small £2.99 one if you want totally dairy free. The Praline one or the chocolates one at £4.99 and £9.99 both have milk in the chocolates. Waitrose, Sainsbury, Tesco, Morrisons, Somerfield, Boots, House of Fraser. G & B also produce milk chooclate in the same factory.

Condel Catering - Mail order www.condelcatering.com (http://www.condelcatering.com) hollow eggs from £3.99 or available filled with truffles £12.95 and £14.40. Condel also produce milk chocolate.

Booja Booja - Grown up eggs with grown up truffles - £10.99 for 150g egg with 80g truffles or £14.99 for 150g of truffles in a hand painted papier mache egg from Kashmir. Available online or in selected health food shops, call Booja Booja 01508 499049 for local stockists.

Kinnerton - Bart Simpson or Bang on the Door eggs 50g egg, 50g fruit jellies £1.99 from Sainsbury, Waitrose, Woolworths. Luxury Egg in black packaging with coloured free from circles £4.99 for 210g of egg and chocolate bar - Waitrose or Woolworth marked as "The Careful Chocolate Company". www.kinnerton.com (http://www.kinnerton.com)

[Intolerant mother]

I got my daughter a After Eight Easter egg one year, and I'm pretty sure it was dairy-free (or I wouldn't have bought it). It had mini-eggs inside with the after eight mint filling.

[Pam]

I haven't checked this year but I have looked in the past and the After Eight egg shell contains butterfat. The After Eight mini eggs were also out last year, I think they possibly contained butterfat too - I got really excited when I saw those in Morrisons last year and was disappointed to find that they weren't suitable. I wish someone would introduce a creme egg sized dairy free egg of some sort. We've got the cadburys mini-eggs sorted with Whizzers speckled eggs a few larger eggs but nothing as an in between size.

I've been on a bit of a hunt this morning and found the smaller Kinnertons eggs in both Woolworth and Sainsburys but no large ones. Sainsburys also had some G & B plain eggs and I saw some Stamp Collection bunnies but I can't remember if they were in Sainsburys or Tesco. My large 24 hour Tesco superstore had no dairy free eggs, not their own free from ones or Kinnerton, though I think the Lindt 70% cocoa one is possibly dairy free (but didn't check the ingredients) and they had some of those. Poor show really, but at least there are dairy free eggs available now, a few years ago there were none to be had at all.

[matt]

i'm sitting in the corner in a huff:angry:

palmil carob bars. edible but not a patch on the real thing.:( i don't miss it really. if i say that enough then maybe i'll believe it.

never was really sure about the filling of the cream eggs. what the heck are they filled with? i mean i know it's loads of sugar but there's nothing in nature that looks like the filling of a cadbury's cream egg!:mellow:

[Copper]

I am sorry but I just can't bring myself to eat any carob bars - I tried one and thought it was yuk.

I have found one of those chocolate covered marzipan bars in my local health food shop. It is sat waiting for that special moment - ie the time I need a nice treat.

[Pam]

Copper, I don't need a special time to treat myself, I'm far too piggy to save anything remotely tasty. The double choc chip cookies that I made yesterday have all gone, I can't wait to make some more.

Matt, those Plamil Carob bars are foul, I tried the unsweetened one and only managed a tiny nibble - the rest went in the bin. The Just So Carob bars are much better, mint is very mint and the orange and raisin one is good but the crispy one is a bit bland. I haven't tried any other carob but I know there is quite a bit out there to choose from. D&D chocolates do quite a range.

[matt]

yeah pam but look at the ingredients for the just so bars.....wheat flour!!!

thanks for reminding me that compared to choc plamil tastes like........editted for public.

i only eat the sweetened sugar one. couple of squares every now and then. i have to say my treat at the moment instead is to have a teaspoon of demera sugar!! it's the only sugar iuse for drinks unrefined. tastes far better than white!

i know it's not healthy to eat plain sugar but i must be allowed some treats, prob better than some of the sweets you can buy.

[JDArsenal]

I've found this website that do dairy free chocolate (suitable for vegans) - a bit more expensive than the average - but as they say on TV - We're worth it !!!


http://www.hotelchocolat.com

[Mac]

:drool: Oh my god :drool: that website is gorgeous!!! and the dairy free bit looked really impressive!! bit expensive, but you're right, we are worth it...........especially on occasions like Easter Sunday when everyone else is ramming chocolate eggs into their cakeholes. :lol2:

[Copper]

I have just found this site - where we could be spoilt for choice

http://www.alotofchocolate.co.uk/

[matt]

:rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: :rant: enough said!

[Angelic Light]

Hi there

Animal Aid supply vegan creme eggs if anyone is interested. They come in blackcurrant and banana flavour. My kids loved them this easter. I ordered them through the animal aid website.

"Cocoa Tree vegan creme eggs, full of delicious fondant and delicately flavoured with bananas or blackcurrant. Organic and fair-trade. Blackcurrant eggs are currently unavailable.
Price (javascript:OpenPrice()) £1.10 each"

http://www.animalaid.org.uk/shop/index.htm

Hugs
Catherine
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

[matt]

how much??? they must be damn good or big for that price. or am i just being a cheapscate?

why do i care i mean i'm not going to be able to eat one even if i did buy it.

[Pam]

I'll watch out for these next year, it's a shame we didn't know about them earlier. They are a bit expensive and with a minimum spend of £5 plus at least £3 postage you need to order quite a lot of stuff to make it worthwhile but they have a nice selection - including Booja Booja, so it should be quite easy to do.

[matt]

you're going to be able to resist for a year? i don't believe it. fiver says you find a reason to get some within the next month:lol2:

[Pam]

I'll need your fiver to be able to afford some at the moment. I rarely buy mail order as the p&p puts me off, I usually end up spending far more in petrol driving round the various health food shops in vain instead.

[matt]

isn't that the truth. i'd be a happy chappy if i could get everthing i wanted in one shop but life would be far less interesting that way.

going to be even more hassle in a fortnight when i move (atlast) have to sort out a new health food shop to get my scheese for me. and further to drive to the others.

congrats on 800 posts by the way pam. i'm just a little behind. snapping at the heels :lol2: right that's me done for the day. back on in the morning. have a good one.

[Pam]

I'm sure that you'll find a decent shop once they know how much you will be spending with them.

Doesn't seem very long since we were celebrating our 500 posts does it Matt? Things have really hotted up this year.

[Copper]

Buying mail order has to be restricted to holidays here - chez copper. I dread to think what the postman would do with mail order chocolate if I am not in!

[matt]

to be honest i don't like ordering any food either mail order or via internet shopping at tesco's etc. yeah ok i'm cranky but you just don't know how long the package has been sat in the sun....or that they stopped half way round tesco's for a half hour chat melting all the frozen stuff....and so on. much prefer being able to select for myself.

where do the posts go when you're having fun!:bleh:

[Pam]

I've never done an internet supermarket shop, I like to browse and wouldn't like my fruit and veg chosen for me - I like to pick the ones that I want according to how they look. I actually quite like traipsing around the supermarket as long as it isn't too busy. It is just putting it all away when I get home that I don't like and even Tesco don't do that for you.

[lyndamc]

I use Tesco.com when the kids are on holiday! My problem is with other peoples children in holiday times, they seem to just let their kids run riot. My children aren't perfect - far from it, but when we're shopping I expect them to behave. Another reason I use it is my son has dyspraxia (poss autism too) and if he loses sight of me he goes bananas and takes a long time to calm down. He has irrational fears of big cuddly toys, balloons and lots of other things that we're working on.
I don't buy any fruit and veg from tesco, I use local suppliers ie my sister is a farmers wife! Eggs come from a freind up the road and I get everything else from a farmshop nearby.

[Pam]

I know what you mean about shopping with children - and other people's children in supermarkets. I don't blame you for doing it online. I use it as an excuse to escape on my own for an hour and don't take the children unless I'm forced to, then it becomes a chore. You're lucky to have good suppliers locally, our local farmshop is so busy that it is like a supermarket anyway and the parking is horrendous so I never go there.

[lyndamc]

Theres nothing stopping me going shopping alone of an evening after tea but I'm too lazy! I like to get the children to bed by eight at the latest and slob out in front the telly or with a good book!