Coconut beer

Fair trade coconut beer from Belgium. 

Have you ever had coconut juice or water? It has the same smell as that, with the appearance you might find with a cloudy cider, albeit with a slightly yellower tinge. 

Coconut has a well-known taste: something that reminds you of a hotter climate, and more exotic fruits and foods. 

This beer definitely aims to hit those taste buds and amplify your other sense to make you feel like you are in a tropical climate. 

It doesn't taste like beer. It is more like a carbonated coconut drink with that bitterness that you get with a beer. But it's not overpowering in the slightest. As beers go, it isn't something that really showcases. But if you just want to show off an alcoholic beverage with a coconut taste, it isn't horrible, an there isn't anything else out there that I could compare it to that I know of. 

So a coconut fizzy drink could do just about the same job as this. In fact, it may just be worthwhile having a Malibu with sparkling water. It would have the same effect. 

:-)

Elky

Banana beer

Exotic beer with the flavour of banana. 

This beer has travelled all the way Belgium. It may be available in the shops over here in the UK but I wouldn't know as it was gifted to me. 

It has a lovely banana smell that I've also smelt before in banana liqueurs. It smells slightly flat with a hint of alcohol, but it isn't unpleasant. 

It's immediately sweet with an almost medicine-like taste, but the bitterness and sweetness help to cancel each other out slightly so it ends up being quite a refreshing taste. 

At 3.6% alcohol content, it's an enjoyable beverage on a hot day especially if you're looking just to have a sip of alcohol without actually getting drunk. As I am trying it now. 

:-)

Elky

Kit Kat - Passion Fruit, Strawberry and Matcha Green Tea & Cherry Blossom

Passion fruit flavour.

Have you ever had passion fruit? Or a passion fruit juice perhaps? The thing that strikes you first is the smell: it makes up about half of what the fruit actually tastes like. The passion fruit flavoured Kit Kat definitely has the taste of the fruit, but it doesn't smell like it. There is no doubt that the flavour is spot on, but the smell is almost citrus-like. What I can say is that it is delicious! The yellow colour of the bar is enticing and suits the flavour well!

Strawberry (Wa-Ichigo).

The teeny Kit Kats of Japan

The thing with strawberry flavoured foods is that they never have a nice smell unless you add something like vanilla essence. Strawberries themselves aren't that pleasant smelling; if you've ever made a smoothie with strawberries it can be very off-putting, and that's with the natural fruit. This Kit Kat variation has that artificial strawberry smell that you get from other strawberry products. Protein bars and shakes in strawberry flavour have been some of the worst that I've tried in taste smell and in looks. This Kit Kat is in the same shade of pink that I've seen the aforementioned products in, but having the Kit Kat logo stamped over it makes it a lot more appetising than them. Unfortunately, it has that same odd taste that artificial strawberry products have. Don't get me wrong, it tastes more like a strawberry and cream infusion, which is a lot better than other products in comparison, but it's lower down the list on recommend Kit Kats. 

Cherry Blossom and Matcha Green Tea flavour (Sakura Matcha).

I had a few questions before I tucked into this flavour as I wasn't sure of what it was apart from a little flower on the packaging. Which flower is this? The green chocolate doesn't exactly get your taste buds going, not in this shade anyway. Then again I loved the Green Tea flavour and it was a lighter version of this. Still, the green bar in the pink packaging is a big contrast, and before you've even taken a bite you might be wondering what you're getting into. 

Oh my goodness. What a treat. It has an overpowering taste that explodes in your mouth. Sure, it hasn't got much of a smell, which is surprising for a chocolate flavoured from a flower (plant / tree), but it has a creamy, silky feel and taste like no other chocolate bar I've tried. The crunch of the biscuit with the creaminess of the chocolate is a great fit and I would go as far as saying it is one of the best Kit Kat flavours I've ever tasted. It's so original compared to the other chocolates we have on the market including those more "gourmet" varieties. A very nice surprise! And this was all without knowing what flower the chocolate was flavoured by. 

It turns out (after a quick googling) that the Sakura Matcha flavour takes its taste from the Sakura, cherry blossom, and Matcha green tea combination. As I've said previously, when I tasted the Green Tea Kit Kat, I was a big fan, and this combo doesn't disappoint either. 

I tried three Kit Kat flavours from Japan, and they each had something different going for them. Although the Strawberry Kit Kat has nice packaging, it's my least favourite of the bars in this tasting as it has that artificial strawberry taste, smell and look. It still beats anything over in this country though.

The Passion Fruit Kit Kat automatically hits you when you take a bite. The smell alone isn't of passion fruit, but after it enters your mouth, you can't fault it. All the elements add up to give you a scrumptious passion fruit flavoured, biscuity chocolate. 

The final flavour was the biggest surprise for me. The pretty-in-pink packaging lulls you into a false expectation as to what the chocolate will look like; striking green is not your first guess. But this is what makes it the most intriguing. Add to that a flavour I can't quite put my finger on (or two in the case of these mini Kit Kats), yet it still being the tastiest out of the three, and I think it's a winner. 

:-)

Elky

With thanks to my "dealer" Rosa  over in bloggerland ;-)

Pan

Pan

After dinner mint equivalent?

This is the first time I've ever seen or heard of the leaf folded into a triangle shape and containing rose syrup, some kind of seeds, a jam substance and tobacco apparently. 

Every culture has there own delicacies and oddities, my own has uncooked, salted, dried meat with oregano. It sounds odd but I've grown up with it, and so I find it delicious! (It's called samorella or pastırma depending on where you're from). 

But back to Pan; I was recommended it by a friend after we had just had a late meal and apparently it is something you eat after such an occasion. What he didn't tell me was that it wasn't really a dessert, which was what I was expecting. 

Biting into a leaf is as you would expect, leafy. It isn't a salad leaf which is usually soft or crisp, but an actual waxy, chewy unknown variety. 

The gentleman making the parcels laid two leafs slightly overlapping each other and covered them with the seeds which varied from things you see in the supermarket but don't know the name of, to brightly coloured pellets that look like they'd come straight out of a candy store.  Even asking my friend what half of the things going into the parcel didn't really get me anywhere, apart from pointing out the one that was tobacco, which was slightly off-putting. 

Chewing the first bite of the Pan, I was hit by a bunch of different flavours and textures. I had the crunch of the seeds, the sweetness of the syrup and jam, a bitterness from the tobacco, a chewiness from the leaf and a shock to my senses. I can't really compare it to anything I've tried before, as there isn't really anything I know that is similar. 

The bitterness is with you while you chew, and swallowing the last bite of the Pan I couldn't see myself going out of my way to have it again, especially because of the tobacco aspect. 

However, as I drove off into the night, dislodging seeds from between my teeth (glamorous), the sweetness of the rose was still present, and for some reason, although I didn't see, smell or taste any hint of mint, my mouth felt minty-fresh which was quite pleasant. 

For people who are always looking for something new to experience, I would recommend trying a sweet Pan and maybe asking for it without tobacco. There's something off-putting to me about that element, even though I don't know the rest of the ingredients in the parcel anyway. 

There is also a plain Pan, which did not look as appetising as my leaf, and had none of the brightly coloured seeds or pellets, or jam, or rose syrup or most of the things I had to rave about. 

I won't be eating Pan again, but I am glad that I have tried it, because now I can say I have. 

:-)

Elky 

Green Tea Kit Kat

Green Tea Kit Kat

Green Tea Kit Kat

Kit Kat is awesome. They've released so many flavours and variations over the years to keep things fresh, and I find some of the most recent additions to be some of the best! (Hazelnut anyone?)

This has also meant they have released the not-so-nice flavours.  Coconut was the strangest, least appetising chocolate I've had the chance of eating recently. I thought it would be a crispy, crunchy Bounty; it wasn't. 

I'm a big peanut butter flavour Kit Kat fan and I added the hazelnut flavour Kit Kat to my top Kit Kat list. These are both 'Chunky' bars which means more chocolatey goodness! But breaks away from the original two / four-finger treat. 

Which brings me to my latest Kit Kat flavour find: Green Tea flavour!

My Giant hand size comparison

I'm not sure if it's available in the UK as it was gifted to me by Rosa and is covered in Japanese writing. What I do know is that it has an awesome creamy chocolate flavour, in a somewhat off-putting green tinge. The taste resembles that of those pink wafers (for some reason my mind jumps to a purple packet with the Pink Panther munching away on them) that sandwich a creamy filling of 'something', but with less of the stale texture or 'bite' that they have. 

The Green Tea Kit Kat actually doesn't have an overpowering green tea taste, in fact, it's very mild. It's a shame it doesn't exist in the UK, as I'd be one of the people that would go out of the way to find a bar, or recommend to a friend. 

Two things though: firstly, it would be nice to have it available in UK size; my hands engulf the tiny bars. And secondly, I don't think it would suit the Chunky range. In fact, just bring it over how it is Kit Kat! I want my Green Tea Kit Kat fix!

:-)

Elky

Special thanks to my Japanese chocolate dealer, Rosa, of http://www.rosainbloggerland.com/ :-)

Hairy Biker Brownie Bodge Bake

The weighing scale wasn't working properly. This meant when we tried to measure out our ingredients, we weren't really sure if having a barely-budging scale was a help or a hindrance.

My sister and I had seen 'The Hairy Bikers' on TV a week or two ago; they had made chocolate brownies. They looked delicious, and my sibling and I had talked about making them ever since. Today was the day we put the brownie where our mouth is. Where our mouths are. We ate brownies basically.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/bikers_chocolate_46736

We used 'The Hairy Bikers' recipe, as closely as we could. We had no fruit, but used a combination of dark and white chocolate, and walnuts. Melting butter was unexciting, as was measuring out ingredients; I left these jobs to my sister.

I dealt with manly things, like cracking eggs into a bowl and whisking them. I also whisked melted butter with (brown / Demerara) sugar before combining this with the beaten eggs. Then cocoa and flour was sieved and mixed into the sugary, buttery, caramel-egg liquid.

My arm still hurts. Never send a man to do a machine's job.

The "batter" got a nice helping of chunks of dark and white chocolate, as well as some chopped walnuts. We added these when the mix had cooled a bit so the chunks didn't go-to-goo before they hit the heat.

We parchment-papered a silicon baking square (it's not really a tin, and it's weirdly flexible) before tipping the mixture into the tray and putting it in the oven, making sure to set timers for 25 minutes.

The raw batter in the bowl tasted good.

When the buzzer beeped, I can't say I delayed in prodding the cake-like end-product eagerly. It needed another 7 minutes of cooking time before we took it out to cool, but there it was.

Brownie goodness. I don't know what 'The Hairy Bikers' brownies tasted like, but our attempt tasted very strongly of chocolate. There's a load of sugar, butter, and chocolate in this recipe so it definitely isn't low in fat, but that obviously isn't the point.

The square I had was so indulgent that I had to stop at one molten chocolate piece. I'm really looking forward to a cool, more solidified brownie tomorrow.

Bring on the breakfast brownie!

:-)

Elky

Curly Kale Crisps

All recipes state kale chips rather than crisps, but over here in Blighty we know them for what they do! They (are) crisp!

I read somewhere that kale was a new super-veg / leafy thing from the cabbage family sporting magical properties such as the same vitamin k content as 242 baby carrots and other similar super-facts which are actually accurate. I've been looking for more green in my diet for a while and was getting bored of the same old ways that I eat spinach or lettuce so this was a welcome new addition.

The first time I tried the it, I put a bit of olive oil in a pan and sweated off the kale until it was slightly wilted, and it was really quite enjoyable! This brings me to today. I've seen a bunch of recipes and videos on how to bake kale crisps that are as good as, if not better than, regular potato chips / crisps.

The problem with all of these recipes is that they start with whole kale leaves, which are then are ripped into bite-sized pieces. However, no matter how hard I look (my local supermarkets and markets), I cannot find it in this form. It is already pre-cut into thin strips, which is not ideal. But I tried it out anyway.

I started with my kale which I washed and drained in a colander. I then laid out half of my 200g packet on a tray with grease-proof paper / parchment paper and drizzled a bit of olive oil over the top. I also seasoned it with (too much) salt.

After 15 minutes in the oven at 180 degrees Celsius I nibbled on a few of the leaves and found them still ... leafy and hydrated; they hadn't crisped up yet, so I put them in for a bit longer. When I eventually took out the blackened, salty kale crisps, I was underwhelmed. It was like eating crispy seaweed, which is fine at a buffet but not something I go out of my way to find, make or eat.

Maybe it's because my batch was over-salted, or perhaps because the kale was thinly cut rather than in large crisp-shapes, but I don't think I'll be cooking kale this way again.

I will however be eating kale again. Two-hundred and something-or-other baby carrots-worth of vitamin-something? That's a big number, and I don't like carrots. Vitamin intake win!

:-)

Elky

Bacchus Belgian Cherry Beer

Oh cherry-flavoured everything. How sweet you are. I'm a die-hard Cherry Coke fan, in a can. I don't like the flavour that comes in a plastic bottle, and I'm yet to have found or tried a glass bottled Cherry Coke, but I digest (pun!)

This flavoured beer has the lovely essence of sweet cherries juxtaposed with the bitterness of beer. The balance is quite brilliant actually. It's surprising because beer usually has the ability of giving me a shudder depending on its bitterness, but not with this beer.

It comes in a lovely half-champagne, green glass bottle which is wrapped in a cherry themed paper. It really is something quite special.

The only thing I can pick on is its colour. It's on the darker side of brown / red. Like an off strawberry Ribena (I can't be the only one that's had it?). But I actually like the colour. And the taste. And the cool.

Cherry deliciousness!

:-)

Elky

Chilly, Chilli Chocolate, AMT and Me.

Apparently today, the 11th March 2013, is the coldest day in March since 1986. All I know is that it has been snowing on and off all day and it has been freezing cold!

Add to this the fact that, this evening, my train was cancelled and instead replaced by a bus service, I was in the mood for something hot to perk me up.

Enter the station shops: a pasty shop, Burger King, McDonalds, Wasabi and AMT Coffee. I decided since I had already had a Burger King meal for dinner that I should avoid anymore fast food and go for a nice hot chocolate instead. AMT wins!

To my amazement, I noticed that there was "chilli hot chocolate" on the menu, so I placed my order and waited for the gent to tip a packet of chocolate powder into a paper cup and continued to watch as he added hot milk and stirred.

Okay, so it wasn't the best production of a hot chocolate I have seen, in fact there was powdery residue on the inside of the cup, but that's not the point. It tasted good, and in that freezing cold was a blessing!

It was a nice chocolate flavour and had a slight kick from the chilli which helped to intensify the warmth it gave me. I would say that the chilli element must have been quite strong as my tolerance is quite high, so people that don't have such a tolerance to spicy may find it a bit much.

But to me it was just right! Thank you AMT Coffee for the Chilli Hot Chocolate on the coldest night of March in 27 years.

:-)

Elky