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Kcal 275 Fat 11.3g Carbs 41gI hadn't had a Double Decker for years but by popular demand and many requests today I bucked that trend and purchased one on my way to work.
The Double Decker is one of the bigger bars you will find in your local newsagents. It weighs in at a hefty 60g (slightly less than your average Snickers at 62.5g) - its interesting to note that although not the highest in fat per 100g in comparison to other bars it certainly packs a punch in Carbs; over 41g which I can tell you without looking will mostly be sugar.
Despite its size the bar was distinctly lacking in smell when opened. It had a faint sweet chocolately smell but that aside the lack of aroma was surprising and hardly whet the appetite.
The Double Decker consists of 3 main components: an outer layer coating of Cadburys Milk Chocolate, a thick layer of nougat and a crispy cereal like base. The Nougat is intresting, it has a flavour that it hard to pin down; it has a dominating chocolate flavour but with a hint of coffee. Unfortunately the flavour of the nougat is particularly sweet tasting and due to the sheer amount packed into the bar it was unsurprising that the taste became rather sickly by the end of the whole bar. Texture wise the nougat avoided being overly chewy and was quite light in comparison to other alternatives.
The outside coating of the bar is your typical great tasting Dairy Milk, unfortunately the thickness of the coating was not substantial enough and its flavour was quickly engulfed by the aforementioned plentiful nougat. This is something that Cadburys should really address.
The cereal base is where this bar really shines. It is absolutely delicious and is remarkably similar in taste to rice crispy cakes - you know the ones you used to make when you were little ;) The base provides a nice crunchy element to the bar and is fused well together by a small, but greatly proportioned helping of caramels. This ensures the layer doesn't simply crumble away but still avoided being overly sweet. This element of the bar could, and certainly should be applied to other parts of the Cadburys range; I could see this working particularly well replacing the wafer element in the Cadburys Picnic!
Overall a filling bar that just needs a slight adjustment in its ingredients proportions to make it a top 5 contender. The nougat for me is too dominant and makes the bar ever so slightly too sweet tasting by the time you have finished it. The soft nougat texture against the crisp cereal base works particularly well, and as mentioned above the cereal base element is certainly something that greatly helps this bar achieve a greater than average score. Its a story of nearly but not quite for the Double Decker...The Chocolate Mission continues :)
8.5 out of 10
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22 comments:
This is another one of my favourite bars, but agree with you about the choclate to nougat ratio, should definately be a bit more chocolate on the outside and a bit less nougat on the inside. Such a nice and filling bar though, and good for when you need to get full up quickly, especially before a lecture :D
So so true Colin...theres probably no better bar to have before a two hour lecure on Busines Economics *Snore* it certainly does the job in that aspect.
Cheers for reading fella always nice to know your thoughts!
I love the Double Decker bar but agree with the issue over the thickness aspect.
I can remember years ago the DD bar had a thinner nougat top..before making it as large as it is today. Can anyone else recall the advertising they had with it?
Colin Hey Colin I am with you on this still! A thinne nougat would make it all the better!
I have had a look at some old school double decker adverts... and found this one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JbYstLqsv0E&eurl=http://www.chocolatereview.co.uk/choctalk/index.php?topic=1317.30
You had any luck!? Was this the one you meant?
Thanks for the input
Jim
Hey Jim,
yeah i agree with the nougat, i liek double deckers too but am sure the nougat top was a little less at one point.
I wasn't aware the Picnic had a wafer in it - isnt it just peanuts, chocolate, raisins and caramel?? The lion bar has a wafer but thats nestles lol
Alan
Alan no matey im pretty damn sure the picnic has a wafer in it! hmmm I will have to check but im pretty sure - it varys by country I know that!?
jim
i didnt know it varied by country lol im sure the uk version doesnt though- you don't mention it in your review of them just cripsie bits and caramel, peanuts and raisins. it would be a more even shape surely if it did?
cheers
alan
Alan Yep there is a different 'Picnic' out in Australia I believe! Im not too sure of the differences but I will inform you when I review it of course :)
You are indeed correct...no wafer...just the rice crispies!!
lol I think I can be forgiven! Im nearly hitting 300 different bars of chocolate this year :D crazy huh!
Cheers Pal!
Jim
Hi Jim,
Did you know that Double Deckers actually originally had raisins in the bottom? Until 1986 when 'consumer research' heralded the present cripsy base? I'd be fascinated to know what they tasted like! lol
I'm not sure where the caramels you talk about are though- i wasn't aware they had caramels in the base lol they don't mention them, just a crispy cereal base.
cheers
alan
Alan That is a nice little fact isn't it! Hopefully someone who once tasted the one with raisins in will swing past one day and enlighten us on how the taste differed. Personally I think the raisins sounds great.
The caramels that I talk about are the substance that is used to fuse the crispy base together... I didn't mean that there was a layer of caramel.... just a sticky sugar like substance holding the cereal together ... aka caramel lol!!
Hope that clears it up for you
Jim
hey jim,
yeah i always liked the sound of the raisns too!
ahh lol i didnt think you meant a layer of caramel i actually thought you meant some of the balls were caramel and not all crispies lol i just thought the base was made up of a chcolate mixture lol obviously not lol
cheers
Alan
Alan As far as I am aware the crispies are just crispies. Im 99% sure the base is fused together using a sticky sugar mixture aswell as a chocolate coating....well I thought so at the time when I was reviewing it anyway!!
Jim
I used to eat these all the time when I was at school, and yes the ones with Raisins in were much better than todays slightly more bland descendants. "Bring back the raisins" is all I can say.
Jolinarmalkshur
CADBURY you heard the man! We want raisins!!! I can't say I ever tucked into a DD that had them but I can imagine they added a nice little extra dimension!
Thanks for the input! I am aware that a lot of companies brand teams check out this site and are always looking for consumer feedback ... so it is well worth leaving a note!
Thanks
Jim
I remember the raisin version too, thought I was going mad and had imagined it but seems I wasn't wrong after al!.....
All these years buying DDs and they never quite seemed the same, constantly disappointing because there were no raisins!!
Bring them back Cadbury - you heard us.....
I was very disappointed by this bar. It looked so tasty, but when I opened the wrapper, I was a little disenchanted by the lack of any aroma.
Then when I bit in to it, I also found that the bar had too much nougart in. Made the bar far too sweet. The base, while having a nice texture, didn't taste of anything, and I didn't think the chocolate coating taste very good either.
Won't be getting this one again.
Until about Jan 2011 i worked on the line at Somerdale that produced Decker and Picnic. Must say the bars tasted much better fresh off the line than having been in a wrapper for weeks. The original Deckers had a crushed base of cornflakes, crispies and raisins with a choc mix, far superior to the cheaper cereal choc mix of now. ALL the products were better prior to the 1980's, when cheaper ingredients were introduced. The bars are also a good deal smaller too, look at Wispa, the size now is a disgrace.
Double deckers did have raisins and were much much tastier then.... I dont eat them since the change
I didn't much like them with Raisins and picked them out as a kid
Wispas havent changed size, in fact I read that when they were trialled back in the early 80's people found them too big so they were reduced slightly for the permanent launch. In fact judging by several vintage Wispa wrappers theyre actually bigger now than in the 80's! Double Deckers certainly are. A DD of the early 80's weighed a miserly 48g.
Hi Alan,
They maybe longer now but they are not bigger. The Wispa in the eighties (certainly late eighties) was a surprisingly tall and deep affair!
Andrew
Like many of you people, I was let down incredibly by this bar.
It smelt nice when you put it right (and I mean RIGHT) up to your nose, which was ok. The outside chocolate layer was (as Jim said) too thin, and its flavour was overtaken by the tasteless (in my oppinion) nougat, which sadly made up most of the bar. The biscuit bottom didn't do a lot for me either taste wise, but did add a nice crunch. The bar was comfortably filling, but I feel I got no real tasty pleasure from this bar - just some acceptable texture and a feeling of content from the chunkiness of the chocolate.
I won't be buying this again.
-Robslyer.
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