September 26th: Thorntons Chocolate Cakes

Kcal 179 Fat 9.8 Fat(sats) 4.2g Carbs 20.7g

If you have been reading the site lately you will be aware of my recent forays into the world of cake bars. Indeed I have recently reviewed products such as Mars and Cadbury Mini Rolls as well as Galaxy's original and caramel cake bar offerings. Today I decided to step up my investigation and get involved with these Thorntons Chocolate Cakes (to posh to be called Cake Bars I assume!?) which were on the same offer as the Thorntons Mini Caramel Shortcakes, at £1 a pack. These Thorntons Chocolate Cakes came described as 'chocolate sponge filled with a layer of chocolate buttercream and Belgian chocolate sauce, covered in Thorntons milk chocolate' ... sounds great huh!?

The cake bars (Yes I am going to call them that!!) came in a pack of five that I ate across the course of one working week with my mid-afternoon tea. Presentationwise the product looked all round pretty good and I liked the look of the glossy foil outer wrapper which incorporated a fine selection of tempting pictures and enticing product information. Inside the individual cakes were wrapped in separate wrappers which I liked as they had transparent windows so the inner product could be seen. I always think it is a good thing to be able to see the product in its wrapper as it reassures the consumer that what is inside is what is promised on the packaging - I think there is a lesson to be learnt here for a lot of other manufacturers. As evident in the photo above the cakes themselves also looked pretty stunning, though maybe a little squished thanks to being bundled into my work bag.

When I opened the plastic packets I was immediately met with a nice array of chocolaty scents which gave a nice insight to the taste of the product. What was immediate from the outset was that Thorntons had by no means skimped on the portioning of the outer covering chocolate. You can see from the above evidence it was wonderfully thick and it certainly provided a really solid base set of cream and chocolate flavours with its lovely smooth melt. On its own the inner chocolate cake may have been just a touch bland, though the inner chocolate syrup and chocolate buttercream gave it a lovely touch of moistness as well as an additional sweet chocolaty flavour burst. If I had a minor criticism it would be that the distinction between the chocolate buttercream and the chocolate syrup wasn't all that evident but I guess this may have just been a consequence of the cakes getting a little bit flattened in my bag before I ate them. Personally I thought that one cake was near enough a perfect amount to eat in one sitting. The cakes delivered a wonderfully rich chocolaty taste experience that left me feeling both satisfied and fulfilled which is pretty much all you can ask from such a product.

Overall these have definitely been the best cake bar type product I have reviewed so far and I think that another product is going to have to go some way to top them. From the out set I really liked these and the thickness of the outer chocolate meant that from the get-go these were never going to fail to deliver the all important chocolate hit. Below the outer chocolate the cake, syrup and buttercream elements combined to bring a nice variety of different flavours to the party and did so with a mixture of moist, dense textures that made for an altogether filling and tasty snack offering. As I have previously mentioned this pack of five lasted me a whole working week which I think at £1 is really good value for money given the quality of the product. I will definitely buy these again in thefuture and I recommend you do so yourself if your partial to a cake bar every now and then.

8.5 out of 10