Lu Mikado
Tuesday 3 Jun 2003
	Well, well, well. What a hectic week its been so much so that our biscuit of the week is long over due. Which is very naughty when you consider that the Wife and I trekked all the way to France in a covert mission to obtain them. They are none other than the fabled and much sort after 'sticky', as in 'like a stick' not 'adhesive', Mikado. See they do exist and there is the picture to prove it! As it turned out it was leading French biscuit outfit Lu, who were making them all along. We picked up a packet of the Dark Chocolate and the 'Nouveau' Milk Chocolate. Looking like nano-bread sticks that have been dipped in chocolate, or over dressed sparklers, the Mikado is an extremely dainty little biscuit. I suspect that it is actually a fairly near relative to the Pretzel, given its diameter. In fact if you unrolled a Pretzel knocked off those big salt grains and dipped it in chocolate you would get something almost identical. You would, of course, also have amazing powers of biscuit straightening, which I hope you would use to fight crime and injustice in the world, although the opportunity would probably never arise. Also I do know you can get chocolate covered Pretzels. So what to do with the Mikado. Well being so closely aligned with the Pretzel you aren't going to able to substitute them for a meal, no matter how easily they are consumed. Given its appearance and mass its probably not going to be the sort of thing to give to your builder with his mug of tea (3 sugars please). I would consider building large load bearing structures from them based around tetrahedra by fusing the chocolate ends together, I expect. Or maybe you could poke them into ice-cream, I don't know thats just a guess. As for the obvious question I know you're all wondering, 'Who would win in a fight between a Jacobs Mikado and a Lu Mikado?'. Well my money would be on the Jacobs, although the Lu could probably inflict grievous stick shaped holes in the jam and marshmallow of the Jacobs.  Your feedback 8 messages

Foxs Chocolate Viennese
Sunday 18 May 2003
	Well we've returned to good old blighty this week for our biscuit of the week. Inspired by last weeks Romany Creams our packet of Foxs Chocolate Viennese found itself leap frogging up the queue of review biscuits, to find itself on Sunday afternoon tea and a sit down duty. Anyone who was lucky enough to have a biscuit selection tin from Marks & Spencer this Christmas will have been treated to a few of these biscuits as Foxs make a large part of the M&S range. So as you might expect these biscuits fall firmly into the the little treat niche. Described on the pack as 'Buttery biscuits sandwiched with real Milk Chocolate', Foxs have done a fairly able job of summing up these little treats. The biscuits have a lovely buttery crumble to them and the chocolate provides not only a rich milk chocolate flavour but real structural integrity as it completely adheres the two biscuits to one another. It actually appears that the chocolate may have soaked a little way into the biscuits. About the only point I would make against these is that they can be quite cloying on the throat, however a nice cup of tea will instantly sort this minor issue. There are certain biscuit packs that you know are going down in one sitting. This is such a pack. With a mere ten biscuits, each of which is utterly incapable of putting up a real resistance to a biscuit eating onslaught, there can only be one outcome. Total biscuit consumption.  Your feedback 1 message

Romany Creams
Monday 12 May 2003
	Well we have just finished off this weeks box of review biscuits, and very nice they were too. All the way from the Republic of South Africa, came a 200g box of Bakers Romany Creams. The Bakers logo features a little man, 'The Bakersman', with receding hair and a pencil behind his right ear, adorned in an apron. He says on the pack 'I've been there, on all those packs of Bakers Biscuits you know and love, through everyone's childhood, a part of all the best memories'. Sentimental old chap this Baker. He also appears to sponsor Mini Cricket according to the pack. Describing themselves as crunchy choc coconut biscuits, the Romany Cream is a sandwich biscuit with a filling of smooth chocolate cream. Now as you may know I'm not a fan of coconut in biscuits, with the 'Nice' biscuit representing perhaps the most loathsome example. However, after the recent Anzac review maybe I'm mellowing in my old age. The texture of the Romany was truly unique, the closest thing I could compare to would be a Foxs Viennese finger with a slight aldenté edge afforded by the finely divided coconut. The back of the pack displayed a recipe for chocolate cream pie, instructing one to crush the whole pack and to combine with butter to make a biscuit base. I have no doubt that this would produce a killer pudding. Despite majoring on the chocolate theme the overall chocolate taste was low key with the coconut easily holding its own. When put up against a nice cup of tea the Romany Creams started to disappear at quite a rate. The biscuits themselves are quite small and I would think it not indecent to consume them in two mouthfuls. The pristine example of a Romany Cream on the pack front did not prepare me for the appearance of the contents. Rattling around in a bag in side the box the meant that the chocolate cream filling was quite hard to spot being covered as it was in a layer of biscuit crumbs. Now I don't mind this for a minute as it means less packing. In fact I would think it would be quite good sport to eat boxes of the things trying to find one that looked the same as the one on the box. Ok, now to the nitty gritty, why are they called Romany Creams? Sorry I really don't know. What an earth the particular association between the Romany people and crunchy choc coconut biscuit is I can't even begin to guess at. Why they are so typically South African? Don't know either. Can you get them outside of South Africa. Don't know. Yes I know this is not much of an exhaustive reference of the Romany Cream,but as I said we enjoyed the biscuits. Thanks to Nick Alliwell for getting us the Romany Creams to us.  Your feedback 3 messages