Your ViewsKeep your e-mails pouring in, it's good to know that there are lots of you out there with views and opinions. To help you work out what is what, are now little icons to help you see biscuit related themes. And now you can see at a glance which are the most contested subjects via this graph (requires Flash 6.0 plugin). Please keep your mails coming in to nicey@nicecupofteaandasitdown.com | If you like, you can use this search thingy to find stuff that matches with any of the icons you pick, or use the fantastic free text search, Yay! | Your e-Mails |
Scott Crowther
Bourbon Review |
Hi
I just wanted your opinion on the glut of cheap imitation biscuits available in your average local corner shop.
Take my personal favourite biscuit, the bourbon cream for example. Usually, dimension wise, roughly twice as long as they are wide, with a deep and rich soft filling sandwiched between two crunchy chocolatey biscuits. Perfect for eating 'in the buff', or dunking in tea or coffee (although tea is always my choice), they are, quite simply, perfection.
Imagine my horror to be given a packet of 'Essential Bourbon Creams' as a gift from my father, purchased at his local corner shop. Sneakily packaged so that you cannot see the offending product through the wrapping, or even as an image on the outside, I was dismayed and disappointed to find a roughly square item inside, with a pale imitation of the dark brown colouring I was expecting. Having the driest and thinnest layer of filling ever tasted coupled with outer layers roughly twice the thickness of the norm, this 'Bourbon' (if you can call it that) sucks all moisture from your mouth instantly. A truly painful eating experience, even with a good cup of Tetley.
Can I suggest that a 'taste off' would be a worthwhile exercise to identify the best brand of biscuit, so that we may never again suffer the pain of eating a food item that dares to call itself a biscuit?
Naturally, I would happily volunteer to be a taster guinea pig - in the interests of science you understand.
Oh, and thanks to my Dad for the packet. I know it's the thought that counts, but frankly don't bother next time unless you have a 'nicecupoftea' bourbon buyers guide to hand.
Scott C
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Nicey replies: Well 61mm by 30mm 10 holes should be the metric to follow. Step outside that at your peril.
Anyone else called Scott want to mail us today? |
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Colonel ButterScotch OBE DSC MM
Bourbon Review |
Dear Sir,
I was delighted to peruse your site after having recently seen coverage of it in the daily periodicals to which I subscribe. It is indeed excellent and informative and a proper use of this new electro-telegram-mail that is popular with the young nowadays. However I was scandalised to read your rather disparaging review of the bourbon biscuit. Having been in a variety of institutions in my life where the tea and biscuits budget does not stretch to fancy dan "abbey crunch" or similar nonsense, the bourbon is the king of biscuits.
It's stout cocoa flavour and smooth cream feeling combined in a satisfyingly larger biscuit for the hungry person is divine. Two bourbons and a nice hot tea is as close an approximation of heaven on god's earth as YOU ARE LIKELY TO SEE! You may feel the bourbon lacks something but it is the very steadfastness of its flavour and unerring dedication to duty that is its strength.
Keep up the good work,
I remain your ob'dent servant,
Colonel ButterScotch OBE DSC MM
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Martin the Muncher
Bourbon Review |
Dear Nicey,
First up, thanks for a most excellent site!
Reading your Bourbon review reminded me I hadn't tried my wife's favourite biscuit of the moment. As a preamble to this mini-review, I must point out that, being lactose and gluten intolerant presents her with quite a challenge in the biscuit munching department.
Anyway, the biscuit in mind is the 'Trufree Bourbon Biscuit', available in Holland & Barret, GnC, Sainsburys and other stockists of 'alternative' fare. These are labelled as wheat, gluten, milk and egg-free, so the Mrs has no problems consuming them in great quantity; vegetable fat and soya flour seem to be the main substituted ingredients. The question in my mind was how they compare to the real thing. Sadly, the shelves of our local Sainsbury only yielded their own inferior brand as a reference so my study will remain slightly flawed.
Well, putting aesthetics first, the Trufree biscuit is shaped exactly like the real thing, right down to the 'BOURBON' stamped onto each side of the sandwich, although the biscuit is only about 2/3 the size of the traditional variety. Colour wise, the biscuits are slightly lighter and the filling slightly darker. Experiment proved that it is perfectly possible to eat these in the deconstructionalist manner (i.e. separating the biscuit and filling layers for separate consumption), although the adhesion of the components is adequate for consuming whole.
The texture, while firm, was lighter and crumblier, although not so 'gritty': the Sainsbury traditional biscuit has a lot of sugar crystals embedded in the biscuit. The filling seems about the same, but I suspect a higher coccoa content. Taste-wise, there is actually little to choose. Due to the lightness of the flour component, the biscuit part seems sweeter, although not unpleasantly so. The filling tasted like (and probably is close to) real chocolate.
The one drawback is that soya flour seems not ideal for creating a dunking biscuit with the result that the test sample dissolved. These are definitely accompaniments to rather than integral components of the Sunday afternoon tea and sit-down.
All in all, then a pleasant little surprise and Mrs will be dismayed to find her stash of these biscuits dwindling fast.
Keep up the good work!
Yours,
Martin the Muncher. |
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Chris
Bourbon Review |
Hi,
I have recently discovered your website, and I believe that it may, in fact, be the most impressive site I have come across which caters for the tastes of the biscuit enthusiast. However, I notice in your Bourbon review (dated 5/5/2002), you advocate that the lengh of a bourbon biscuit should form the basis of an SI measurement. This is an extremely good idea in my opinion, and one which might help us to visualise exactly how long things are in a more realistic and mouth-watering manner. However, as an example of its use, you suggest that one might say "that ocean liner is 7.6 kilobourbons long". Now, assuming a bourbon is approximately 7 centimeteres long (I didn't have a bourbon handy at the time of writing this, but after asking consulting 10 different people, we reached the concensus that 7cm would seem to be a reasonable estimate), 7.6 kilobourbons would be somewhere in the region of 532 metres. Considering that the QE2 is 294 metres in lengh, and the Titanic measured 269 metres, this figure would seem to be somewhat unrealistic.I feel that this error goes some way to detracting from the value of other information contained on the site, and in future, I suggest you consider what you write in your reviews far more carefully!
cheers! :) |
Nicey replies: Thanks for your concern Chris, but I was in fact thinking of an Ocean going Marmot liner (see the Giant Marmots section for an Ocean going Marmot tanker) which get to about half a kilometer long, depending on how much forage they consume. So I wasn't too far out was I? |
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