| The Wife has called an end to this madness declaring it a disgrace that I haven't done a Biscuit of the Week since last year. With summer finally here and the prospect of lots and lots of cycling the natural processes that keep my midriff in equilibrium stand a chance, that is eating biscuits and getting from A to B. So with out further ado lets take a look at a wafer biscuit that we've inexplicably managed to pass over for many a year the Blue Riband.
What do you know I set my self up for a well earned biscuit only to find the Blue Riband has positioned itself as some form of calorie counting biscuit. Yes this assemblage of wafers milk chocolate, wafers and some nameless brown stuff between the wafers, bills itself at 99 calories per biscuit. Fine, but we'll come back to that. Right now let's rip into one and see what's going on before we start picking through the details.
Well no sooner have we started and its over, blink and you could have missed the whole thing. Casting my mind back a few seconds I realise that the Blue Riband does have a distinctive and overriding flavour. You are going to be underwhelmed when I say it tastes strongly of wafer, but it really does. Perhaps more so than any other wafer based biscuit I can think of. With distinct notes of well toasted bread crusts the wafer here is providing much more than a simple carcass on which to pour milk chocolate, its an equal partner in the taste. Of course all that wafer disappears at the slightest munch causing the Blue Riband to do a vanishing act in our mouths.
Whilst wondering about why its called a Blue Riband it transpires that the biscuit was launched in 1936 one year after the creation of the Blue Riband trophy awarded to ships that made the transatlantic crossing in the fastest average time. So maybe the speed at which these things go is captured in the name.
At 99 calories each they reckon each provides 5% of the daily intake, that's twenty a day then! Also I think as an adult male I get another 200 calories on top of that so I could have another one pretend we are still on 2000 and it would be like it never even happened. Nestle have anticipated this with a cunning scam, they only put 9 in a pack. Check my maths but I make that you are forced to buy 20 packs and eat nothing else for ten days solid if you wanted to live on Blue Ribands and not have any left over. Whether that is physically possible, or happens routinely I don't know.
For the sake of a sanity check lets compare the Blue Riband to a proper wafer, something you can consider eating one at a time and not feel that you missed something, the mighty Tunnocks Caramel. Not only is it considerably bigger but our Tunnocks tipped the scales at 34g whilst the Blue Riband managed a paltry 18g. There you have it the are only about half the weight of a proper wafer.
Not only can I justify having another but I've just proven that I've only really had half a normal wafer.
Actually I've got a Tunnocks here, kettle on, I think I'l have that instead. I know, I know that makes 1 and a half wafers or something..
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