Snack Review: Cadbury's Picnic Share Block

Cadburys has revamped the look of their iconic chocolate blocks, and advertising that the new shape means you are getting more chocolate, as well. Personally, I love the new fun packaging as they carry on from their Joyville campaign into this new Joyful one, and the pictures are adorable, as you can see below.

Advertisement image from Cadbury's website

From the pictures, it seems like these are all the classic flavours we know and love, but when I was at the supermarket the other day I found something completely new and not really being advertised anywhere I could find online. I've seen hype on their Facebook page about bringing back the Black Forest flavour due to popular demand, and even that Coles is carrying an exclusive, limited edition new Cherry Ripe block. This article is the only place I've seen the new flavours announced, stating that they are "Picnic, Crackle, Strawberries and Cream, [and] Toffee Brittle".

Tahdah! New Picnic Share Block

As I have been a really slack food blogger, I didn't realise the new flavours were even a thing, and I was so excited to see a new Picnic product that I didn't even look over the display for other new flavours. Whoops. In my defense, I really love Picnic bars. They are hands down one of my most favourite Cadbury items, and if you let me, I'd pig out on them till I was sick. Still, I'll see if I can get my hands on the other new flavours for review next time I'm at the shops.

The texture of the back of the bar

This block is meant to be the flavours of the Picnic bar we all know and love, but in a different form. It states that it contains peanuts and rice crisps, just like a regular Picnic, but there are bits of toffee candy instead of the chewy caramel. Most of the ingredients are uniformly distributed throughout the chocolate and in generous amounts, as you can see in the photo above.

Cross-section of the block

So, what did I think? Well, it's a very tasty block of chocolate, definitely. It's hard not to like something with so much fun crunch and texture, with the added flavour hits of peanut and toffee. Still, I'm not sure I would consider it enough like a Picnic bar to warrant the name. I expected the higher chocolate to ingredients ratio, so that's not really what put me off. I think it was the lack of peanuts overall. As you can see above, they are not as plentiful as the rice crisps or the toffee, so you only get their flavour every couple of bites.

Post-taste. Ignore the terrible nail polish, please.

When I did manage to get peanut, toffee, and rice crisp in one bite, then it was very reminiscent of eating a Picnic bar. Picnic bars are chock full of peanuts, after all, so I consider that a major component of the experience. Overall, though, I'd say I was mostly picking up the flavour of toffee while eating this new block, and while delicious, it's not really what I was looking for from this. I would probably eat it again, and happily, but I feel it doesn't live up to my, decidedly very high, expectations.

Final Verdict

Tastiness: YUM!

Lives Up To Its Namesake: Every 1 out of 3 bites
Would Eat Again?: Yes, but wouldn't necessarily be my first choice
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 Reese's Peanut Butter Cups

Eating Things So You Don't Have To: Pizza Hut Cheeseburger Crust

I'm almost embarrassed this is my inaugural post, but here we go. Today I tried Pizza Hut's latest crazy crust offering, one boasting a mini cheese burger on every slice. This replaces the Hot Dog Stuffed Crust they offered for a limited time recently, which I did try at the time, so I'm able to compare the two. This is one of those fast food things where the novelty value is what draws you in, and, admittedly, I'm a pretty big sucker for these things. I'm willing to try most things at least once!

Screenshot of an ad from Pizza Hut Australia's website

Obviously, the question of the day is 'Is it any good??'. First things first, let's compare the ad to what I received. Above you see a pretty lush pizza with a good amount of toppings on a reasonable amount of crust, though not much more than you'd expect from a regular pizza. The cheeseburger meat is clearly visible beneath the slabs of tasty cheese, and of course it's all beautiful and picture perfect.

Okay, I ate a few before I even took a picture. I was hungry!

So, I'm definitely not a professional food photographer, but that is pretty different than the ad. I didn't even realise at first that I ordered the same Italian toppings as pictured, but hey, even better for a comparison! The biggest difference is the amount of crust surrounding the cheeseburger portions, and that the meat is invisible beneath the cheese because of it. They were also pretty skimpy with the toppings, but that's pretty par for the course with these fast food pizza places.

Close up. Not sure it makes it any more appetising.

The actual pizza section is quite small compared to normal pizzas, but it's more than made up for in volume by the cheeseburger crust. A few slices of this pizza is very filling! This was also true of the Hot Dog Stuffed Crust pizza, though the shape allowed a greater portion of the pizza part to remain instead of being replaced by the fancy-dancy crust.

However, the amount of bread surrounding and in between the mini cheeseburgers seems to add a lot of wasted space and bulk. It also made the experience a bit dry and bland overall, since there's so much plain bread involved. Comparatively, the Hot Dog Stuffed Crust improved the crust portion of the pizza, much like when you stuff the crust with cheese. Hot dogs are the perfect shape to be wrapped in dough and encircle a pizza, and so there's no dry, bready bits to work your way through just to get to the delicious meat. It tasted like there were some Pigs in a Blanket (Is my American showing? It's just hot dogs baked in a dough similar to pizza crust. ) that just happened to be attached to a kinda decent pizza.

Much tastier with sauces added.

My other major complaint is that while Pizza Hut included sauces with the Hot Dog Stuffed Crust, this pizza came without any extras. The cheeseburger patty itself was quite juicy, or at least greasy, in ways that hot dog meat generally isn't, so perhaps they felt sauces weren't required. Still, especially with the large amount of bread surrounding the meat, it was too dry to eat alone and enjoy the experience. After I tried the first one, I grabbed my sauces from the pantry, and they made the mini cheeseburgers palatable. I regret not getting a photo of a cross-section of the patty, since, while there was no grill char as pictured in the advertisement, it was a moist and enjoyable bit of meat.

I feel that the Hot Dog Stuffed Crust was not only much better executed overall, but it was also a lot tastier. The cheeseburgers are lost in the amount of crust, and I don't recall anything very memorable about eating them, especially drowned in sauce. If you handed me something similar without the added pizza, I doubt I'd want to eat more than one. The hot dogs, on the other hand, were quite nice and could stand on their own, since they are essentially Pigs in a Blanket. I felt it actually added to the pizza experience in a unique way, and is great for those late night cravings where you just can't decide between pizza and tubed meat products. I would definitely indulge in that more than once just for pure novelty.

Final Verdict

Novelty Value: High!
Tastiness: Enh
Would Eat Again?: Not likely
Rating: 2 out of 5 Peanut Butter M&M's