St. Feuillien Brown Ale (Marks & Spencer’s) By @SpectreUK

I have pork chops tonight. You're probably thinking that's not such an interesting meal, but pork chops and gravy with potatoes and veg done right are literally my favourite gravy meal. I'd probably have pork chops, two at least, as my last meal.

I always thought my mom did the best pork chops. I'd ask for pork chops every time I visited. She's pretty old now and we seem to meet halfway between our homes at a Hickory's Smokehouse more often than she cooks now. Cinabar offered the other week to cook me pork chops. I challenged her that my mom cooked the best pork chops, and so Cinabar goes and knocks my challenge out of the park.

I fancy a brown ale with my pork chops tonight. This Belgium Reserve Brown Ale, St. Feuillien (Saint Foo-Yen) should fit the bill very well indeed. At 8.5% in volume, this brown ale was uniquely top-fermented and has been brewed by the Friart family since 1873, keeping with the original traditions of production.

On opening the bottle there was a heavy malted barley aroma from the deep brown ale inside. Pouring with a frothy head, St. Feuillien had the strong wholesome flavour of sweet malted barley. Heavy on the malts, this brown ale barely had a hint of herbal bitterness. Those luscious biscuity malts just kept on giving right through to the aftertaste.

If you like your smooth sweet malted barley brown ales, this St. Feuillien is definitely for you. I know I'll certainly have a bottle or two in my beer fridge as often as possible from now on.

Cadbury Dairy Milk & More - Nutty Praline Crisp (Iceland) By @Cinabar

This is the second new bar from Cadbury, and as much as I love a new chocolate bar, this one sounds weirdly similar to the last. The first bar was Cadbury Dairy Milk & More - Caramel Nut Crunch, and this one is Cadbury Dairy Milk & More - Nutty Praline Crisp. They are both variations on nuts with chocolate. I love nuts and chocolate, so I’m not really complaining, but I also think it is strange to launch two bars like this at the same time.

This bar, as opposed to having nuts in it, has smooth praline with a crispy wafer. I am all about the texture when it comes to chocolate bars, so I couldn't wait to give it a try. I broke a strip off, and even as I did this, I noticed the light snap of the wafer, which was very appealing. The bar itself is full of smooth praline, but the wafer is light and crispy, and that mix of textures made me smile. The smooth, nutty flavour with the chocolate was also a dream. There is lots of nut flavour, but the crunch is just from the wafer. I really enjoyed this Cadbury Dairy Milk & More - Nutty Praline Crisp bar. That mix of texture and the sweet chocolate were just lovely. I’m looking forward to seeing what else comes out in the Cadbury Dairy Milk & More range, and I’m still hoping they introduce some new flavours too. 

Filbert's Snack Salami - Chorizo & Sea Buck Tonic [@NLi10]

 I was on the beach watching my partner do some sea kayaking and fancied a snack. The shop facing the sea had all the normal things, like the Feast I had, and they had bar snacks by Filbert's too!  So naturally I picked up a Salami (but for later on)

The Filberts olives work out a little expensive but are much more portable than the jars and plastic tubs from the supermarkets.  You know - for those picnics in the woods (or more likely bar snacks).

Enjoy with an IPA! Nope - we got some dirty tonic.

This Sea Buck Tonic was hidden away in one of the little local St Ives brewery shops with all the pirate themed spirits.  We did pick some of those up too as presents but I got this as a taster then intended to get more later (but failed)

Golden Wonder Spicy Bikers (Cost Cutter) By @SpectreUK

Do you ever get that feeling of one packet of crisps isn't enough? I do love gorging on crisps sometimes. It's the same with biscuits. I manage my calories and workout like a madman so I can eat healthy for the best part, and gorge sometimes for a treat, but still stay in the realm of my allotted calories.

These Golden Wonder Spicy Bikers should go rather well with my roast pork and mustard sandwich at lunchtime. From the colour of the packet and some of the ingredients of paprika, nutmeg and black pepper, I'm thinking barbecue spices. These maize flavoured crisps are baked not fried for a bit of a lean towards healthiness, even if they don't expect you to eat the whole packet. I like how they mention on the back that they have ramped up the flavour 'by 360 degrees' to make them 'wheely great'.

On opening the packet there was sweet onion and a touch of garlic to the orange paprika coloured maize wheels inside. With added spices of nutmeg and black pepper, there was a medium heat to these Golden Wonder Spicy Bikers. Moreish to an extreme, I found myself chomping through the whole packet of these 'wheely great' maize crisps in no time at all.

Information on the packet; The 50g bag contained 119 calories per 25g, with 5.2g of fat, 0.9g of sugar, and 0.22g of salt. Please see ingredients in photograph.

Extra Cream Custard Creams (Marks and Spencer) By @Cinabar

When I first heard about these biscuits, I thought they would be giant biscuits, but the biscuits are the same size and the filling is double. This still sounds like a formula that could work. The latest creation from Marks and Spencer are these Marks and Spencer Extra Cream Custard Creams. There are 12 biscuits in the pack, and I opened them up to take a look. There is a photo with a ruler for scale. There is definitely extra cream, but not quite as much as I imagined; maybe I’m just greedy.

I gave one a try, and what I hadn’t expected was that there was a much stronger, creamy custard taste. It really is much more noticeable than I had expected. These are so creamy, and the custard is my favourite element, so these were a dream. There was a slight change in texture, with a more soft filling and a stronger crunch. I liked that too, but seriously, these Marks and Spencer Extra Cream Custard Creams biscuits are all about the custard filling. I hope they don’t stop these, as I’m not sure I could go back to regular, thin Custard Creams.