Cadbury Twirl is another of those bars that are best served chilled. A Cadbury Twirl is very much like a Flake, but covered with a smooth layer of chocolate. When chilled, it crumbles just like a Flake, but the outer coating helps to stop the crumbles flaking off and going all over your clothes.
You get two thin bars in each pack – so you can share if you want (yeah, right!), and the chocolate is typical Cadbury’s (Dairy Milk). The bars themselves appear to be made by folding very thin layers of chocolate on top of each other, leaving plenty of trapped air for that crumbly texture, so they’re very light.
I quite like the Twirl and have occasionally bought it in the past. It’s not the most interesting of chocolate bars, but it’s a nice little treat on a hot summer day.
I knew I was in trouble the moment the conversation started:
Dom: You know, we’re getting a fair few search hits for “deep fried mars bar” – I think you should write a recipe or something.
Me: *I* should write a recipe? Why can’t you do it?
Dom: I don’t own a deep fat fryer.
Me: How do you know I have one?
Dom: *pointed silence*
Me: *shuffles awkwardly, wondering if it’s too late to remove the photos of homemade chips from Flickr*
Deep-fried Mars bars hit the news a couple of years back, when it was reported that chip shops in Scotland had these cholesterol-laden “delicacies”. At first, it was thought their existence was solely an urban myth, but an NHS survey found that just under 1 in 4 take-aways in Glasgow had the battered chocolate bar on their menu. And now it was my task to recreate them in the comfort of my own home.
For those wanting to repeat my experiment, I should at first list a few safety pointers. Chip pan fires are responsible for more injuries due to household fires than anything else. A heating chip pan should never EVER be left unattended, not even for a moment. I have an electric chip pan (which is considerably safer) but can still be dangerous – at the risk of stating the obvious, chip pan oil gets VERY VERY HOT – only a sober sensible adult should be attempting this recipe (but not too sensible, or you wouldn’t be trying deep-fried mars bars, right?). This is not the late night snack of choice after getting home from the pub. Deep-fried Mars bars are just not as fun if they involve a trip to A&E or a visit from the fire brigade.
The obligatory safety notice done, we can now move on to the recipe.
You will need:
A chip pan (preferably electric – see above)- vegetable oil
- 4 tsp plain flour
- 2 tsp cornflour
- a pinch of bicarbonate of soda
- a small amount of milk
- a Mars bar (I used a mini Mars bar, in the hope of retaining the use of some of my arteries after eating, but there should be enough batter for a full size Mars bar)
Method:
- Place the plain flour, cornflour and pinch of bicarb in a small bowl and give it a good mix.
- Gradually add small quantities of milk, stirring it in, until you get a smooth batter – you’re aiming for custard-style thickness for a good batter.
- Dip the Mars bar into the batter, making sure it’s coated properly. Lift out, and allow the excess liquid to drip away then place quickly into the chip pan, being careful not to get your fingers splashed with oil.
- The deep-fried mars bar is ready when the batter has browned (takes around 1 minute)
So… what were the results like?
Well, the first problem I found was that chocolate, when it gets hot, gets quite melty. All well and good, as that’s the point of deep-frying it and not totally unexpected. The downside to this fact though is that it had then melted around the mesh of the chip pan basket and was near impossible to remove. I managed to hack it off eventually with a knife, but it wasn’t going to win many awards for beauty. I was also very glad to own a dishwasher.
What did it taste like? Well, imagine a warm mush of chocolate and caramel ooze, surrounded in the batter you normally put round fried fish. That should give you a clue. The word “sacrilege” came to mind. It was very sickly and (in my opinion) a waste of a good chocolate bar. The idea of a warm and liquid centre appealed at first, but the combination became sickly and inedible after only a few bites. On reflection, it’d have been far less mess and effort to have just skipped the batter coating altogether and shoved it in the microwave for a few seconds.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to pop out to buy some Rennies…
Why not check out some of our more successful chocolate recipes instead.
Divine Fair Trade Chocolate is made with Ghanaian cocoa beans and bills itself as “Heavenly chocolate with a heart”.
According to their web site, “Fairtrade aims to build dignified trading relationships between consumers in the North and producers in developing countries. This involves changing the way that conventional international trade works, so that:
- producers receive a guaranteed price for their goods, and the security of long-term trading contracts.
- producers benefit from guaranteed minimum health and safety conditions.
- producers, their workplace and the environment are not exploited.
- education and training opportunities for producers, especially women and children, are actively fostered.”
Which is all excellent and admirable. But to truly give the producers a fair deal, the product has to be worth buying too. And for me, this just doesn’t quite do it.
The milk chocolate bar I tried was a solid, thin bar, divided into small chunks. The taste is quite chocolately, but it lacks any of the creamyness that milk chocolate should have. It didn’t feel luxurious like expensive chocolate, and it didn’t give me the quick fix of one of the more common brands. All in all, I found it quite average. It reminded me of the chocolate you sometimes get on cheap, non-descript Easter Eggs.
Maybe I would have been happier with the plain chocolate version, which I intend to review at a later date. Maybe I’m just a chocasnob. But I really think that they could do so much better with this.
If you’ve tried Divine yourself, I’d be very interested in hearing what you thought? Am I being unfair?
Late last year, Mars announced somewhat triumphantly that they would be discontinuing their king sized ‘Big One’ Mars and Snickers bars due to public concerns about obesity. But what they did next was a master stroke – they simply chopped the bars in two and called them ‘Duo’ instead. Inspired.
The idea, so they say, is that you’re meant to “share” the two halves. So you won’t get fat.
Yeah, right. Like I’m going to share my Snickers!
Snickers is one of those chocolate bars that you just buy when you’re hungry and want something to satisfy the chocolate cravings and fill you up. You don’t necessarily think about it, you just know you’re going to be left satisfied.
I never really had an issue with the ‘Big One’ bars – if people are stupid enough to think they can eat nothing but chocolate all day and not get fat, well it’s their own fault. But I actually prefer the Duo format. It allows you to eat half, put the kettle on, then settle down with a nice cup of tea and have the other half without leaving messy half eaten chocolate bars lying around.
Snickers itself is simply wonderful. The peanuts and thick nougat make it one of the chewiest bars you can get, and I’m sure that the extra effort you have to put into eating it just adds to the experience. Although best if slightly chilled, this isn’t one of those bars you want to leave in the fridge all day like Bounty, or it will become too difficult to chew and you’ll end up just getting frustrated and throwing it at the wall.
Properly cooled to just below room temperature, the caramel is yummy, if slightly sticky and the choclate is thick and breaks into nice chunks when you bite into it. The very slightly salty peanuts just bring the whole thing together into one delicious bar. Or two bars, in this case.
Chewy, tasty, unpretentious and filling. I love it.
