|
Friday, June 17, 2011
Nestle Skinny Cow Dreamy Clusters
I already reviewed the bars, called Heavenly Crisp, and today I’ll tackle their new Dreamy Clusters. The Dreamy Clusters come in dark chocolate and milk chocolate, but since I was buying a full box of these and they were $4.29 each, I only picked up one. (I’ve spent close to $15 on products for review this week, which is a bit steep for me when the average cost of a review item is about a buck.) The package describes Dreamy Clusters as crunchy crisps and creamy caramel drenched in dark chocolate. That actually sounds fantastic. Kind of like a 100 Grand bar but in dark chocolate. The box contains more than the wafer bars, there are six packets and each is just shy of one ounce. So the value is a bit better.
The ingredients start off pretty good for candy, but go a little awry after that:
Maltitol & erythritol are sugar alcohols. They are less sweet than glucose, fructose or sucrose but also have a slightly cool effect on the tongue and can have some side effects (such as intestinal gas and a laxative effect). They don’t make up a large portion of the candy itself, but their presence means that the flavor and satisfaction may be affected.
The pieces themselves are quite small. But that’s no big deal if you think of them as tiny chocolates from an elegant box. I got five pieces in my bag, and I opened two bags. So I’m going to guess that’s the norm. (I also felt the other bags in the box and they seem to be the same, maybe I need to invest in a Candy Blog ultrasound machine.) The packet that holds them is senselessly large - it’s five inches by four inches and each piece is about an inch in diameter. It does protect them, none of them were smashed though all were scuffed up.
The pieces smell great. They’re bumpy and though they vary in size, they’re pretty consistent in their construction. Each piece is made up of a caramel center with a dark chocolate coating studded with a crisped rice product. The caramel has a good pull, though it’s not a large reservoir, it only provides a small amount of chew and a large hit of salt. The dark chocolate coating is quite sweet but of good enough quality that it didn’t seem chalky or overly bitter. The main notes were raisins and a generic woodsy flavor. The crisps were salty, light and crunchy. They were bigger than the strange new things that they put in 100 Grand bars these days, so I found them pretty satisfying as a textural element. They didn’t have much of a malty cereal flavor. Five pieces was actually satisfying. The portion sounds small (about half the mass of a Snicker or 3 Musketeers) but the fact that there were five pieces and they had a lot going on (especially if you bit them in half instead of popping them in your mouth whole) might make these a decadent little treat. I’m annoyed by the use of the sugar alcohols and exceedingly long ingredients list. In a chocolate candy, sugar is not what racks up the calories, fat is. However, instead of substituting the inimitable cocoa butter for something else, they left it in, and just added the crisps which are part air and part lower-calorie fiber/carbs. The nutritional panel for these is decent enough - there’s actually 1 gram of protein and it says 3 grams of fiber. It’s hard to give these a resounding endorsement because of my misgivings about their marketing (emaciated cows are appetizing?) and their ingredients. Also, the price is needlessly precious - you get half as much candy as a 100 Grand, but somehow it costs four times as much? (I’m basing that off of a $1.25 package of 8 fun size bars of 100 Grand which weights about 6 ounces.) However, these are nicely done for a candy marketed to dieters. They do taste good and without knowing that it’s “diet candy” I’d still eat them. Related Candies
POSTED BY Cybele AT 11:50 am
|
||||||||||||||||||
ABOUT
FEEDSCONTACT
EMAIL DIGESTCANDY RATINGSTYPE
BRAND
COUNTRY
ARCHIVES
|
Meticulously photographed and documented reviews of candy from around the world. And the occasional other sweet adventures. Open your mouth, expand your mind.
  SEARCHSearch the Candy Blog archives
    
FEATURED NEWS ITEMS
COPYRIGHT NOTICEAll content (text and photos unless otherwise credited) is copyright 2005-2025 by Cybele May Please do not use my photos without prior permission directly from me, they represent what I ate in preparation for these reviews and are not to be used for other purposes. Design by Hop Studios
|
|||||||||||||||||
SUPERB
YUMMY 
TASTY 
WORTH IT 
TEMPTING 
PLEASANT 
BENIGN 
UNAPPEALING 
APPALLING 
INEDIBLE 
-
Comment by
Rodzilla on 6/18/11 at 6:42 am #
-
Comment by
Jonny on 6/18/11 at 8:28 am #
-
Comment by
Sarah on 11/12/13 at 4:29 pm #
Commenting is not available in this channel entry.I feared you’d be able to taste the sugar alcohols. I think you’d have to eat a whole box to get enough of them for an upset stomach..but that’s always a possibility if they tasted this good.
as always, another great review! These sounds pretty darn good.
Jonny
Does anyone know how to get Dreamy Clusters (Dark Chocolate) in Canada? No retailers carry them and no online companies seem to ship them to Canada. It’s the weirdest thing.
Next entry: Beacon TV Bar
Previous entry: Glico Pocky Cookie Crush