Review: Hotel Chocolat Selection

In the vegan range - Pistachio Crunchies, Gianduja Bombe, Marzipan Ingots. Hotel Chocolat's range is ever changing, but helpfully they label their stuff as vegan, so it's quick to find something dairy-free. We picked out three packs that caught our eye:

Veganoo's Flickr Photostream

Flickr has had a makeover which makes it very appealing. You now get an entire Terabyte of photo storage space for free - that's pretty amazing. If you're on Flickr, check out our photostream - all of our headline vegan blog photos get fed to Flickr:

flickr.com/veganoo

New: Hobnob Choc Chip Biscuits

McVitie's Hobnobs have long been vegan and at one time Plain Chocolate Hobnobs were vegan too. That's no longer the case, but these new Choc Chip Hobnobs are a great alternative. They use a plain chocolate recipe that doesn't include dairy fat. Oaty Hobnobs full of lovely dark chocolate chips. Somebody put the kettle on!

Review: Sojade Riz Strawberry Cassis Dessert

Rice milk yoghurt/dessert with strawberry and blackcurrant. Sojade Riz is a line of rice based desserts for those who want to avoid both dairy and soya. These desserts are chilled, and look very similar to the Sojade soya desserts, but are quite different. The flavours available are Apricot, Mango/Passionfruit and Strawberry/Blackcurrant. We picked up a twin pack of the latter flavour for our review:

Review: Sojade Chocolate / Vanilla Desserts

Dairy-free creamy vanilla and rich chocolate desserts from French firm Triballat. The company is behind both the Sojade and Sojasun brands, as well as some of Tesco's own brand dairy-free range. Sojade is their organic brand line, for sales through health food shops, and you won't find these in the supermarket. These twin pack desserts are new to us, so we gave them a whirl:

Review: Taifun Curry-Mango Tofu

Pre-marinated tofu with mild curry and sweet mango. Taifun make the world's greatest tofu, and they also won our tofu taste test. This is an unsmoked tofu, that's been marinated in lime juice, mango, curry spices, garlic and white wine vinegar. Marinated tofu has been in the shops for years, so is this  more of the same?

Gluten-Free Vegan: DS Digestives

Vegan digestive biscuits from DS Gluten Free. If you're avoiding wheat, but crave that wholewheat taste of a crumbly digestive biscuit, your choices are limited. These DS digestives use a blend of maize, soya, buckwheat and tapioca flour. No rice flour in sight... so does that avoid the grittyness problem?

Review: Goody Good Stuff Jellies

Vegan jellies, sweet and sour. Goody Good Stuff are an independent UK company launched in 2010, specialising in vegetarian sweets. Most of their range is vegan, and according to their marketing team they're also Fat Free! Meat Free! Dairy Free! Alcohol Free! Gluten Free! Egg Free! Nut Free! Soy Free! Wheat Free! and Gelatine Free! Most importantly, they sent them to us Cost Free!...but we won't let that influence our review:

UPDATE: Vegan Status - The eight packs we reviewed are vegan (see the ingredients panels at the bottom of the page). Goody Good Stuff have clarified which products contain beeswax, and the situation is complicated. Don't mistake Koala Gummy Bears for Sour Koala Gummy Bears for instance! The Goody Good Stuff website isn't very clear, and the packs are not marked as vegan, so use the following list that the company provided this morning (2013-05-17).

CHEESEBOARD: Vegan Cheese Taste Test

Part 2 of our big vegan cheese review. 11 dairy-free cheeses, one cheeseboard. We've got together 11 brands of vegan cheese on sale in the UK and put them to the Taste Test. In Part 1 of the test, we saw how well they melted, and how they tasted hot. Now we're looking at how they compare when eaten cold. 

Review: Venchi Extra Dark Hazelnut Chocolate

Italian chocolate with Piedmont hazelnuts. Venchi have been making fine chocolate since 1878, so they should be rather good at it. Many of their products are still hand made using artisanal techniques, and that could explain the price. This is expensive chocolate at nearly five quid for 150g. Is it worth it?

MELTDOWN: Vegan Cheese Taste Test

11 dairy-free cheeses, one big review. We've got together 11 brands of vegan cheese on sale in the UK and put them to the test - the Veganoo Taste Test. In Part 1 of the test, we see how well they melt, and how they taste hot. Next week we'll be looking at how they compare eaten cold. Pizza is the name of the game for the meltdown test, but which vegan cheese will come out on top...?

Review: MozzaRisella, SmokeyRisella, CreamyRisella

Vegan cheese, italian style. Three varieties of dairy-free cheese from Italian producer Frescolat. These three are all variations on classic mozzarella - a traditional one, a smoked version and a soft and creamy version. We've heard great things about these new vegan cheeses... read on to see if we agree:

Review: HESTON from Waitrose - Chocolate Sauce

Heston Blumenthal's weird chocolate sauce for Waitrose. Dairy-free isn't something we were expecting when we spotted this in a local Waitrose, but it sure is. The body of the sauce is based on wheat glucose syrup, and as well as chocolate, it's also flavoured with coffee. Don't for a moment think that means it tastes like mocha:

Review: Camille Bloch Torino Mousse Chocolate

Fluffy vegan chocolate mousse in a thin crispy chocolate shell... sounds like heaven? Despite getting a severe bashing at the hands of the postal service, this could be one of the best things to have arrived through our door recently. The bar consists of 8 chocolate domes connected by a very thin and fragile chocolate base... ours arrived from Vx in pieces, but at least the domes were intact:

Review: Popchips air-popped crisps

Not fried, not even baked... crisps that are air-popped and half the fat of regular crisps. We spotted these in a local wholefood shop and thought they looked great. With the calories we get through here at Veganoo, reviewing all these foods... lower fat is a relief! 

Review: Sweet Vegan 'Try Me' Marshmallows

UPDATE: Sweet Vegan are now trading as Marshmallow Deli

Taster pack of assorted vegan marshmallows from Nottingham producer Sweet Vegan. This is a great way to sample a selection of the marshmallow flavours that Sweet Vegan offer. Vanilla, Chocolate, Coconut, Strawberry and Banana came in our pack, although you may get cherry in yours.

The Big Cheese: 11 brands of vegan cheese

The biggest ever vegan cheese taste test. Coming shortly on Veganoo. We've assembled a huge vegan cheeseboard covering 11 brands of vegan cheese available in the UK. The cheeses are Swiss, German, Italian, American and of course British.

The names can be confusingly similar if you're a new vegan... Veganic, Vegourmet, Vegusto, Vegerella, MozzaRisella, Tofutti, Teese, Sheese, Cheezly, Jeezini.., and SoyaToo. We couldn't get hold of any Daiya, but the Tofutti and Teese are American takes on vegan cheese.

We're going to be putting them to the ultimate Taste Test, or should we say taste tests... as they'll be tested for meltability and how they taste hot, as well as how they taste cold.

Budget Vegan: Hills Cream Sandwich Biscuits

Digestive Creams, Orange Creams, Chocolate Creams... 4 packs for a pound! These are the cheapest biscuits we know of, but they're one of our favourites. Hills Biscuits are sold in Nisa stores at this bargain offer price...mix and match any four packs for a pound. Avoid the custard, coconut and strawberry creams which all contain dairy, but take your pick of the others:

Review: Vantastic Schnouggi Nougat Bar

Hazelnut 'nougat' bar from Vantastic Foods. Firstly, a German lesson: Nougat means something different in Germany than it does in the UK/US and France. German 'nougat' is what we call 'gianduja', in other words sweet hazelnut chocolate. This is a mini bar of gianduja:

Review: Choc Shot Liquid Chocolate

Versatile vegan squeezy chocolate for drinks, toppings and more. New from the makers of Sweet Freedom is a novel product in the form of liquid chocolate in a squeezy bottle. This blend of Sweet Freedom (fruit based sweetener) and cocoa can be made into hot chocolate, milkshakes and sauces, or used as a topping on ice cream, porridge or toast:

Budget Vegan: Giannis Ice Cream Cones at Aldi

Vegan waffle cones in 10 packs from Aldi. We've now found so many vegan ice cream cones that we wonder if there are any non-vegan ones anymore? These ones are the continental crispy waffle style cones rather than the wafer kind. We grabbed the dairy-free ice cream from the freezer and did yet another cone review. It's a hard life, dear reader...

Review: Go Max Go Thumbs Up Choccy Bar

A weird peanut praline with cinder toffee and chocolate concoction. That's the review done then. Oh you want more?

Budget Vegan: Burton's Jammie / Choccie Dodgers

Twin packs of Jammie Dodgers and Choccie Dodgers from Poundland. You've probably had a Jammie Dodger or two, but have you seen Burton's Choccie Dodgers? They're both currently on sale in Poundland in packs of two. Are either as good as you remember from childhood?

Review: Askeys Crackin Chocolate Ice Cream Topping

Vegan 'Ice Magic'... a hard-setting chocolate shell topping for ice cream. Just like Ice Magic, this is a chocolate sauce that you pour on ice cream that sets instantly to form a chocolate shell:

Review: Jus-Rol Croissants

Freshly baked vegan croissants...popped from a tube in the fridge. It's very hard to find vegan croissants, in fact this is the only option we know about, other than to make them yourself. This way is far quicker of course...the tube lasts for about 2 months in the fridge, and once there, you're only ever 15 minutes away from fresh crispy croissants:

Review: Lotus Caramelised Biscuits

The taste of Speculoos and the perfect biscuit for coffee. They've also been around since 1932. Lotus biscuits are the ones you often get as a complimentary treat in cafes when you order a coffee. It's handy to know that these are vegan if you're given one with your soya latte. They come in packs like this in supermarkets, but you're more likely to get an individually wrapped one in a cafe.

Review: Booja Booja Champagne Truffles

Rich, dark, dairy-free chocolate truffles with real champagne. "Everyone needs a little Booja-Booja now and then" goes the tagline, and we have to agree. These are not everyday chocolates and are pretty expensive, but for a special occasion or celebration, they're worth every penny.

Review: Free & Easy Dairy-Free Cheese Sauce Mix

Vegan cheese sauce powder for cheesy sauce in 3 minutes. At least that's what it says on the pack. This stuff has been around for years, but has recently been re-branded so we thought we'd give it a try. This isn't an 'instant' mix that you just add boing water to... you have to cook it in a pan. We made some up as a cheesy sauce for pasta to give it a whirl:

Review: Viana Picknicker Veggie Snack

Vegan meaty sausage snack, sort of a vegan pepperami. These are similar to Topas Space Bars - they're both meaty finger snacks, offering a flesh-free meaty hit while away from home:

Review: Biona Large Ravioli (Spinach & Leek)

Enormous egg-free ravioli from Biona Organic. Vegan ravioli are rare, especially large restaurant-sized ones such as these. These look like egg pasta at first glance, so you may have passed them by on the shelf, especially as they aren't even labelled vegan (come on Biona!). That nice yellow colour is in fact just turmeric, but it does make the fresh pasta look appetising: