Author's product rating: 
| Advantages: |
Not too sticky, |
| Disadvantages: |
Very sweet |
| Recommend to potential buyers: |
yes |
I love toffees, well; I love lots of sweets but every so often Just love to eat toffees. I have been known to make my own butterscotch and chewy toffee and of course fudge, but the ones I have decided to review today are made by that chocolate lovers company Thorntons.
The website has a brief history of the company that I will summarise here.
Joseph William Thornton opened his first
sweet shop in Sheffield in 1911 and a second in 1913, he opened these shops with his son Norman, and when they opened the second shop they started making their own sweets to sell.
Joseph died in 1919 and his son carried on the business being joined by his younger brother in 1921 when they founded the company J.W.Thornton Ltd.
By 1939 they had opened 35 shops in 18 towns spread across the Midlands and North of England.
In 1988 the company was floated on the stock market and is now a £160 million company.
Now , some 90 years after Joseph opened the first shop the company owns 400 of it's own shops and there are more than 180 franchises selling chocolates and toffees under the name of Thorntons in the Uk.
There is a lot more information about the company on their website for anyone who is interested, here I have just tried to give a feel for how the company started and where it is now, I haven't copied the above statement but the dates and names of course have come from there.
http://www.thorntons.co.uk/investor/default.asp?tid=30
Onto the toffees.
The other day my husband walked down to our local shop and before going asked me if I wanted anything. "Toffee please." I said, "Any sort, I just fancy a toffee." To my great surprise he didn't come back with a bag of cheap toffees, he came back with a bag of Thornton's special toffee. I didn't know our local shop sold Thorntons toffees; they must be one of the 180 franchises that are scattered around the country.
Anyway, to cut a long story short, I ate them and really enjoyed them so this evening when my husband once again asked " Do you want anything from the shop?" I asked him if he could get another bag of Thorntons Special Toffee, Original so I could continue writing this review.
The bag holds 180g. of toffees and is a lovely buttery yellow colour with toffee coloured writing across it. This script tells me that the 'secret of creating great toffee is in the timing, temperature and the blending.'
Lower down it tells me that there's 'The finest brown sugar, golden syrup and rich creamy butter carefully blended in copper pans.'
Thorntons Special Toffee is superimposed in deep brown toffee colour, this darker writing is shiny if held to the light.
The top and bottom edges of the bag are toffee coloured and internally the bag is foil lined to keep the toffees fresh and so they don't clump together. That doesn't really work actually because most of mine seemed to be stuck together, I don't mind this because I like a huge knobbly lump of toffee to chew on.
Enough about the bag, what about the contents?
On opening the bag I get a faint whiff of sweet creaminess, rather like that sweetened condensed milk that I have used to make fudge. Not exactly like toffee I think but quite nice all the same.
The bag is about half full of different shaped lumps of toffee, some of which are stuck together, all different sizes. This would be a bit awkward with children, they would think the person with the biggest piece favoured, but then who nowadays feeds sticky toffee to children? (Not me she says, no, I will eat these and the children can have a lovely juicy orange or an apple.)
I have an odd shaped lump of this toffee in my mouth and it is smooth, fairly hard, gets softer with sucking as the mouth warms it a little, very sweet, but best of all for me, not too sticky. This toffee doesn't immediately stick round my teeth, it can be moved all round my mouth without the need to poke my fingers in my mouth to prise it off my teeth which is a bonus for me. I can discreetly eat these in public without the need to poke around my mouth.
Ah, sweet, very very sweet, slightly of condensed milk, I can't get away from that fact, a slight hint of butterscotch in the background. I can taste that these are made with brown sugar and syrup, but they don't actually taste of anything much, the overall sweetness is what impression I am left with.
The texture is smooth, very smooth and as it warms up and I chew still smooth, my tongue slides across the surface gathering sweetness for the taste buds without feeling any ridges or grittiness, at first that is, towards the end there is a slight grittiness of sugar not quite dissolved but not much.
And when I have finished one toffee my mouth just screams out for another and another, so very addictive, that is probably the sugar and I know it isn't really a good idea to keep dipping my hand in the bag but I do.
What they don't do is leave my mouth coated in a film of fat, or grease or whatever you want to call it. That is something that happens when I eat cheap unnamed toffees that my local shop usually sells in clear plastic bags. I often judge toffees by the amount of film left in my mouth when I have finished eating them and these Thorntons special toffees don't leave me with anything apart from a rather sweet flavour that lingers for some time after the toffee has gone.
On the back of the bag It says that they are best before the end of July 2006, well I expect to eat them well before then. They contain milk, also may contain nut traces. The bag tells me that they are suitable for vegetarians, are made from a Gluten-free Recipe and are Alcohol free, so ok to eat a bag and then drive home.
They are nearly 1,000 calories in a 180g bag, so I am eating no more and going to put them in the cupboard.
My husband did remember to tell me the price and this bag of toffees cost him £1.39 I don't know if the prices are fixed of it they would be a little less in a supermarket or Thorntons own shop but not a bad price for a bag of sweets of this quality.
So, will I buy them again? (Or will they be bought for me again?)
The big question, and I am not sure really of the answer because next time I ask for toffees I might get something completely different but do like to think that one day I may have another bag of these to chew on, they are a pretty good sweet.
I have tasted better (well, I do make my own sometimes and they are far superior,) and I have tasted worse, but on the whole I would recommend them for anyone who doesn't have nut or milk allergies to give them a go if they like very sweet sweets.
Thorntons Special Toffee comes in different flavours and my real favourite is the Brazil Nut one, but this comes a close second.
Oh, and if there is anything wrong with them there is an address on the back of the bag to send the whole lot back to and they will send you your money back.
Thanks for reading.
Sue
very helpful
very helpful
