Cadbury whinge & berry panacotta review

So Cadbury has decided to lower their standard of chocolate & the weights. (but charge us the same) Its that not-so-new thing that companies do to get a bit more profit in their pockets.

I did some investigating on the old cadbury and new the cadbury.

I can tell you that the new cadbury family blocks of chocolate with more added vegetable fat come in harder card boxes. Instead of the old paper wrapping. (which i still think is better.. made of less tree, takes less space in the recycling bin)

I can tell you that old cadbury did have vegetable fat in the ingrediants but it was listed as 5th ingrediant after milk solids, sugar, cocoa butter, cocoa -something, *vegetable fat

the new family blocks of chocolate it is listed as the 3rd ingrediant milk solids, sugar, *vegetable fat.

However the amount of milk chocolate solids is both the same 70%?. i think i was looking at Cadbury almonds & cadbury desserts creme brulee..

I can tell you that coles has cadbury on special this week (2 for $6), as does woolworths ($3.49?) and k-mart has only the old family blocks for $3.20. (whatever the instore stock is) K-mart the new and less chocolate family blocks you will pay up $4.00.

The desserts old range was 235g and is now 200g. The Norm family blocks was 250g and now 220-210 depending on plain vs almond etc? (i think)

I can tell you that its not just the purple wrapping/now boxed family blocks that are suffering the downsizing-yet-price-the-same. Cadbury's range of Old Gold chocolate is also affected.

I can also tell you that Lindt chocolate has no vegetable fat whatsoever that i could see!!!! :)

Cadbury argue that the tasters said the fat improved the flavour and made it easier to bite (i didnt think we were a nation of denture wearers) It does make it easier to snap off a piece from the block. However when i did so to the berry panacotta from their deserts range i ended up with 2 pieces.. i had the bottom layer square of choc with the filling and the top shell.. something that hasn't happened before.. might just be me but it screams "CHEAP!!!!" to me!

With cadbury now being easier to snap off, bite or what have you... i am wondering of the party game used at parties, classrooms, youth etc. The game where you roll a die and then you can chop using a knife and fork only those pieces off one at a time. For older teens a 30sec time limit is given or so and no matter what you roll you will always get one piece!

Also i have to think... you add more fat to a block of chocolate.. surely that ups the fat content and people would less likely buy it? hmmm

and the fact that we have long hot insufferable summers!! Climate change people would argue, that with the increase of temperatures. Not to mention the on-going above average heat waves during summer etc. That Australia would have one of the hardest chocolate family blocks to combat the heat!

The berry panacotta Cadbury dessert family block was uber sweet. More sugar than berry... but was expected after trying what they considered "tiramisu" & "creme brulee". Both girls loved it. Was addictive... not sure i'd buy it again honestly.. so full of sugar, melted quickly when held (at norm body temp. its pretty cold at the moment)

Susan Boyle again

Took a screenie of a youtube vid of Susan Boyle on Britain's Got Talent. Semi finales? Her 2nd performance.. not as good i dont think compared to the "ive got a dream" les miserables song. But that was, what before all this attention, all the hype, before speaking to oprah, before being a youtube star, before fans wrote letters to her cat. The pressure was on, we were all expecting another great performance... and i think you could see with her mistakes that she was feeling it!

Im just glad that she still seems to be her. She was gracious with the judges on-air apology of them judging her before she sang. That was a really nice touch! :)

Tia's 6th birthday

Tia and her present. "Bratz the Movie" on the wii.
Tia's birthday cupcakes/cake
Tia and Anna the cat

Tia had her 6th birthday this month. This birthday was alot different that her previous birthdays..

• First off it was a school day. (monday)
• Her birthday falls on or just off mothers day. (she was born on a mothers day)
• I usually do some sort of character cake.
• Tia hasn't eaten or finished a piece of birthday cake since her 1st birthday. (too much party food? or does slicing up hello kitty give a child nightmares?)
• Im not sure but i think she may have gone to bed without eating any cake (i typed cat then lol!)
• Her dad came home and went out, doctors maybe? can't remember
• We had macdonalds at home. She also had a sundae (maybe why i didnt give her cake)
• Her present was not wrapped (that's daddy style for you)

Progressing along...

Im now 28weeks pregnant. I need to get a wriggle-on with some things that NEED doing.
They are:
1) book in with the hospital midwives. Answers questions when i feel like they are just thinking "ok why did she leave it this late? whats wrong with her?" When in simple truth.. i feel fine re pregnancy! Everything is progressing well, im getting a big belly.. lots of kicks.. reflux, veins... and stuff thats TMI ;)

2) Looking at a double pram. Alyssa will be 13months old. She will be walking by then.. but have u ever walked at baby speed for anything longer than a few minutes? lol..

3) Figuring out Alyssa & Baby sleeping arrangements. Will Alyssa still be in our room + the newborn? How will Tia's room be changed to possibly even fit Alyssa's cot in there?!

4) Move or not to move... gah x.x i think this is up in the air, much like the sleeping and living of all the girls. If we find a place big enough & still be a fair price then i guess we would move. It would have to be somewhere between the shops and Tia's school. (not that i'd feel particularly safe living in those streets. I know alot of people in government housing or 1-2bd flats are NOT crims but our first place down here REALLY has me scarred!)

5)catch up with all the mail & stuff.. ive got prez, bills and cards that i need to send off. The post office moved & I'm silently protesting! x.x

Alyssa is slowly undoing the filing.. and eating it apparently. Better sign off here then! Hope everyone is having a great week and getting stuff done!

feelin' sleepy...

first off the picture sorta explains itself.. lol. However alot more went into than just going "oh darn spanish subs" first there was the searching, i looked at a few options, decided on this one... waited for it to download, went to play it using quicktime and got a "error 2002" some movie atom error x.x searching that error only gave me the ways to fix it if u had vista, ipods etc (not helpful in my case at all) considering we run XP and its just a MP4 file. Tried using microsoft media player and no it didnt have the codec for it to run, therefore it would not work thru the 360. Anyways (hope im not boring u with all this..if so go to next paragraph) decided on converting the file from MP4 to avi.. seeing that it would take 90mins on this slow pc i decided i'd use a feature in the converting software that plays the file.. hmm yes it did work. Ok now then.. lets check the subs takes screenshot (the preview window is so small i couldn't work out the words). Finds screenshot and oh darn?! spanish?! gah x.x looks up file again reads "spanish subs" ROFL!!!!!!!!!

My lack of good sleep... thankful that i can sleep.. i am just now entering the phase of where i have to wake up to roll over, and no i cant sleep on my back (bad for circulation) *sigh*