Jaffa Pihlaja by Fazer
Today I’ll be tasting the Jaffa Pihlaja, again by Fazer, and again supplied all the way from Finland by the excellent Jari (many thanks!)
This review could be a little controversial – after all, I’m claiming to review biscuits, and the Jaffa is legally (if not morally) a cake, isn’t it? As a point of trivia, McVities, the manufacturer of the UK Jaffa cake, had a long and complicated court battle with the UK tax office. By some rather obscure point of British tax law, chocolate covered biscuits are counted as luxuries, and therefore attract VAT (Value Added Tax), whereas cakes are counted as essential items, and don’t (naked biscuits, cookies with chips in and chocolate flavoured biscuits also escape the tax). The UK tax office took the manufacturer to court in 1991, where it was eventually decided that Jaffas are indeed cakes, despite being bite-sized, chocolate-covered and sold next to biscuits in the shops.
A wise man once explained the difference to me much more succinctly – if you leave a biscuit out it goes soggy, but a cake goes hard and stale. By that definition, the Jaffa is indeed a cake. Nevertheless, I’m going to press ahead with this review, and I shall just hope you all forgive me.
So what do we have here? There’s a large weighty box in a striking orangey-red colour, with what appears to be a fox’s face on the front, along with the manufacturers logo. There’s a little picture of some Jaffa cakes next to what looks like fox-flavoured sweets – there’s a subtitle of Pihlaja which could be the fox’s name? The box is attractive in a rather two-tone way, although the work Jaffa is picked out with a rather posh-looking gold outline.
Inside the box we’ve got two transparent plastic packet each with twelve cakes in – the weight of all 24 cakes coming to 300g according to the box. The Jaffas look identical to their British counterpart – a yellowish spongy base underneath, with a layer of chocolate covering a hump of jam or marmalade on top.
The cakes feel light and fluffy, and the underside has a little spring (another indication that these aren’t biscuits). First bite is nice – the chocolate cracks pleasantly, and the sponge has a springy texture. There’s definitely an interesting taste though!
British Jaffa cakes have (for the most part) a filling of orange jam or marmalade, so I’m a little surprised by the taste of these, because it’s certainly not orange! Some kind of berry, but with a chemical taste, there’s a hint of pear drops (or nail varnish remover – so probably acetyl acetate) which leaves the tongue feeling slightly anaesthetised. A close look at the jelly layer show’s it’s more of a dark red rather than orange too, so it seems this is a new flavour!
I rather like it, once I get over the surprise. In all other respects these are much the same as a British Jaffa cake – that is to say, dangerously more-ish. It’s quite easy to eat them very quickly, the light sponge makes them feel less filling, and “just one more” kicks in. The jam filling is quite sweet, maybe a little sickly, but the chocolate is nice and the two flavours work well together.
As a dunker these work well – the sponge base soaks up a lot of liquid without falling apart, so as long as you choose a drink that is compatible with the flavour you’ll have a good time.
A little research casts some light: Pihlaja are one of Finland’s oldest sweets, and were originally flavoured using berries from the Rowan tree (also known as Mountain Ash). These days the flavour is artificial. Once again Jari has sent me a surprise crossover product.
As a snack these are delicious – I’m not sure they are quite as nice as their British, Orange-flavoured, counterpart, mainly because the strong taste is a little overpowering, but I’m sure I’d have no problems eating a whole pack. Oh, wait, I just did!
If you fancy trying these for yourself, Amazon does sell them (at quite a premium!): Fazer Pihlaja Jaffa biscuits
As a little postscript, it would have been remiss of me not to have acquired some McVities Jaffa cakes to take comparison pictures with!
Finnish on the left, British on the right – the lump of marmalade in the British one is definitely not as wide but more pronounced.
