Wendyl Nissen: High-sugar twist on a classic Kiwi biscuit

High in sugar at nearly three teaspoons per Mallow Puff. Photo / Supplied

Griffins MallowPuffs Passionfruit flavoured. $3.49 for 180g or eight biscuits.

These caught my attention at the supermarket alongside the pineapple version. These are a limited summer edition but there were plenty left where I shop.

MallowPuffs are a bit of a Kiwi institution so I couldn't resist trying this new take on an old classic.

I had only one - they tasted great, but were too sweet for me.

Ingredients (greatest quantity first)

Sugar

This is a very high sugar product. For one MallowPuff, which is 23g, you get 11.9g of sugar making it 51.2 per cent sugar. That's just under three teaspoons of sugar in one tiny puff.

Wheat flour

This flour will be used in making the biscuit base.

Milk solids

These are what is left over when you dehydrate milk. Often used in chocolate.

Cocoa butter

A common ingredient in chocolate cocoa butter is a fat extracted from the cocoa bean.

Vegetable fats (antioxidant (307b:soy)

Not sure what vegetable oil is used in these biscuits. It does contain the antioxidant tocopherol, which is vitamin E as a preservative. It is extracted from soy.

Cocoa mass

This is a liquid or liquor extracted from cocoa beans.

Glucose syrup

This is a syrup made from the hydrolysis (reacted with water) of a starch, usually corn.

Invert syrup

This is a sugar syrup which is a mixture of glucose with sucrose.

Water

Dextrose monohydrate

This is often used intravenously to replenish fluids. It is basically dextrose, which is another form of sugar.

Stabiliser (gelatine)

Gelatine is a natural jelly-like substance that is often taken from meat products but can also be created from vegetables.

Emulsifiers (soy lecithin, 476)

Soy lecithin is a natural emulsifier, polyglycerol polyricinoleate (476), and is made from glycerol or glycerine combined with caster oil or another fatty acid.

Natural flavours

So this does taste like passionfruit, and it uses natural flavouring to do this. Sometimes a natural flavouring isn't the actual flavour, it can be made up of some other natural flavourings like apple or another fruit to mimic the passionfruit.

Salt

Not a lot of salt in here at 27mg.

Raising agents (baking soda, 450)

These are baking soda as you would use in your baking and diphosphates, which are salts of phosphoric acid.

Natural colours (160b, 100)

The marshmallow filling is a pale yellow. Natural colours to achieve this are annatto(160b) a peach colour and turmeric (100) a yellow colour.

Preservative (202)

This is potassium sorbate (202), which comes from sorbic acid, which is a natural product.

Acidity regulators (296)

This is malic acid (296), which occurs naturally in fruits and is mainly used as an acidity regulator or to provide a tart taste.

My recommendations

At nearly three teaspoons per biscuit I think these go beyond the sweet treat you have with your cup of tea or put in a child's lunchbox, because everyone knows you need two biscuits with your tea or lunch and if you ate two of these you'd been down nearly six teaspoons of sugar for the day.

They do taste nice, so if you can limit yourself to just one as a rare treat, then go for it.

Highlights

●High in sugar at nearly three teaspoons per MallowPuff.
●Uses natural flavour and colour.
●447kj or about 100 calories per biscuit.