£1 Challenge

Without getting overly political, these are relatively bleak times for the economy, wages aren’t keeping up with the rising cost of living, initiatives to help us all out are being cut left right and center, and the currency faces an uncertain future thanks to some sort of referendum I might have voted leave on, but that’s straying from the point, of course.
So, to spread some good news about how far your change can go, I decided to go thrifty for this series of reviews, and see how many relevant things I can buy and review for just £1. This can be anything from chocolate, cakes, biscuits or even a drink if I fancy it, there aren’t many rules other than I can’t just go and buy loads of 10p lollipops and bubblegums, these have to be true bargains, far flung from their RRP!
These reviews will be quite short, due in part to the randomness of some items, but let’s see how well I did today, it’s worth noting all of these items are from my local Heron Foods, the undisputed king of oddment groceries.

McVitie’s Chocolate Hobnob Flapjack- 25p (RRP 50p)
It tastes twice as nice at half the price, you would think, but unfortunately this doesn’t hold a candle to an actual chocolate Hobnob (one of the greatest biscuits in the world, might I add). The chocolate is nice but the flapjack is a little bland and dry for my tastes, I prefer a lot more of a syrupy texture when it comes to my flapjacks, this just tastes like it’s been sat around in the cupboard for too long, which may explain the price reduction. It’s not horrible, but it’s really not a thing of amazement.

Galaxy Duet Toffee & Popcorn- 29p (RRP 65p)
In a nutshell, the Duet was released by Mars in 2015 after three years of painstaking research into awkward gimmicks, the idea is that there are two fingers with an individual flavour in each, which can either be broken off and eaten separately, or if you’re feeling rebellious, eaten at the same time.
Caramel/Shortcake and Cookies/Cream were the initial flavours, and were later joined by the one I hold possession of, Toffee/Popcorn. Sadly, I’ve seen this flavour flogged off for dirt cheap in other outlets, along with larger versions, which doesn’t send a good message about sales figures to say the least, but I hope it’s just because of it being new, and not god-awful.
On their own, the toffee stick is literally a Galaxy Caramel, not quite sure how that would in any way allow for the slight tweak of name to “toffee”, and the popcorn stick, well, is a bit shite to be honest, of all the things to be added into chocolate, I would not rank popcorn highly as a “must do” for any confection manufacturers, in fact I would advise heavily against it as the kernels outlast the chocolate and get stuck in your teeth, admittedly adding to the realism of the popcorn eating experience, plus the flavours don’t match at all and it’s all complete balls.
I’d eat the caramel stick, though.

Tic Tac Popcorn Flavour- 5p
I don’t even care what the RRP is, FIVE PENCE I paid for these, and they’re in the bigger size too, this must be the cheapest thing I’ve ever bought that I can eat, but unfortunately they’re popcorn flavoured Tic Tacs… not even the slightest hint of optimism is hitting me right now.
Ugh, oh my… AGH! These are fucking dreadful, imagine being given these thinking they’re lovely Tic Tacs but then having to spit them out due to their immensely horrifying flavour. Perhaps this is what they are, some sort of prank Tic Tac so you can give your friends convulsions of pure disgust. The consensus based on these two reviews is clear, STOP WITH THE POPCORN FLAVOURS, THEY’RE NOT NICE AND THEY’RE NOT SELLING, OBVIOUSLY, OTHERWISE I WOULDN’T HAVE BOUGHT THESE FOR THE VALUE OF A PAPER CLIP.

Oh My! Chocolate Chip Cookies- 29p
Finally, and fortunately, we have well branded cookies from over the sea in Ireland that were released in September 2016 by the East Coast Bakehouse in Drogheda, and a very odd thing to have found indeed, these are on par with a Maryland cookie, the best thing I’ve bought in this challenge by a country mile. That’s around all there is to say on these, very nice indeed!

TOTAL SPENT: 88p
GOOD PURCHASES: 1/4