Through my own labour-intensive research, I’ve discovered that Aldi does a great chicken kyiv, but a terrible custard cream. Marks and Spencer do a decent microwavable mac and cheese, while Asda has the best alternative hot cross bun.
And as I dunked a McVitie's chocolate digestive into my cup of tea, I wondered: “Which supermarket does the best choccy biccy?”
And I’ve been out to buy a packet from Aldi, Asda, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons and M&S to find out. I did also visit Tesco and mistakenly picked up the horror that is ‘milk chocolate oaties’, due to infuriatingly similar packaging, so sadly they won’t be included here.
READ MORE:
In the search for the best brew-accompanying biscuit, I poured hot water over my Yorkshire tea bag, opened every pack and laid them all out on the kitchen counter. Here’s what I found when I went looking for the best McVitie's chocolate digestive dupe:
Price
McVitie’s chocolate digestives are usually around the £1.50 to £1.60 mark. The biscuit was first created in 1925, just two years before the Jaffa Cake.
It’s no surprise that Aldi offered the cheapest alternative at 49p, while M&S was at the opposing end of the scale at 85p - though both cheaper than the branded biscuit. In the middle, Asda’s packet was priced at 55p, with Morrisons 5p more expensive, and Sainsbury’s at 65p.
Packaging
There seems to be a bit of a theme with chocolate digestives packaging, opting for one of the two colours that make McVitie’s packaging so recognisable - brown and blue.
Asda and Aldi both went for brown, with the rest of the brands opting for blue. Though Aldi’s biscuits were the only packet to have the little tab that unravels to pop out a biscuit, rather than having to pull them open like a bag of crisps.
Appearance
All of the brands biscuits were fairly uniformed chocolate-side. Aldi’s perhaps less regimented - but I won’t deduct points for that.
On the reverse however, is where things get interesting. Firstly, McVitie’s sees a wheat illustration above the brand name, which is mimicked by Aldi, ever inspired by bigger named brands.
Meanwhile, all four other brands were practically identical, engraved with ‘sweetmeal digestive biscuit’. The only difference was that the M&S biscuit offered a slightly darker bake. Other than that, Asda, Morrisions and Sainsbuy’s biscuits could have easily come from the same packet.
Taste
In terms of taste, there wasn’t a great deal in it - not like with the custard creams where I couldn’t even eat Aldi or Asda’s. All of them were wheaty with a good chocolate ratio, consistent texture and no breaking or flaking everywhere. I’d say the M&S ones were a little overbaked compared to the rest, but I didn’t find any of them unpleasant.
All of them dunked well in tea with no disasters. That’s what’s so comforting about a digestive, you can always rely on them.
Number of biscuits
McVitie’s packets hold 16 biscuits, which makes every biscuit 9.3p - which feels obscene when, at Aldi there are 17 biscuits per pack, costing 2.8p each.
Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and M&S packs all contain 18 biscuits, but of course, their price per biscuit differs due to the cost of the packs. And as they’re near enough identical, Asda provides the best value of the four at 3p a biscuit.
All things taken into account, Aldi shared the most similar design and packaging to the McVitie’s chocolate digestive. They were also the cheapest, and performed well in the taste test. Following the custard cream taste test, I’d nearly written off all of Aldi’s biscuits, however, they take the crown for the chocolate digestives. Now I'm off to pop the kettle on.
