Easter is on the horizon, the time when eating a ridiculous amount of chocolate is deemed acceptable. Purchasing Easter Eggs can prove super expensive though, especially if you buy luxury brands such as Lindt or Hotel Chocolat.
That being said, there are plenty of Easter eggs out there in a more affordable price bracket, with supermarkets providing cheaper alternatives. But which own-brand Easter Egg is the best?
The Liverpool Echo tried Easter Eggs from M&S, Lidl, Aldi and Tesco to find out which one reigns supreme - here's their verdict.
Marks and Spencer Extremely Chocolatey Biscuity-Egg
M&S has come up with some great Easter treats this year - its Giant Speckled Egg Bar is divine, trust me - and I was intrigued when I spotted its £8 'Extremely Chocolatey Biscuity-Egg'. The egg - ok it's not egg shaped, let's just get that out the way now - is, as the name would suggest, based on one of M&S's popular choccy biccies.
Once I opened it up it felt quite heavy and it was quite tough to crack into, but that's only a good thing because it's down to the chocolate being so incredibly thick. When it comes to taste, it's a really milky milk chocolate, very creamy and is packed with chunky biscuit pieces, which personally I loved.
It's a total winner if you like dunking chocolate biscuits into a cup of tea, because it's like you're getting the best of both worlds. If you can get over the fact that it's not an egg shaped egg, I'm pretty sure you'll love it just as much as me.
Price: £8
Rating: 4/5
Where to buy: You can buy in Marks and Spencer Food Halls or online at Ocado.
Lidl Deluxe Single Origin Easter Egg
Lidl has plenty of chocolatey treats on offer this year, and interestingly, a lot them are dark chocolate. I wasn't too sure how to feel about this, because dark chocolate is probably my least favourite, but I opted for the 'Lidl Deluxe Single Origin Easter Egg' because the design was beautiful.
I couldn't get over how amazing it was aesthetically, considering this was an Easter Egg, it looked like a piece of art, so kudos to Lidl for the sheer detail of this sweet treat. The Easter egg itself was actually quite thin and crunchy, and once I took a bite, the bitterness of the dark chocolate really took over.
I chose the 'Ecuadorian' dark chocolate, with a 'slight hint of orange' on the lizard design, but 'Madagascan' dark chocolate is also available for those who'd prefer it. Despite not being a big lover of dark chocolate, there was a lot of taste to this Easter egg, it actually made a nice change not having something so sickly sweet.
For those who are big fans of dark chocolate, Lidl has got it absolutely spot on, but I'm not sure I'd personally choose a Lidl Easter egg again, purely because I prefer milk. The design of the egg was amazing and it had a nice crunch, and I really liked how different it was compared to other Easter eggs available in supermarkets.
One thing that let this egg down was the fact that I couldn't really taste the subtle hint of orange as promised, but that could be because of the overpowering bitter dark chocolate. For those who favour dark chocolate, I think this is a great option.
Price: £4.99
Rating: 3/5
Where to buy: Your local Lidl store
Tesco FreeFrom Honeycomb Crunch Choc Egg
Tesco had little to offer in the own-brand Easter egg hunt this year, I have to say. While the supermarket giant does have a huge range of eggs from Cadbury, Galaxy and other big brand names on offer, it has only a couple of Tesco branded options.
After searching a number of my local stores, I managed to find Tesco’s FreeFrom Easter eggs, which are gluten, wheat and milk free. With only a couple of options to choose from I went with the Tesco FreeFrom Honeycomb Crunch Choc Egg.
Since I’m usually a big fan of Cadbury when it comes to Easter eggs, I didn’t have big expectations. Luckily I was proven somewhat wrong once I’d actually tried it.
The egg was quite weighty and solid, so much so that I struggled to crack it open. Taste-wise the chocolate was similar to cheap advent calendar chocolate, but its saving grace was definitely the honeycomb.
The egg has chunks - big and small - of honeycomb all the way through it, so much so that it out does the chocolate and gives a sweet, crunchy flavour. While the chocolate certainly didn’t have anything on the classic Cadbury or Galaxy, the honeycomb added something different and saved the day.
Price: £4
Rating: 3/5
Where to buy: Your local Tesco store or online.
Aldi's Dairyfine Billionaire's Milk Chocolate Easter Egg
Aldi has a variety of Easter eggs on sale this year, including a selection of free-from eggs. I love all types of chocolate, but when it comes to Easter eggs, milk is my favourite. I was delighted to find there were plenty of milk eggs on sale, but it was Dairyfine's Billionaire's Milk Chocolate Easter Egg that caught my eye.
The egg looked striking in its purple box with different coloured chocolate decorations and intriguing treats stuck to the front of it. Priced at just £2.79, I couldn't resist buying it due to it looking more than just your average Easter egg.
The Dairyfine Easter egg is a hollow milk egg with a blended milk and white chocolate decoration. Melted into the chocolate on the front of the egg is white chocolate coated biscuit balls, caramel fudge pieces, chocolate fudge pieces, golden coloured honeycomb pieces and mini white chocolate coated biscuit balls.
The egg itself was quite hard to crack open due to the chocolate being thick, but I personally like Easter eggs to be thicker, so the struggle to get into it was a good sign. I popped the first piece of the egg into my mouth and I was in heaven - the milk chocolate was smooth and delicious.
As for the extra treats on the front of the egg, they were super tasty. The caramel fudge pieces are understandably quite hard, but were full of flavour. The mixture of textures and flavours with the biscuit and honeycomb pieces really added to the egg. It didn't feel like I was eating an Easter egg, as there was so much more to it. For £2.79, it's an absolute bargain.
Price: £2.79
Rating: 5/5
Where to buy: Your local Aldi store.
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