Cadbury Flake is a UK bar that’s chocolate folded in on itself in thin sheets, which adds a textural component that changes the melt and mouthfeel, not unlike how aerated chocolate seems to taste different. It’s also really popular as an ice cream topper. This summer, I saw lots of British people and foreign tourists walking around eating an ice cream cone with a little Cadbury Flake sticking out of the top. I never bothered to try the plain Cadbury Flake, but I did try three of its many variations: the Dipped, the Praline, and the Dark.

The Flake Dark is just a normal Flake but made with dark chocolate (44% to be exact). For dark chocolate, it is way too overly sweet. Unsurprising for a mass made bar but still disappointing. It was also pretty waxy. Still, it did at least taste like cocoa, which is more than can be said for many Hershey’s products these days.

The Flake Praline (below photo) fared somewhat better in my taste test, but it still wasn’t great. As far as I could tell, it was a normal milk chocolate Flake with its base dipped in a praline/hazelnut/chocolate mixture. The Flake texture still comes across, only this time it comes with a tinge of hazelnut flavor and crunch. Still, the thing was overly sweet. I often have that issue with chocolate + hazelnut combinations but usually still manage to enjoy the two together. In the case of the Flake Praline, not so much.

Finally, we have the Flake Dipped, which is a Flake bar dipped in? chocolate. The dipping didn’t do much for the taste or the texture, but it at least contained the Flake crumbles (the previous two were rather messy and shed chocolate bits everywhere). I found the chocolate to be too dry with a sour finish, unusual for U.K. bars.

Overall, I found the Flake line to be pretty disappointing, which is why I never bothered to try the original. If its jazzier versions were bad, the plain milk chocolate version could only be worse. You can also get Flakes in miniature bits as a soft serve topping (at KFC, I think?). I tried them that way and was not impressed. An O for this mediocre trio.

By Rosa