December is approaching at a rapid speed. The month of christmas trees, fireworks and familial obligations. But the one I personally find the most fun is Sinterklaas (the superior of Santa Claus). This holiday is not only focused on gifts given by a (creepy?) old man, but, like many other holidays, has a big food element tied to it. Because who doesn't like a good holiday snack?! Those of course being ‘Pepernoten’ (translated: pepper-nuts). Small crunchy bites available in the fall and winter. They are a staple in every Dutch household this season and for good reason. The classic is, well, classic, a solid 10/10. With one problem: once you start eating, there is no stop. Over time, many, many, many different variants of pepernoten have become available in supermarkets. For example with different kinds of chocolate coatings, but also with unique flavours. To help you make a good choice of pepernoten this year, we gathered all of our certified pepernoot-reviewers and got four rather unique flavours to review for you today. Our experts rated the taste, look, smell, and if the name was somewhat accurate to the flavour. From worst to best I present to you the official Lifeline pepernoten review:
We got the pepernoten from Van Delft (a pepernoten store in Herestraat). One thing that immediately caught the attention of Jente and yours truly is that “the pepernoten are too small”. Because when it comes to pepernoten, size matters. After our initial observation, it was time to dig in.
Cherry Cheesecake
First up the cherry cheesecake flavoured pepernoten. With their hot pink coating they are the brightest of the bunch! A feast for the eye, however, this screaming colour was perceived as artificial by some of our reviewers and as super cute by others. So it depends on how much you like the colour pink if you find this one appetising or not. The smell was also as chemical as their look. As our seccie pointed out, they “smell fake”. Ignoring the E-numbers density in the little tiny pepernoot, we dared to take a bite. And sadly, the taste was not as bright as the crushed up insects that were used for the colour. It is sweet, chemically, and reminds a few of us of the pink bubblegum we ate as a child. It did remind us of artificial cherry flavouring, but the ‘cheesecake’ part was nowhere to be found. This is not the best in our humble opinion, and like Chay said “I don't want to eat a cheesecake crunchy thing”. Which we agreed with. Let cheesecake be cake, let pepernoot be pepernoot.
Sex on the Beach
A promising name for a bag of pepernoten and we sure hoped it lived up to the name. However, we were very divided on this flavour. With grades ranging from 3 till 8.5, this is really up to personal preference. The look of this one is just fine, it is unique as it is orange, which reminded Alessia of Kingsday, but there is nothing too special about it. The smell of this one was perceived as mainly two things: sweet and peach. With variations such as peach ice tea, Jamin-store and Skittles being used to describe the smell by our lifeliners. The taste is where our group of reviewers divided. There was a group of us, me included, who found the taste to be that of white chocolate and orange. Yes, it’s sweet, but that's to be expected. On the contrary, some Lifeliners found the taste to resemble a floor cleaner. I suspect because some cleaning products have a citrusy smell, but it does make me wonder what they clean their floors with… As far as sex on the beachyness, we did not really feel the cocktail. We mainly felt some peach smell and orange taste. However, Jente pointed out that she could taste the vodka (there’s no actual vodka in it though). You will either love or hate this one it seems. Maybe first ask yourself what floor cleaner tastes like to you before buying.
Banoffee
I know, I know, I know, bananas are yellow. BUT, there is no reason to make a pepernoot yellow. This colour really threw our appetite off. Even more so than the pink did. Some trusted lifeliners started making associations with the colour which did not make them seem more appealing. Our honorary lifeliner Anette commented that it “looks like diarrhoea” and Marit referred to her Texel-ness by saying “it looks like seal poop when they are sick”. These associations are fair, but don’t give the banoffee flavour high hopes. Though, surprisingly, the taste is much better than the look. It's all about what’s on the inside at the end of the day kids. The taste is that of typical chemical banana flavour; to some this is the worst, but to many lifeliners this is the best. “Tastes like Haribo bananas” according to Jente. And Gintare, who simply loves banana flavouring, gave them a solid 10 for that fact. We all agreed that the banana flavour was there, whether we liked it or not. But the toffee flavour was nowhere to be found. We think the pepernoot can be renamed to just banana.
Apple Pie
Thus far our reviewers have been quite critical. Nit picking on the little details and aftertastes, rating it rather harshly. When you thought we had no sprinkle of positivity left in us, here is the last pepernoot flavour: apple pie. This is by far the best one. It has an appetising rustic look to it, and smells delightful. “Smells like a cinnamon candle” according to Marit. The taste of this one is what really made all of Lifeline really happy. Nostalgia hit us like a full on rainstorm in the peaks of fall. It was there and we were soaking. “Feels like christmas” said Gintare, “tastes like my grandma’s apple jam” added Anette. The extreme cinnamon taste made us reminisce about the cosy months with scented candles and apple pies and grandma’s in kitchens and warm blankets. There was a hint of fruitiness which we defined to be apple, but there was like 80% cinnamon which we loved!! Out of all the flavours we tried today, you are highly recommended to go and get the apple pie flavoured pepernoten.
