So I thought I would briefly introduce today’s tasty treat review before Mark takes over the reins and invites you into the thoughts and opinions of his eyes and more importantly, his taste-buds! (All thanks to a sneaky purchase I made last week!). Basically, I bought BROWNIES! And no, not your regular gluten free coffee shop brownie, but gluten free and vegan brownies!
They arrived beautifully wrapped! Secretly ordered as a present for me from Bex 🙂 x
I found out about this little company courtesy of the frozen yoghurt shop based in Brighton, Lick. They were advertising a new topping of brownie pieces and so I clicked on the link to see where the brownies came from and was very pleasantly surprised! The range of brownies they do is amazing…regular, gluten free, vegan and gluten free & vegan combined (all the ingredients are proudly placed on the site and within your order too). When I speak of the ‘range’ of brownies, it doesn’t just end at providing for those who eat gluten free and vegan, oh no, the brownies come in a variety of flavours. From white chocolate chunks, chocolate orange to peanut butter or dark chocolate & raspberry, the selection is vast and mouth watering!
So what is this company I imagine you are all wondering! Well it’s called ‘Have Cake’, (www.havecake.co.uk) and is run by Louise, an incredibly passionate baker based in the wonderful city of Brighton! If you’re local to the area you might have tasted some of her brownies in a few of the local restaurants, but it’s just as easy to taste her delightful baking skills if you live anywhere across the UK. She delivers next day and currently delivery is completely free! For £14.50 you get 9 brownies and there after any additional 9 brownies will only cost you £13; also the payment is done through PayPal, so it’s nice and simple. And so although I would love to waffle on endlessly about these brownies, I sadly have exams coming up over the next month so I will hand you over to Mark. I’m pretty sure he has eaten all the brownies now so I guess he definitely has enough brownie is his belly to give you all a good review!
Enter the brownie expert…
Actually I have one brownie left thank you very much Bex 😉 It’s Mark here again to guide you through the latter half of the review since I’m the one who ended up eating them all!
Gluten-free & dairy-free brownie with white chocolate pieces. How is this possible?!
I’ll start by saying, I haven’t had a brownie in about two and a half years and for very good reason… the last one killed me! I’m lactose intolerant, so you can imagine my delight to receive nine perfect looking brownies through the post, wonderfully gift-wrapped and… dairy-free? It must be my lucky day.
I was immediately suspicious of course as these brownies looked and smelt like heaven, just as I remembered them to be! They were even complimented with a healthy dose of white chocolate chunks. Had I been sent the real deal by accident? There was only one way I was going to find out…
So upon my first bite, it’s fair to say I was pretty blown away. The brownies were just as any lactose-intolerant would dream them to be; a textured crunch on the outside with a rich, chocolatey, gooey inside. Honestly, I had to go and double-check the ingredients again to truly believe it! I always assumed the rich gooeyness of your average brownie came from copious amounts of butter and milk chocolate, so to find that these brownies actually contained neither… was baffling to say the least!
Here’s the ingredients as taken from the Have Cake website:
White Choc Chunk Brownies: Gluten Free Flour, Sugar, Sunflower Oil, Cocoa Powder, Organic Vegan White Chocolate (Cocoa Butter, Cane Sugar, 10% Rice Syrup, Vegetable Oil, Vanilla, Sea Salt)
I had difficulties (and still do) in coming to terms that so little could create such a work of art. How are they so gooey and chocolatey without needing dairy? I guess I’ll never know 🙂
No, I wouldn’t believe this plate is gluten & dairy free either!
I had my brownies with vanilla soy ice-cream and butterscotch sauce which complimented them wonderfully; I opted to have them straight from the fridge ordinarily as it kept the middle nice, soft and deliciously congealed throughout. Of course, half a minute in the microwave also breathed a new sticky life into them when I was feeling adventurous!
As we all know, gluten-free and dairy-free equivalents of the real deal commonly tend to fall short due to the sacrifice required to adapt them to our needs. However, Have Cake’s brownies are without a doubt, a rare exception to the rule. I can only recommend you give them a try and hope that you relish the opportunity to eat something that, like me, you may have crossed off the menu a long time ago.
So what are you waiting for? Get over to www.havecake.co.uk and make your choice! Let us know on Twitter and Facebook what you thought 😀
