I recently told you about how Cadbury, courtesy of The Online Circle, delivered a hefty package of baking chocolate to my humble abode, and how I used the now-cocoa-butter-not-vegetable-fat-containing Dark Chocolate Melts and Milk Chocolate Chips within to make ridiculously gooey and sweetly-sweet-sweet chocolate brownies.
In that post, I promised you more reviews and recipes. Today, I’m making good on that promise, even though I would honestly rather be curling up and falling asleep in a room that smells like Vienna almonds and is full of fluffy gambolling puppies. And then I would like to wake up in New York. Or Kansas City.
Instead, I’ll tell you my thoughts about the new Baking Chips range of Cadbury chocolate, and then bequeath unto you my adaptation of a Chocolate Bubble Slice recipe that I found in my Kid’s Party Food cookbook. (By “adaptation”, I mean “adding peanut butter and cutting the recipe down by a third”. That counts, right?)
Here’s what I think of Cadbury’s new dark, white, and milk chocolate baking chips:
Dark Chocolate Baking Chips: The chocolate flavour is richer than expected, but the overall taste is dominated by sugar, with toffee and caramel notes abounding. I’ve often bought Nestle’s dark chocolate chips to snack on during craving emergencies in the past, but will switch to Cadbury in future as the chocolate flavour is slightly deeper. However, I take umbrage with Cadbury’s (and Nestle’s) use of milk solids in its “dark chocolate”. As someone who is lactose intolerant and has vegan tendencies, the existence of milk solids means I’ll always opt for Lindt or Ghirardelli dark chocolate where possible.
White Chocolate Baking Chips: The aroma reminds me of caramel Top ‘n’ Fill, and the texture is a little bit grainy. There are notes of vanilla ice cream, yoghurt, and cream cheese. These are, like the dark chocolate chips, better than I expected, with some cocoa butter richness alongside the sweet milk and cream notes. I’d buy these for baking.
Milk Chocolate Baking Chips: These are a scourge and embarrassment to the name of chocolate. They remind me of apathetic teenagers trailing after their parents in public, desperately hoping that no one they know sees them. In other words, these milk chocolate chips seem determined to reject any relationship to actual chocolate. They’re faintly tangy, but overall just sweet with a fudgy texture, tasting more of vanilla sugar and flavourless milk than chocolate. I think these milk chocolate chips should either be rebranded as Oily Sugar Chips or simply cast into the fiery pits of doom. Also, tangent: who honestly ever actually chooses to bake with milk chocolate chips instead of dark? EXACTLY.
In summary, my opinion of Cadbury’s new Baking Chips is that the dark chocolate chips are perfectly fine to use in baking and even for snacking (when cravings demand an easy sweet chocolate hit), that the white chocolate chips are pretty good in and for the same, and that the milk chocolate chips are near-tasteless devil spawn wasting my precious tummy space.
And now, the recipe! I’ve had a half-finished box of Rice Bubbles in my pantry ever since I made the Peanut Butter Rice Krispie Treats, but have been determined to do something with them other than the standard Mars Bar Slice. Imagine my delight, then, upon finding a recipe in an old cookbook that asked for both Rice Bubbles and milk chocolate Melts.
I adjusted the recipe to make a smaller batch while also adding a hefty spoonful of peanut butter to the icing because, well, why not? This Chocolate Bubble Slice with Peanut Butter Icing went down an absolute treat with both my dad and my two fellow chocolate lovers at work. Therefore I thank Cadbury for providing me with the incentive and means to bring a little chocolate happiness to my office.
Chocolate Bubble Slice with Chocolate Peanut Butter Icing
Makes 12-16, depending on how big you cut your squares.
Adapted from The Women’s Weekly Kid’s Party Food Mini Cookbook
Base
- 1/3 cup (80g) butter, melted
- 1 cup (200g) firmly packed brown sugar
- 1 egg, beaten lightly (or 1 and a half eggs, if you can be bothered with that)
- 2/3 cup (24g) Rice Bubbles/Krispies
- 1/2 cup (40g) desiccated coconut
- 2/3 cup (100g) self-raising flour
- 2 tbs (Australian, i.e. 40ml or 2 American tb + 2 tsp, 17g) cocoa powder
Icing
- 1 cup (140g) milk chocolate Melts (I used Cadbury), melted
- 1/3 cup (80g) butter, melted
- 2 heaping spoonfuls of peanut butter, optional
- 2/3 cup (24g) Rice Bubbles/Krispies
- Grease and line with baking paper (extending the paper up the two long sides by a few centimetres) a 20cm x 20cm (8 inch x 8 inch) square tin. Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F).
- In a medium bowl, combine the butter, sugar, and egg. Stir in the Rice Bubbles, coconut, and the sifted flour and cocoa powder. Spread into prepared tin, and bake for 20-22 minutes until firm. Cool in pan.
- For the icing, take another medium bowl and combine the melted chocolate, butter, and peanut butter, stirring until smooth. Stir in the Rice Bubbles. If you used the peanut butter (and, let’s be honest, why wouldn’t you?) and find that the topping seems too thick to spread, add a little more melted butter.
- Spread the topping over the cooled slice and refrigerate until firm. Cut into squares and distribute among friends, family, or workmates. Accept inevitable hugs.
Woo hoo, I’m first for once, but what to say, what to say? I mustn’t waste this space! Yep, I’m going to – waste this space – cos I’ve got nothing. I might of course have had something if the recipe worked for me, but it doesn’t and so I will (waste this space I mean).
DO you know how you could make wasting the space up to me? Swinging by work tomorrow with the clothes I went to your place today to pick up and then absolutely forgot about. :S I’m in chaos, ma!
Will see what we can do!
Thank you mum! I was so upset at myself when I realised. Stressing about having no clothes for Sydney; but did I even wash those ones? Ack!
Hope yoga was lovely?
You had me at the title – and the picture confirmed it!
It annoys me too when dark chocolate has milk in it – surely the whole point is it hasn’t?! And I’ll sign the fiery pits of hell petition; I’m a milk chocolate-lover and even I wouldn’t eat or bake with the milk choc chips, even in a chocolate emergency, I’d have expected better of Cadbury’s, tsk!
*laughs* Thanks Eleanor! I’ll get that petition up and running asap. Absolutely none of the “dark” chocolate in the baking aisle of Coles or Woolies is dairy-free, which is so irritating. In future, I’ll be using Whittaker’s instead, I think!
If they taste like sweet-sweet-sweet, that sounds far removed from tasteless to me. I’d eat them! And what’s this? Lo and behold, you, your dad, and your coworkers enjoyed them fiery spawn chips things:) It was probably just the peanut butter though, right?
So excited for stress month from hell (it originated in the same sector as those chips) to be over, so I can bake something already !
You can have them. Calling them sweet was just me being nice and grappling at straws. I honestly felt like I was chewy on solid air at times. Bah, humbug!
And actually, darling, we didn’t. There were no milk chocolate chips used in this recipe. I TRICKSTED YOU!
Emma, sending you a bazillion well wishes and hugs and sparkly support-thought for your demon month! See you on the other side
xoxo
I love chocolate, and this dessert looks so good!
Thanks Melanie! It was rather tasty
Okay, Ms Reads-My-Mind, I have some leftover Coco Pops from a chocolate recipe I’ve just made. (Which is now on my blog.) Will duly take the rest of them and try making this recipe, because it sounds superior to all things.
I hate that they put milk solids in their dark chocolate- I always list dark chocolate as an ingredient in my vegan/dairy-free recipes, would hate for someone to go out there and get the wrong stuff and then get all swollen up and resentful.
Pssst…. I recommend adding even more peanut butter. Somehow. Perhaps more to the batter? I have faith in you, Ms Also-Often-Reads-My-Mind.
Ah, I don’t think you need to stress about that. Anyone who is truly invested in avoiding dairy will be a dedicated ingredients-reader, I’m sure
I’ve made brownies with a rice krispy/marshmallow/Nutella top and they were a big hit – next time I will use peanut butter too!
I remember that on your blog; it looked incredible! (Unless you didn’t blog it and I’m completely imagining things.
)
Your review of the milk chocolate fully made me LOL.
“near tasteless devil spawn” LOL love your work Hannah xo I’ve never been keen to bake with Cadbury’s.
Id be very happy to just eat this icing! DELICIOUS
Yep, the icing is definitely the best part! Such is the power of peanut butter.
um…oh my….these look too freakin’ delish!
They’re so old-school childhood, I love it
Oh wow, this look amazeballs, no other word for it. I am allergic to 100% of it but I think I need to make it for a cheat day fo’ sho!
I hate using chocolate chips – I just crush up various flavours of Lindt. Because I’m classy like that.
Hannah, crushing up Lindt is totally the classy option! I’d do that if it weren’t for the fact that I’d always rather eat my Lindt straight than use it in baking
I recently cheated on my soy free diet and nibbled on some left-over cadbury baking chips a few days ago. I also bought myself an American milky-way that had both soy and barley in it – and I’m supposed to be avoiding both gluten and soy!
Haven’t had time to do much with chocolate lately, just starting to feel better after the other day’s mishap. Just had to do it – just once…
I completely understand wanting to let go of the diet restrictions for a moment, but oh! I wish I could’ve given you something higher quality and tastier than Cadbury!! An American Milk Way is like our Mars Bar, right?
Yes they’re very similar – except I believe they use ‘real milk chocolate’ on the bars over there. The 3 musketeers over there are similar to our milky ways over here I believe. Unfortunately I don’t think I’ll be re-doing it for a while, even though I am feeling better now.
Darling you would never get any sleep in a room full of puppies!
I did go out and buy the Melts after your last review. I will have to buy some of the white Chips to go with raspberries in my almond meal muffins.
I do love the packaging of the new Cadbury baking range; I guess it helps that purple has always been my favourite colour.
But oh, Margaret, not sleeping in a room full of puppies would be so much better than simply lying in bed alone dealing with concurrent insomniac nights. *shudder*
White chocolate and raspberry is such a perfect combination! Definitely go the chips not the melts for muffins, but I’m sure that was your intent anyway
It is a lovely rich purple, isn’t it?
I LOVE the idea of mixing in rice bubbles and peanut butter as a frosting. Peanutty and crunchy. You have satisfied my silly American cravings.
*laughs* No craving that involves peanut butter could ever be called silly, although it could definitely be called American-influenced
Oh, that’s disappointing about the milk choc olate chips. I love Cadbury in my baking, but will steer clear of the milk choc chips. I usually use Nestle choc chips and had hoped the Cadbury ones would be even better!
Good woman. Dark chocolate chips all the way! There’s probably not a huge about of difference between the N and Cadbury chocolate chips, but I do feel the new Cadbury ones have a slight edge over Nestle’s old’uns.
sounds like an excellent way to treat your rice bubbles! curious about how it would taste to add peanut butter to the melted chocolate
I am glad you find the dark choc chips pleasing – now I just have to find them – went to where they usually keep the cadbury ones last week and found myself at home with melts not chips – was most displeased by the changes because when you are tired and rush to the supermarket after dinner you should be looked after rather than challenged!
The peanut butter wasn’t very strong in flavour, but I’d love to try ampng it up in future. Perhaps add some to the batter as well?
Ah, at least the Melts are proper chocolate and not disgusting vegetable-fat creations these days! Silver lining?!
I was comforted by your review – normally I would never buy melts because they are full of rubbish
Amen. But at least there’s the small comfort of them not being quite as rubbish anymore.
I for one can never imagine buying milk choc chips over dark choc ones. I see them there in the supermarket and wonder who does buy them.
But thanks for the review, I will give them a try instead of my regular nestle ones next time.
Exactly, right?! No one of sane mind *should* consider buying milk chocolate chips. Complete waste of shelf space and tummy space
Let me know what you think if you do try these instead of Nestle!
This looks like an adult version of the rice crispy treats I recall from childhood birthday parties
I like the chocolate chip review too – very helpful! Although I confess to feeling a little sick on thinking about the white chocolate chips. I think white chocolate designed for cooking might be at the bottom of my chocolate hierarchy.
I definitely see where you’re coming from! Thankfully these don’t contain that awful copha stuff from childhood chocolate crackles.
This white chocolate is actually better than the “snack” white chocolate in the confectionary aisle, which (at least, last time I checked) all contained vegetable fat instead of pure cocoa butter. But then again, I prefer white chocolate to milk chocolate anyway
Your food photos are looking GOOD, chica! I’m trying to cut sugar out of my diet, though, so I had to breeze by them.
Ah, so you’ve joined that movement too? Fingers crossed you’re still having fruit, at least!
And thank you! I still struggle so much with taking photos, so that means a lot 
Im dying of sugar overload in the best way just looking at these! I bought some chips over the weekend so will see how they go
Teehee! Yay! I love your comment
Good luck with the chips!
How can I go and make porridge for breakfast after reading this!
Hmm I think after the success of the raw vegan carob brownies with the healthier members of the house, this recipe might be perfect for my cereal-and-peanut-butter-head sons. Ciao ciao
Easy! You just make porridge like I do: cooked with vanilla and soy milk and topped with dark chocolate, maple syrup, and peanut butter. Best breakfast ever!
Wooooooooot! I’m so, so, so ecstatically happy that the raw vegan carob brownies worked well for you! *heel click*
Hey that wasn’t how my Nana taught me how to make porridge. Sounds divine. But then would I deserve the carob slice for morning tea (such a lovely, non-Italian concept)??
Lady, we always deserve the carob slice. It’s one of the perks of being awesome.
I’ve never used baking chocolate before, last time I made brownies I used 2 blocks of Green and Black 85% dark choc. Re: Cadbury chocs alright for baking… hahaha not convinced!! Esp when you didn’t go into your voluminous and poetic discourse on all the hints and flavours you can glean from the chocolate, you know.. the way I do with coffees?
Well spotted, Bryan! Cadbury has a long way to go before it’s worthy of, or even capable of inspiring, a nuanced and detailed chocolate tasting review post
I mean, I even wrote a Cadbury review in haiku once because there was so little to say about it! 
I haven’t even broken into my Cadbury box but I think I’ll be giving the milk chips a wide berth-unless of course I was in the mood for near-tasteless devil spawn and want to waste my precious tummy space
And, I mean, you generally have the urge to do precisely that at least once a fortnight, right? At about the same time you get overcome with the desire to apply a stapler to your own knee?
Ar!! I used only the dark chocolate melts! And no to wasting tummy space as well.
Then you saved yourself a lot of agony, Penny. Phew!
I’m supposed to be cutting down on sugar in an attempt to create the perfect bikini body for summer. Then I saw this.
Oh dear. I HAVE to make this, now!
Bye-bye, bikini body!
Darling, your body will always be a bikini body. All you need to do is put on a bikini and own it, lady! Wooooooooot! Plus the best bikini body is a happy body, and a happy body is a body that has eaten chocolate.
Golly, I’d write the best women’s magazine ever if only someone would let me.
Your magazine would be sensational Hannah. Lots of pretty pics, chocolate and peanut butter recipes, great romantic stories, fashion tips, handy hints to deal with heavy workloads, and so on and so on. What would you call it? You could call it ‘The French Press’. But maybe ‘Ooh La La’ might be the way to go?
Oh Mike! The possibilities are endless! It would have to be a name combining my love of musicals, desserts, and laughter, surely. I feel there’s a name on the tip of tongue, but I’m too exhausted to see it from here…
P.S. I’m glad to know at least one fella would subscribe to my women’s magazine
Here i am craving peanut butter and you go and put this in my face! WANT!!!
I is inside your mind reading all yourz thoughtz.
It’s not batter! Clap clap!
I’m going to pretend that’s not a slow clap accompanied by a smirk, Agnes dear.
Would I do that? NEVER. I don’t even know how to smirk.
Oops, my bad. I must be thinking of my other BFF.
You must be. She sounds horrible.
She gets away with it because she’s so puuuuuurdy.
All I lack in the pantry is the rice bubbles – would stale, crushed cornflakes do?
I can’t see why not! Or just leave ‘em out all together and throw in extra chocolate
They look like they have lots of texture, these sweet little delights! Yes, I can see chocolate happiness in them.
So much happiness indeed
wow peanut butter icing with chocolate rice krispies! hahaha love how you call them bubbles.
i bet i would eat this entire pan….!
I wish I could take the credit for that, but in Australia the cereal is called Rice Bubbles!
Kansas City! Yes! Kansas City!
Whoa! Okay so, I’ll send you my address now and you can send those over to me
They look so delicious~And I had no idea cadbury sold those. I love their milk chocolate with fruit and nut, but I don’t particularly like it in baked goods so much. But, this recipe sounds delicious~
I’ll get right on it! I’m sure they’ll survive our summer heat in the postal system
I could send you Cadbury Fruit and Nut sometime though! That makes my stomach go eeeeuuurgh 
omigosh hello! i think there’s an error in your recipe though – peanut butter is *not* an option, it’s mandatory. lol
Bahahaha! I’m with you, Helen, but it did make the icing a bit more smoodgy and less smooth, so thought I’d give people the choice
You is the crazee *woot *woot* You is the Angle babe *w00t* *w00t* You is giving me rake sways of this *woot *woot*
Bahaha!! Oh I am so in love with you right now. I don’t know what you’re on but I want some! Best fried rake sways in town! Look at this stuff, isn’t it neat, wouldn’t you think my collection’s complete?
Wouldn’t you think I’m the girl, The girl who has everything? Look at this trove, treasures untold, How many wonders can one cavern hold?
Looking around here you’d think, “Sure, she’s got everything!” I’ve got gadgets and gizmos a-plenty…
haha LOVE the way you wrote about the milk chocolate chips. I haven’t used any of their products, but that description was brilliant
Great work on the slice!
Heidi xo
Teehee, I’m fairly certain Cadbury’s going to love that description too
Ah well, I told ‘em I’d call it like I see it! 
hehehe I love this review, dang evil milk chocolate melts! I’m not a big milk chocolate fan full stop, so I doubt I will be buying these
Love your idea for the rice bubble slice though, peanut butter is always a winner with chocolate.
Teehee, thank you Lou! I’m not a fan of milk chocolate either, unless it’s high quality and combined with innovative/crazy flavours. Or, you know, turned into a milk chocolate peanut butter sandwich.
This looks so good! I love the way you’ve made the icing the feature. Oh I could soooo eat some of this right now…
Thank you Katy! Anything with peanut butter deserves to be the star, right?
Tee hee. Your assessment of the milk chips made me giggle. A lot.
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