Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic So, Jaffa Cakes are not a product of the Jaffa in SG-1

Ok, being from The States, I am obviously unaware of many of your food products, but when I read fic that someone named Wesley got a package of Jaffa Cakes, I went, )

I just wish we could cough easily and cheaply coughget them here!

James

Jaffa Cakes are pretty cool. They were one of my favourite treats when I was a kid. Traditionally, there's a specific way to eat them.

You have to nibble all the way round and take away the edges, then eat the chocolate coating off, then peel the orangey bit off the top and eat it on its own, (its a kind of jelly substance, so it usually peels off in one piece) then eat the cake base last.

Taste good and provide hours (well, minutes) of fun.

LabRat

You guys have Jaffa cakes in the UK, LabRat? Here in NZ we have Jaffas - little round reddy-orange balls with a candy-ish exterior and chocolate on the inside. The exterior (I think, it's been so long since I've had one) is orangey flavoured...or something.

Sounds as if the flavours are similar to Jaffa cakes. Probably the flavours originated from them. NZ got many other things from the UK after all...

~Anna.

Jaffa Cakes are a flat, round cake base, a tangy orange jelly centre and covered in chocolate.

LabRat

Okay...definitely the same sorts of flavours. But different substances containing those flavours.

Do you guys have Jaffas over there, LabRat?

~Anna.

Jaffa Cakes:



And you can also read all about them .

I prefer to eat my Jaffa cakes the same way as I eat any other biscuit, however


Wendy

There are now several companies making them in several different flavours, but mostly the ones that aren't the originals taste weird. There is only one true Jaffa.

What? Sacrilege!

LabRat

Not wishing to blow your minds, but despite assumptions for once, Jaffa Cakes are not an exclusively British snack.

I have travelled around a lot of Eastern Europe, and seen many different variations of the Jaffa cake. They are all yummy, although there's something about the genuine McVitties version that adds a certain je ne sais quoi. I don't know if it's the thickness of the chocolate or the softness of the cake, or the tanginess of the orange, but McVitties just have that edge to them.

Yum.

I once had a friend who found himself homeless and broke for a few weeks. He stayed on my sofa, and paid rent in Jaffa Cakes, vodka and doing the dishes. One of the best housemates I had

Helga

I remember reading a long post about these (might not have been here, though) which debated whether these are cakes or biscuits... *lol* Something about taxes and god only knows what else. It was hilarious!

Anyhow.... I don't believe we have those over here. Maybe in English-speaking Canada, but I'd never heard about them until a few months ago. They look real yummy, though, so I guess I'll start planning a trip to England. hehehe!

Don't remember the thread, but, yes, that's right. They're thought of as biscuits here in the UK, but they really are proper cakes. In the UK, companies are taxed differently depending on whether it's a chocolate biscuit or a cake and McVities had a big row with the taxman over how much they should pay. The taxman insisted Jaffa Cakes were chocolate biscuits, so were liable for VAT, and McVities insisted they were cakes. McVities eventually went to the trouble of baking a huge version of a Jaffa cake to prove their point - and won. Not least because the cake went stale after a few days and that's the main difference between biscuits and cakes. Biscuits go soft when they go off and cakes go hard.

Here's Wiki's take on it:

LabRat

Taxation debate over cakes and biscuits? Now there is a proper basis for a tea party!

Basically the idea is that food is zero-rated for tax, but "luxury" foods - biscuits, most bottled and canned fizzy drinks, restaurant meals and a couple of other things - are taxed at 17.5%, like most non-food items (the other big exception is books and magazines, also zero-rated). It's complicated and occasionally arbitrary, e.g. the "cake versus biscuits" thing, but the tax is always included in the price of the item so you don't get any nasty surprises.

The tax-free status of books is occasionally complicated too - the books themselves are tax-free, but if they're in some sorts of presentation case they're not (this may have changed now, I'm a bit out of touch with that part of publishing). Role playing games (with a box containing three books, maybe a few counters, and a couple of plastic dice) also used to fall into this grey area - it's one of the reasons why they're almost all sold as books these days, with dice etc. as extras.

Actually, that was a reference to the Boston Tea Party .

I noticed - but the rationale, such as it is, is a little warped. Don't tax the things people live on, just the luxuries that make life worth living.

I couldn't agree more. I tried one with raspberry-flavoured jelly once - and only once. There's nothing like true Jaffa. Which reminds me, it has been ages since I had some.
Then, again, I liked them much better when I was still a kid.

Jaffa, kree! Food!

If I understand this thread correctly, the difference between a biscuit and a cake is that the biscuit (if it is chocolate-covered) is a luxury food and the cake is not?

That's weird to me. I live in the States, and over here a biscuit is bread baked in a small round loaf and usually flavored with butter and sometimes jelly or jam (I like strawberry myself). There are those who prefer to use them to sop up the gravy from whatever else they're eating (but not with jelly inside them), and they are definitely not a luxury food. Cakes are usually dessert or sweet snack food and are usually covered with sweet icing (although not always with the icing part).

Out of curiosity, what do you Brits call the thing that us bluecoats call a biscuit? And how much is a rasher, anyway?

Whatever the answer, I'm going to chalk this up to being just one more example of us being divided by a common language.

I always get confused with hearing Americans talking about 'biscuits'. Because although I know the word isn't used for the same item that we use it for (being in NZ we've naturally inherited a lot of terms from the UK), I have a hard time picturing your type of 'biscuits'... I suppose you call what we call biscuits, cookies? Right?

~Anna.

This is a biscuit:



It's kind of like a scone or crumpet, but not as sweet. Generally, it's also more flaky and buttery. Sometimes more airy, depending on who's making it.

It should not be confused with a dog biscuit:



These are saltines, which are a type of thin, airy cracker:



But a "tea biscuit" like this would also be considered a type of cracker:



In fact, all of the things here are crackers:



This is a cookie:



These are also cookies:



And, of course... This is a cookie monster:



Clear?

LOL, Paul. And thanks. I keep coming across saltines in books (the character usually eats them with soup) and I always wondered what they were but never got up the energy to actually go look them up.

LabRat (one more mystery solved...)

PS - oh, just one thing. Are they actually salty to taste, as I keep imagining they are from the name?