The
Three Cookies
Cookies have always been one of my favorite desserts but
I’ve never had a clear cut favorite brand. There are so many brands of store
cookies it can be hard to decide which one to buy. I decided to taste test
three popular brands of cookies Nabisco chips ahoy, Clover Valley, and Keebler.
I prefer my cookies to be soft and so I picked the soft chocolate chip variety
to test. At the beginning of the test I thought that Keebler would be the best.
My mother in-law took the three brands and divided them
into three groups for myself, my wife and father in-law so that we didn’t know
which cookie we were testing. The cookies were to be graded one at a time on overall
taste, # of chips, appearance, aroma and softness. Water was used in between
cookies to reset our palate
The first cookie was the clover valley chewy chocolate
cookies. The aroma was described as chocolatey by all of us. Aroma scored a
4/10 and was the worst of the three. Appearance was small and round with a
generous amount of chips (13+). It was scored a 7/10 on appearance and 8/10 on
chips. The cookies were dry and left a weird bitter after taste and felt as if
artificial as described by my wife. It scored a 6/10 on taste. The cookies were
soft and was the perfect balance between not too hard and not too soft. An 8/10
for softness. Overall these were our least favorite cookie.
The
second cookie was the chips ahoy chew chocolate chip. The aroma was sweet and
doughy and earned a score of 7/10. The appearance was slightly better than the
clover valley as it had plenty of chips and a slightly golden brown color. On
chips it scored a 6/10 and 8/10 for appearance. The chips ahoy had a doughy
taste and also left a bitter after taste. It scored a 7/10 for taste. The chips
ahoy was the softest as it crumbled very easily when bitten into. It earned a
9/10 for softness. Overall these were the second best cookies.
The
last to be tasted were the Keebler soft batch chocolate chip. The aroma scored
an 8/10 as you could smell the brown sugar and a fresh doughy smell. The
cookies had little visible chips and a golden brown color. On appearance and
chips it earned a 5/10. The taste was great as it was semisweet and had the
freshest taste. It tasted a little like fresh cookie dough. My first impression
was that the cookie was just a little too hard but managed to surprise me as it
melted in my mouth and became soft. The softness was a 7/10. Overall we thought
the Keebler cookies were the best. It must be the elves.
I really liked your last sentence! I think that making a table with the brands, the criteria, and their scores (5/10, 8/10, etc) would make it easier for your readers to compare them. Did each of you score them? Were the numbers you used in your blog averages of everyone's scores?
ReplyDeleteI thought about using a table but thought it may have added too much clutter. I will try it with it and see. Mostly I used my step dads scores combined with input from my wife for the numbers. Thanks for the input.
DeleteI like that you used a score a system, but what actually constituted each score? Like, the Clover Valley only got four out of ten for aroma, and you said it was the worst in the category. Why? What did it smell like, and what did you want it to smell like? The same thing with the appearance. What were you hoping they would look like? When you talked about the smell of the Keebler cookies, the description was better. I think you could explain the others the same way, and it would help make your taste a little more clear.
ReplyDeleteThe score system was just based on individual preferences but didn't have set criteria. That would have been a good idea. The clover valley didn't have that cookie smell that I was looking for. The appearance I was hoping to see a lot of chips and a golden brown color. The chips ahoy was the best looking cookie.
DeleteI liked how you expanded on the details of the cookies when it came to the aroma. Using the ranking system that you did, did everyone have the same rankings as you or did they differ some? When writing about the ranking, did you average everyone's ranking with yours? Why did you think that the Keebler cookies would be the best ones at the begining?
ReplyDeleteI used mainly my step dads #'s because that was how he graded them. I adjusted them with input from my wife and my personal opinion. I thought Keebler was the best because the name Keebler is associated with a good cookie.
DeleteAppreciated that you did a fully blind test, had multiple testers, and used a number system with preset categories. There are some places where I feel like going beyond the numbers would help some (for example, is the number of chips all you're rating? Detail on the flavor and why they got the scores they did would be helpful) and some of the description confuses me. What does doughy smell like, for instance? In my brain doughy is a texture, so I don't quite follow. Really appreciated your method, though- the level of detail really helps to establish credibility.
ReplyDeleteI think you did a really good job with this. This post is helpful and you do a really good job with the descriptions. I like the criteria you used for judging the cookies. Why did you guess the Keebler would be the best? I think your last sentence is funny as well. Maybe you could try adding more humor throughout the post.
ReplyDeleteYour post was nicely outlined and define fly contained every element that was needed. I agree that though you have a scoring system, the scoring is so subjective that a clearer "scale" system would help solidify those scores. You explained the texture aroma and other means of measure well and the fact that you outlined what you would be measuring beforehand was an excellent detail. More depth in your descriptions and consistent language are small things that would make this post even greater. This was a great read!
ReplyDelete