Marks & Spencer - new dessert menu?

Yesterday afternoon I took a trip to Marks & Spencers to get something nice for Saturday night dinner.  I tend to only shop in Marks & Spencers for weekend treats as it is a little bit outside of my budget for my day to day shopping.  Although, as much as I wish I could afford to shop in Marks everyday, it does make the weekend all the more of a treat when I have something particularly nice.

 

For dinner on Saturday I had rump steak which came with a portion of peppercream sauce and chips.  I cooked my steak rare.

 

Dessert!

 

Starting from the bottom:

Shortbread biscuit layer - crunchy & sugary

Caramel - smooth, creamy & flavourful

Cream - balances the caramel & chocolate

Chocolate - not too dark, not too light: a good strong chocolate hit.

 

So I was going to just get Millionaire's for dessert when I noticed they had a variation on the theme and had a (new?) dessert called Billionaire's dessert!  What sold it for me was the salted caramel.  I adore sweet and salty flavours (case in point - Reeces peanut butte cups!)

 

Below are my photo's of the dessert and what I thought of it. 

 

:-(

Jeez Louise they are not great photos.  I must remember NOT to use my ipad cover as a little photo booth ever again.  I am embarrassed how bad they are compared to the pic above from the M&S website. 

 

Starting from the bottom:

Chocolate crumb: this for me was the weak link of the dessert.  I like the crunch of SUGAR that is in the shortbread biscuit base on Millionaires.  This was the right texture but in my opinion needed a slight bit of sweetness.

Salted Caramel: yes Yes YES!!!! All it promised to be .  Sweet and salty, rich and caramely.

 

Okay so now this is where it gets confusing and I had difficulty (in a good way) separating flavours.

It is advertised as containing the following other layers: burnt caramel, black treacle mousse and chocolate ganache.

I definitely could TASTE these flavours. I just can't tell you which of the above is which!  But that doesn't really matter.  The taste is what counts.

 

So as to the taste:

The burnt caramel - this was an intense caramel flavour; it had an intensity a bit like the intense flavour of a charred well done steak.  It worked! 

Black treacle mousse: when combined with all the caramel and the chocolate it added a divine intensity to this dessert.

 

And finally what Marks call "the bling" on top of the dessert.  I like the way my flash caught the light and has made it even blingier!!!! :-)

 

All in all this dessert for me was a massive success.  I never thought Millionaire's could be beaten but as is the case a Billion really is a lot more than a Million!