Toppo – Triple Cheese

Toppo is largely what I consider to be a brand of sweet dairy flavours – things like chocolate, strawberry, cream etc. are usually chocolate or dairy adjacent. This usually works out well but like every other brand they tend to get cute and want to brand off into things like cheese where it tends to be more savoury but could also be of the sweet variety. I have no doubt this will be more on the sweet side, but It will be interesting to see how it plays out. This is supposed to bring together cheddar, Gouda and cream cheese. An interesting combination no doubt, especially in what is usually a chocolate filled biscuit stick. But hey, I’m here for the novelty of it all, if nothing else.

The first thing that strikes me about this is the smell. It’s got a very distinct, cheesy smell that reminds me of a strong, aged cheddar. The smell is strong enough that I almost would feel self conscious eating this around others due to the smell. It also have a very savoury aroma to it, which is not what I was expecting. You wouldn’t know that this was supposed to be a chocolate biscuit based on the smell.

Shockingly, this does not taste savoury at all. In fact, I had to squint real hard with my mind’s tongue to try and discern whether I could taste any cheese in the chocolate filling. I came to the conclusion that the flavour of the cheese is too mild and inoffensive to match the smell. I wonder if the actual cheese flavour were deliberately toned down for a market that tends not to do much dairy or cheese, as I can barely catch a hint of it near the middle, sandwiched between sweet vanilla flavoured chocolate. If you were hoping for something more cheesy, these would likely disappoint because they aren’t that different from the vanilla flavours that Toppo has done in the past.

I’ve mentioned before how much I enjoy Toppo largely due to the texture, and this does not disappoint. The outer biscuit has a sort of pretzel like texture to it where the outside is slightly shiny and hard but it has a nice snap as you bite in and the biscuit does a good job keeping your hands free of potentially melty chocolate as you continue you’re way downing the stick.

While the flavour was somewhat disappointing, the texture always delivers and I enjoyed it mostly for that. If you were hoping for a cheesy, stinky flavour, you’re only getting one of the two. If that’s enough for you,by all means go for it. For me though, I think I’ll stick with some more classical flavours. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m craving Cheese Nibs…