Kinderini biscuits beat Nutella biscuits (but watch out for the sugar)
Ferrero never gets a thing wrong. After the resounding success of Nutella Biscuits—small cookies with a touch of Nutella, nothing could be simpler—now comes the Kinder-derived cookies. A seven-year, €50 million project.
The first difference is the target audience. Both are produced at the Balvano plant, in the province of Potenza, but the Kinderini biscuits are aimed primarily at younger children, while the Nutella Biscuits appeal to the nostalgia of those in their forties and older who grew up on Nutella.
The signal is that of the smiley faces that stand out on Kinderini, which recall emoticons: there are as many as 15 million combinations.
The marketing strategy for Nutella Biscuits (creating anticipation, since they had disappeared immediately) was replaced here by a large public tasting in Largo Gae Aulenti, Milan.
But how are these Kinderini made?
Green.me has compiled the ingredients list. Here they are.
the list of ingredients of the new Kinderini:
- wheat flour 43.5%
- sugar
- anhydrous donkey
- vegetable fats (palm, shea)
- wheat starch
- skimmed milk powder 2%
- 1.3% low-fat cocoa
- powdered milk rich in fat (0.7%)
- whey powder
- leavening agents (ammonium bicarbonate, sodium bicarbonate)
- burro cacao
- hazelnuts
- sale
- emulsifier: lecithins (soy)
- vanilla
- cocoa paste
- powdered egg white
- may contain mustard
An endless array of industrially produced ingredients makes you imagine the health impact of excessive consumption. But the worst thing about Kinderini is the sugar: 26.8 grams per 100 grams, or 3.4 grams per cookie. A huge amount.
But are these Kinderini biscuits any good? Michela Becchi, in Gambero Rosso, gives them top marks: "The cream is sparse, distributed in small dots, sometimes in place of the mouth, or in the heart-shaped eyes, or even in the hat. And perhaps it's precisely this simplicity that makes these biscuits so successful." She continues: "Despite the distinctly sweet flavor of the pastry (which, after all, the company has accustomed us to), the Kinderini biscuits are tasty, yes, but in a more controlled, moderate way, compared to Nutella biscuits."
The reasoning is that these Kinderini are biscuits for everyone, to be eaten without too many expectations. The same expectations that created Nutella Biscuits: "The expectations that had been created around this novelty were too high to be met, and hazelnut spread is a product far too common in Italian homes to create something innovative." In short, if Nutella Biscuits aimed to amaze, to create a phenomenon that was quickly dispelled, Kinderini, according to Gambero, are here to stay, thanks to the unmistakable flavor of Kinder chocolate.
