Comments on: The Biscuiteer: Arnott’s Iced VoVo

By: DC

DC — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 02:48:06 +0000

The more marshmallowy biscuit referred to in this comment thread is perhaps Paradise Food’s Strawberry Mallow: http://www.paradisefood.com.au/_images/product_fancies3.jpg

Rediscover, mellygoround!

By: Mel Campbell

Mel Campbell — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 22:20:58 +0000

“And then when I asked if the Iced VoVos would be back, they said they didn’t know.”

By: Mand

Mand — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 21:49:27 +0000

This article makes me sad. Not because I care whether Iced Vo-Vos have marshmallow on them, but because someone brought a packet of them to my last-day-of-work morning tea a couple of weeks ago, and I thought ‘I’m enjoying this cheesecake! I’ll have an Iced Vo-Vo later.’ But when I went back later, they were all gone.

The moral of this story is that when it comes to free biscuits, carpe diem.

By: mel

mel — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 05:14:35 +0000

No need to get personal, Brigid. Geez. Each to their own, chill out.

By: Puffin Fresh

Puffin Fresh — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 00:30:48 +0000

I agree with the last post - the mallow vo vo seems like a good idea but in reality it whacks out the proportion of the biscuit.

By: Brigid Tancred

Brigid Tancred — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 04:18:23 +0000

These people are talking rubbish. A proper iced vo-vo never had marshmallow or anything disgusting like that on it. It was always soft but crunchy. The only difference between the biscuits I used to eat in the forties and the contemporary version is that we now get much fewer biscuits to the packet. There is a substitute version made by another company which unashamedly uses marshmallow. I reccommend that to those of your readers who lack discernment.

By: mellygoround

mellygoround — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 02:12:15 +0000

I loved Iced VoVos as a kid precisely because, unless my memory is totally screwed, they were soft, fluffy and marshmallowy. I tried one again last year for the first time since I was a child and discovered - exactly as you report - that it was neither as soft and fluffy as I remembered, nor as marshmallowy. And also tiny.
I’ll allow that everything seems bigger when you’re smaller, but I remain convinced that downsizing has definitely occurred.

Is there any way to find out? Would Arnotts’ admit to such a thing?

By: Brian Hair

Brian Hair — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 21:04:20 +0000

I joined Arnotts in the eighties and the first week attended a retirement of an employee who had worked for them for 40 years. The manager giving the farewell speech said to the retiree “You must have had an interesting job to stay so long”. The reply was “I shook the desiccated coconut onto the Iced Vo-Vo”.

He had done this for 40 years? What dedication to the Vo-Vo.

By: T J Honeysuckle

T J Honeysuckle — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 11:36:48 +0000

Those shrimp sweets are made out of spongey stuff that is very similar- if not identical- to lolly bananas. And they do not taste of shrimp.

By: Mel Campbell

Mel Campbell — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 06:22:58 +0000

Jeb – I always used to think the pale pink part was marshmallow and was surprised by how hard it was. This shop describes the consistency as a “transitionary form between icing and marshmallow, and is perhaps closest to the components that pink shrimp sweets are made from.”

Having never eaten the shrimp sweets they’re talking about, I can’t say if this is true.

I’m not sure if they used to be made with real marshmallow and have since downsized to mere icing, but apparently Aldi sells a biscuit called Snow Cakes that contains real marshmallow. I’ll have to check these out and report back.