A MAJOR supermarket chain has released five new cookie flavours for sweet treat lovers.
Tesco launched the new range of Finest Cookies earlier this month, with five new flavours hitting the market.
5
Belgian white chocolate is one of the five new flavoursCredit: Facebook / Baby Deals UK
5
Belgian milk chocolate is one of the five new flavoursCredit: Facebook / Baby Deals UK
5
Belgian triple chocolate shortbread is one of the five new flavours.Credit: X / @hcarpe1977
The five new flavours include Belgian milk chocolate, Belgian triple chocolate, Belgian white chocolate, jumbo oat and flame raisin and chocolate shortbread.
All flavoured cookies come in a four-pack and are baked in-store.
Tesco Clubcard members can also get their hands on the new flavoured cookies for just £2.
The plastic packaging can also be returned to soft plastics collection points at Tesco stores and the cardboard bases can be recycled at home.
An eagle-eyed cookie lover shared the scrumptious find on Facebook group Baby Deals UK, saying: “These new Tesco Finest Cookies look so tasty and are just so hard to resist”.
Online punters have also weighed in on the new flavours, with many people saying not much has changed.
One person wrote: “They aren’t new though, they’ve just been put in new packaging”.
Another said he preferred home-baked goods.
“Nah not for £2, make them yourself, much better, cheaper and have as many as you want,” he said.
The cookies have sparked fiery debate as other shoppers sang their praises.
I travelled to America to try the viral TikTok shop Crumbl
“They’re delicious, better than the old version,” one person wrote.
Another said: “Aye looks amazing, loved crumbled cookies”.
“Packaged like M&S, bet they’re not as nice,” one person said.
5
Hot debate has been sparked over which biscuits are betterCredit: Snack Reviews/ Facebook
5
M&S released the new array of flavours ahead of Christmas last yearCredit: Facebook
“Have to try these [and] see if they’re as good as the M&S ones!” another comment read.
The Tesco release comes almost one year after M&S released its in-store biscuit range, revamping an old favourite recipe.
At the end of November last year, the store also launched a Christmas-themed version, Gingerbread and White Chocolate, which earned particularly glowing reviews.
One fan said on X: “Those Marks and Spencer ginger and white chocolate cookies live up to the hype. Very dangerous.”
Another added: “Please keep the white choc & gingerbread cookies beyond Christmas. I need them all year!”
But while the taste has been praised as “amazing”, shoppers are unhappy the treats now come wrapped in plastic rather than paper packaging.
The M&S film bags can only be recycled by taking them to supermarkets, meaning they are less likely to be reused compared to the old paper wrappers.
Commenting on Facebook, one fan said: “Why are the bakery cookies now packed in a plastic bag rather than paper?! Backwards move. Not part of Plan A surely?”
Another added: “I hope they haven’t changed the paper bags to cellophane, as if they have I won’t be buying them.”
Meanwhile, on X, another fumed: “Why have you gone from paper bags for cookies to plastic? Thought you had a focus on sustainability?!?”
Fox 11 anchor Elex Michaelson is one of the nice guys in L.A. media. His tough-but-fair-and-especially-polite lines of questioning made him a natural to help moderate debates for the L.A. mayoral and sheriff’s races three years ago. The 38-year-old Agoura Hills native is so nice that he’s known not just for his work but also … his mom’s cookies and brownies.
Newsletter
You’re reading the Essential California newsletter
Sign up to start every day with California’s most important stories.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Los Angeles Times.
Michaelson gifts every guest who treks up to Fox 11’s West L.A. studios for his weekly public affairs show “The Issue Is” a box of the desserts. We’re talking former California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, billionaire Rick Caruso, L.A. County Dist. Atty. Nathan Hochman, Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi and dozens of other political heavyweights on both sides of the proverbial aisle. U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla (D-Calif.) once brought a bag of Porto’s to Michaelson’s team in gratitude for all the cookies and brownies he had received over the years. Former Congress member and current California gubernatorial candidate Katie Porter sent Elex’s mom, Crystal, a handwritten thank-you note.
“Every single time I see [L.A. County Sheriff] Robert Luna, he brings them up without fail,” Michaelson said with pride in a phone interview.
One not-so-famous person who has been lucky enough to enjoy them? Me.
Elex recently gave me a box when I appeared on “The Issue Is” just after U.S. Border Patrol sector chief Gregory Bovino, who took time off from bloviating about the border to accept the goodies because even la migra gets sweets, I guess.
Crystal Michaelson’s cookies and brownies are worthy of a stall at the Hollywood farmers market, and I’m not saying that just so I can appear on “The Issue Is” again soon.
The cookies last time around were blondies studded with chocolate chips and M&Ms. Slightly toasted on the outside, chewy on the inside, thick yet airy and spiked with an extra dash of vanilla, the blondies were beautiful. Just as delicious were the brownies, all about the firm, dark-chocolate-derived fudge that crackled with each bite. Both featured a generous sprinkling of sea salt, the crystals perfectly cutting through all the sugar and butter.
They didn’t last the drive back to Orange County.
Cookie diplomacy at the highest level of California politics
When Elex took his mom to a holiday party hosted by then-Vice President Kamala Harris some years back, most of the movers and shakers greeted her with the same enthusiasm they showed her son because of what she bakes.
“I’m not really a baker!” insisted Crystal, an artist by trade. She makes the goodies every Thursday afternoon, the day before “The Issue Is” tapes, with an occasional assist by Elex. “But it’s turned into a whole thing!”
The tradition dates back to elementary school, when Crystal treated Elex’s teachers and classmates to them as “a thank you.” Elex took some to the first and last day of his college internship for Fox 11 to hand out to the newsroom, then repeated the gesture when he worked at XETV in San Diego and ABC 7 in Los Angeles before returning to Fox 11.
“Their first and last impression of me,” he said, “were these cookies.”
Michaelson repeated the move every day for the first week of “The Issue Is.” The inaugural guests were Newsom, then-Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff (now California’s junior U.S. senator), and commentator Areva Martin.
“Everyone loved the cookies so much that they joked, ‘We won’t return unless we get more cookies,’” Michaelson said.
The crew insisted they get treated to them one more week, “and my mom just never really stopped since then,” even baking and shipping them to regular guests during the COVID era as a Christmas gift.
“One of the only things that seems to unite Republicans and Democrats [in California] is these cookies and brownies,” Elex said. “There’s nothing like the unifying power of food to bring people together to not just talk, but listen to each other.”
Crystal gets a shout-out in the show’s closing credits for “cookies, brownies and moral support.” She learned the recipes as a teen, from a family friend. They’re baked in a Pyrex baking dish, sliced into squares, then put in cardboard boxes that she decorates by writing, “The Issue Is … ”
People have suggested Crystal sell them, but she declines: “I’m not a baker.”
For now, she’s flattered by all the attention — Newsom once wrote a letter on his official letterhead raving about them. The only issue she sees with them …is Elex.
“He eats them too much,” Crystal said. “I’ve said before that maybe I should make them a little bit healthier. And everyone said, ‘No, don’t do that!’”
Today’s top stories
(Christian Murdock / Associated Press)
In-N-Out leaves California
Billionaire In-N-Out owner Lynsi Snyder announced last month her move from California to Tennessee.
The departures of several major companies from California have contributed to a narrative that the state is unfriendly to businesses.
But despite challenges, including steep taxes, the state remains the fourth-largest economy in the world, boasts a diverse pool of talent and is a hub of technological innovation, economists said.
L.A.’s water wars
Los Angeles gets 2% of its water supply from creeks that feed Mono Lake.
Environmental advocates are calling for the city to take less water to help the lake reach a healthy level.
A proposed ballot measure could force a citywide vote on L.A. 2028 Olympic venues.
Organizers with the hotel workers union turned in a ballot proposal to require citywide voter approval of “event centers,” including sports facilities and concert halls.
