Barker's Fruit For Cheese - Quince product reviews

I was apprehensive about trying this. It was one single flavour "quince" and I actually had no idea what it would taste like to me. I have no really tried much with quince in it and for some reason it makes me think of little old ladies (a bit like marmalade does). I was surprised. I thought the volume was appropriate and the value is a good mix of indicating quality and being affordable occasionally. The lid was easy to close and open and the seal peeled back simply to make it clear it was open. The closed container also survived a drop from the bench which I thought quite remarkable. The consistency was perfect for spreading and it worked well for folk making their own crackers and choosing volume combinations to suit them.

I liked the packaging which was practical and clearly indicated what it was and what it was for and it looked fine on a casual table. It would probably be the most widely appealing taste as it was not too strong and yet it was clearly a sweet fruity taste. Simple and stylish would be my conclusion. I didn't particularly think it did much for blue cheese or smoked cheese but again that is a personal preference thing and I think it added something for those who like their cheeses sweetened with a bit of fruit. The one puzzle for me going forward would be what to garnish a cracker with if you put this paste under a cheese slice.

It is a modern versatile taste for me and it was popular with others who tried it. It suited a range of cheeses and husband even tried it successfully on toast (with and without cheese. A thumbs up from me and a good addition to the fruit for cheese range. Still, not my favourite but they are all really worthy of trying once and rounding out a range.

Having fruit with cheese is not something new, but it definitely makes cheese feel a bit more of a fancy treat when you do it! I have previously tried other fruit paste varieties, but had not tried a quince one - which sounded really nice. Best yet - it pairs well with any cheese, so, if very versatile. I do enjoy cheese as a treat, so being able to indulge myself in cheese and a new product to try is great! It is great to know the true Barker's style is there also - NZ Made, not too many additives, and high quality.

The pot itself is like the other flavour varieties - a nice picture of the fruit on the front, coloured differently to the other flavours, making it easy to discern from the others. The lid is a twist lock type closure, with the fruit paste under a sealed foil top, ensuring it is fresh. The pot has the ingredients list on it - and the most notable thing with the main ingredient being fruit. The sugar content is high, but this is designed as a treat food, not an everyday - so that did not really bother me.

I have tried homemade quince paste before so was interested in seeing how this compared to a homemade version. I put together my little selection of crackers and cheese and decided I would pop the paste directly onto the cracker then put the cheese on top, and also plopping a bit on top of the cheese. It was actually nicer having it cracker, fruit paste, cheese order - the sweetness went well in between the plain cracker and nice flavour of the camembert. I found it was sweeter than the pear variety and the blackberry, but everyones taste buds are different. It was not a bad sweetness, or too overpowering though.

All in all - this is a lovely treat to have with cheese and would go well with wine or cider. It tastes just as nice as the homemade one I have previously had, so would definitely buy it again. The price of it means it is not something I could afford to purchase regularly - though I do believe it is a high quality fruit paste, and it would be my first choice when buying and recommending.

Recently I have branched out of my comfort zone in regards to trying foods that I haven't tasted before. My mother regularly talks about her quince tree and the fruit paste she makes - however I was never game enough to try it. While I was browsing the KIWIreviews site, I saw that Barker's has released a range of 'fruit for cheeses.) The flavours available are Blackberry & Brandy, Feijoa & Pear, Pomegranate & Black Pepper, and of course Quince. I decided to see if I could try the Quince one, thankfully one was included in my review box.

The container is a nice style, the Barker's logo is clear and unmistakable, I enjoyed the pictures of fruit on the label, the black background helps to make the description of the product name stand out. This product is suitable with any kind of cheese, and once opened needs to be kept in the fridge. No artificial colours or flavours, and being gluten-free appealed to me.

The smell upon opening the container was pleasant, not too sweet or fruity, and the texture looked smooth. As it wasn't grocery day till the following week, I did not have any specialty cheese to team this with. Instead I got a handful of Ritz crackers and thinly sliced some Colby cheese for the top, then put some quince paste on each piece. I took a bite of the cracker and was actually surprised that the flavours all worked well - even more surprising I found I didn't mind the taste of quince. I decided to try some of the quince paste on a spoon by itself, it was delicious, however I think I will stick to having small amounts at a time. I believe that the container will last me about a week.

This was delicious, and proved to me that I should keep taking more chances with foods I haven't tried. Barker's is a NZ company and never fails to impress me with their high quality products, I look forward to seeing what new creations they come up with next.

I don't think I've ever had Quince before. I've certainly never seen them in the supermarket before, so straight off the bat I have to assume it's quite the bold decision for Barker's of Geraldine to use Quince and only Quince as a flavour in one of its products.

Opening the pack, it certainly smelled aromatic and tropical, but I still had no idea what to expect. I only had two varieties of cheese in the fridge (a tasty cheddar and a smoked cheddar) so I decided to play it safe and try this fruit pasty jam thing on both types of cheese. A slight twist and the lid came off with ease, revealing a foil lid to keep the product fresh, so I tried to carefully peel it partially off so I could reclose it after use to try to keep it fresher for longer, but unfortunately, the foil tore a piece off, so no luck there.

With the product being described as "fruit for cheese", I wasn't too sure of the texture and consistency to expect from this, but the knife easily slid into the fruit, so it was clearly a very fine and consistent preserve. I had kept it in the pantry at room temperature up until this point, so it would perhaps solidify to more of a jam thickness once old. But currently, it was just slightly thicker than baby food. This consistency worked great as it came out of the container easily, didn't fall off the knife, and still spread like warm butter.

The flavour itself was quite difficult to place. It could be best described as either a mix between apple and pear or alternatively, a weak apricot. When combined with the smoked cheddar, the flavours didn't quite work, but with the sharper tasty cheddar, it was glorious! Absolutely delicious. As a lazy male, buttered toast used to be the best thing ever, then cheese on toast became the best thing. Looks like cheese and quince on toast might take out the top spot now. The flavours complement each other beautifully. Well impressed by that!

Quince is not something which I had ever tried before so I was a little hesitant to try this product, hence why I waited until I had tried all of the other varieties. However, once I had tried each and every one of them and found that they were all unique and tasted great in their own different ways I decided that trying out the quince one was worth a shot.

Opening up the pottle for the first time I decided I needed to taste the fruit for cheese on its own, I got a teaspoon and popped a small amount on the end of it, I honestly didn't think I would say it but YUM!!! The quince fruit was absolutely delicious I really liked it and so did Miss 6 who had to try it too. It was a very sweet, fruity flavour which if I had to compare it to something I would say it tastes similar to that of a pear.

Deciding what to do with the Quince, my first idea was to spread it over a slice of hot toast and top it with some cheddar cheese before grilling it in the oven. My partner, Miss 6 and I all had a piece each with us all wanting another afterward, the sweetness really worked well with the cheese, and we thought it would certainly be a great alternative to chutney or relish.

With most of the pottle still left I wanted to try out something different. I have been trying to think of different snacks for Miss 6's lunchbox and had recently come across fruit leathers, as a kid I remember loving roll-ups and fruit for yonks both things which you can no longer buy so I thought I'd have a go at making my own. I boiled up some blueberries and apples and pureed them until smooth and then decided to melt down the remaining Quince to add in. The fruit leathers call for honey to be added but I decided these would be sweet enough without. After mixing the quince in I spread a thin layer of the fruits onto a sheet of baking paper on an oven tray and placed it in the oven over a very low heat to cook and set. This was a long process which took several hours but the results well worth it. A yummy fruit snack which was definitely made nice and sweet by the addition of the quince.

Barker's I have been impressed by your range of fruits for cheese and I will be buying them again, they make such a nice change from jams, and chutneys and they open up so many opportunities for adding them to meals and baking too.

I have never liked quince before, I've tried it a few different ways and had no luck, however sometimes you just need to try it a different way and it is a hit, so I figured why not? I like that these twist open and the plastic feels solid, handy as my youngest stacks things in the fridge rather precariously, so it feels like this would survive a fall or two (hopefully more with our luck). My youngest had really enjoyed the other flavours we had tried, so wanted to dig right into it, she simply adored it whilst her sister promptly went and spat it out in the bathroom sink. I tried some and found I didn't like it at all, to me it tasted like over sweet honey with the texture of an over ripe pear.

We agreed that we would try this again, on crackers, with cheeses (we can never get just one type, we always end up with a broad variety) such as the suggested cheddar, but also some edam, feta, brie and a couple more. My eleven and nine year olds didn't like this on any item they paired it with, whilst my seven year old thought it was delicious but decided that her preferred method of eating it was straight out of the container with a teaspoon. I found that I still didn't like it, no matter what I paired it with, so I am quite content to let her finish the rest of the pottle on her own.

I am going to be honest I have never tasted 'Quince' before so had no idea of what to expect from this. My husband was not really keen to have and pulled a face when I told him what we were having. This was the last one we opened and realistically was not expecting much from it. I will get the cosmetics out of the way first: I love the design and love how you retwist the lid back on so will stay fresh for longer. I also find the labeling very cute and find it stands out.

Right down to the nitty gritty with cider in hand we sat down to watch the final of the Big Bang Theory with Garlic Crackers, Snax Original Crackers, Camembert, Brie and Edam Cheese. I first tried on the Garlic Cracker with Camembert and found there was no real taste as the garlic was over powering. So swapped to Snax with the Edam and I really enjoyed. I found I was eatting the cheese with just the 'Fruit for Cheese' on it or was covering my cracker in it followed by the cheese or just putting on the cheese and eatting cracker with it - didn't really matter in the end how I did it because I just loved the taste.

It kind of looks like a marmalade and the taste like it too. I found it wasn't as sweet as the Feijoa and Pear and I really enjoyed it. We were lucky to experience three of the flavours and while I was going crazy on this flavour my husband did sneak back to the kitchen and pulled out the Feijoa and Pear and ate that one, which was fine as I was more content with this flavour. This morning we did let our daughters try and funny neither were that fussed.

I am really surprised how taken by this flavour I was considering no one else was. My husband did say he liked it and if there was no other option he would eat it, where as this is the one I really loved. Maybe because it is not as sweet as the others or not as strong in taste and it compliments the cheese & wackers perfectly. However, the price is a little off putting but then when you look at how much we/I ate last night and how much is still left it works out to be very worth while. I will definitely consider purchasing again.

Quince has always been either a love or hate taste for me, you really have to cook it or use it in a certain way for it to be enjoyable. I first tried it at my sisters house roasted cut into pieces with a roast meal and found it too strong a savoury flavour for me with a harder texture than I expected. My sister had described it to me as sort of like a pear but you can't eat them until they are cooked because they are too hard. I had almost written quince off as not for me after this but have since tried it made into a quince paste/jelly and had a different opinion.

This however is the best experience I have ever had with quince, while having similarities to the quince jelly I had tried at a cafe it had a much nicer, sweet yet savoury taste and paired perfectly with cheese. I really enjoyed this with cheese and a cracker, and later in a cheese, salad, sandwich. Having had my first experience with having quince roasted with a roast meal I did think I have to try it with a roast dinner so when having roast pork I served this instead of a traditional apple sauce.

It was absolutely divine for this and almost better than absolute sauce as being not as sweet it wasn't such a stark contrast to the meat. I do think it is definitely perfect paired with strong cheeses but can be used in so many other ways too which I love and would definitely buy it again in the future. I have since told my sister she needs to make her quince into something like this rather than roasting it!

I don't especially like quinces. At least, up until now I didn't. They can be extremely tart, rather like a sweetish choko, and on the one occasion I was tempted to try to bake them I set the oven on fire! So I approached this product with caution, not sure what I was in for. However, my friends were anxious to try this new fruit product so we ended up using the whole container, experimenting with different ways of using it. And the consensus? Even I was won over; clearly this is the best way to use a quince!

We started by serving part of the jar in a reasonably conventional manner. One of my friends had brought some beetroot flavoured wraps from Farrahs, one of our favourites, so we cut some of the wraps into strips approximately 10x4 cm and spread each piece with cream cheese. We then added a small amount of the Quince Fruit for Cheese to each one and then rolled the pieces so that they looked like red sausage rolls. These went down very well. Even the children liked them, and wanted more. They were tasty and fun to eat although if you weren't careful and bit too hard the fruit would ooze out the other end - but that just added to the fun. These "rolls" would be nice like this as party finger food as they look quirky and taste delicious.

The quince does have a strong, sweet flavour and is slightly acidic so we all thought it would be nice added as a layer to an apple crumble mix. Some of my friends even thought there was an apple-like aftertaste to the product so they thought this would be a good combination. The children also tasted a little on its own and said they would enjoy it in a sandwich just like a conventional jam. One of the youngest present said she would eat it just on its own, but she was not allowed to go that far!

Next day we had sliced ham and smoked chicken for lunch, so tried a little of the fruit as a condiment instead of the usual sauce or pickle. This was a lovely combination: it enhanced the flavour of the meat, giving it a little extra zing. One of the children made a ham sandwich and spread a thin layer on top. She usually has mustard, so this was quite an adventure for her. Since she is normally a conservative eater who dislikes trying new foods, this was a real breakthrough for her.

Everyone said they would buy it again as they could think of lots of other ways of using it. I have seen some in the local supermarkets, so it is already available. I think I will be queuing up to get some more too!