Custard Creams can kill: Official

Jaffa Cakes!!!!

The emphasis on cakes here. They went to a lot of trouble to prove they were not biscuits for VAT reasons so there should be a separate Most Dangerous Cakes list.

Goggles for all those so mindbogglingly dense they can poke an eye out with a biscuit.

Run for the hills...!

Looks like they overlooked the threat that is the new generation of biscuit-loving zombie; babies! We see them, every day, getting brainwashed by mind-controlling Farley's Rusks. Their dependancies on twice-baked cakery being ever more ingrained into their young, impressionable (and, ultimately, programmable) minds. Biscuits are taking over the world and using the doe-eyed charms of infants to woo us into a false sense of security. Just wait until the Lizard Army figure it out. It'll be one hell of a fight.

I for one welcome....etc.....<yawn>

2 things

1) "Those of you who like sucking a Ginger Nut" Pfffft! Brilliant!

2) I thought that HobNobs were the SAS of biscuits?

So the real Q is...

How many Brits does it take to eat a biscuit SAFELY?

Just plain wrong!

Jaffa Cakes aren't Biscuits!!!

Jaffa Cakes

Jaffa Cakes are cakes, not biscuits

Jaffa Cake not a biscuit!

There was an extensive court case between HMCE and McVities that ruled a Jaffa Cake is indeed a cake (and therefore not subject to VAT). McVities argued that biscuits are normally expected to go soft when stale, and cakes would normally go hard. A Jaffa Cake goes hard when stale.

It's this sort of shoddy report writing that's ruining the country! Think of the children!

Jaffa Cakes

How can this be taken seriously when they make the school boy error of classifying a cake as a biscuit.

Statistics, good statistics and outright lies.

I really don't believe these numbers. I seriously doubt a third of britons actually dunk biscuits on a regular basis any more, far less that a third of the population has been seriously scalded in the act of doing so.

Best breaktime 'treat' I know of...

Sucking (hot) tea through a Peng^H^H^H certain choc-covered biscuit snack - heaven! (courtesy of my youngest sister-in-law)

Carrots cause wrinkles then death...

100% of all carrot eaters eventually die.

At last

a bootnotes story relevant to IT

I have a few questions.

Foxes crunch creams OK?

Need a link to the paper to check methodology.

I only eat biscuits when I drink tea - is that safer?

Can we access the raw data to check their calculations, or shall I just reproduce the study in the office over next couple weeks?

Have I been asleep, it's not 1st April anywhere in the world?

Mmmm dangerous biscuits.

Crumbs!

Biscuits are that dangerous? Dayum. Gives a whole new meaning to the term "tea break."

Crumbs!

That is all...

Valuable research!

Seriously...someone paid for this research???? I'm in the wrong line of work...

Finally, Science!

Good work, Science, this is exactly the kind of information we need to make decisions in our daily lives.

I feel vindicated in my choice of gingernuts and jaffa cakes as my biscuits of choice, although I suppose in the interests of threat mitigation we should all be nomming as many custard creams as possible in an attempt to eradicate this threat once and for all.

Poked themselves in the eye?

I mean seriously WTF? Will all biscuits now come with protective goggles?

Jaffa Cakes

Good to see that Mindlab included Jaffa Cakes for comparison. Although technically, they are a cake, not a biscuit. Maybe that is why they are least dangerous!

I suppose, if you poked yourself in the eye with one, it might be quite dire all the same. I'm not sure whether I find it hard to believe that a THIRD of Brits are forgetful of the location of their mouth?

Excellent

More! More! This is the kind of useful and informative reporting that the Reg should be bringing us all the time.

Hurrah for number crunching boffins!

Good stuff.

"an equal percentage have poked themselves in the eye with a biscuit."

Just: how?!

Good thing I wasn't actually taking a drink when I read that. My attempt to conceal chortling drew enough funny looks from colleagues.

@ Sarah

"Moderatrix wonders if it's too early to start on the bourbon."

I'm sorry, there is such a time as "too early for bourbon"? Have a bottle of Old Huckleberry 101 on me. Best drunk in pints.

DARPA

Have just launched a project to develop the worlds deadliest baked snack for immediate deployment in armed conflict.

Best Headline ever...

Superb article and great headline...

Although don't want the H&S people to see this otherwise they'll force a Local Workstation/Desk Assessment for potential Health & Safety risks.

Statistically reliable...?

I'm wondering if this isn't just the order of popularity of said biscuits. I mean, the more we eat, the more likely we'll have an accident. Custard Creams are probably the most popular workplace/social club "tea break" biscuit because they come in massive great packs of 40, 80, 100 or more for pennies, whereas the Jaffa Cake is fairly expensive and comes in packs of 12 or 15.

Cookies are really two different things -- they're the "new doughnut" in that you can get the big chewy onesas a special Friday treat from the baker's, Millie's or Marks & Sparks, but there's also the very different crunchy ones that come in packets that aren't really any more expensive than things like Hob-Nobs. These little crunchy ones also come in the big tins or tubs containing a selection.

Oh, what's in these "Family Favourites" boxes? Quite often the following:

Custard Cream, Cookie, Wafer, Bourbon, Oat Biscuit, Digestive, Shortbread, Nice Biscuit, Chocolate Finger, Sandwich Cream (plain+chocolate coated), Jam Shortbread Sandwich (jam ring, Jammy Dodger, Happy Face)

Did they account for this? The data to hand strongly suggests that they didn't....

@Sarah

"Moderatrix wonders if it's too early to start on the bourbon."

Well as my Argentine wife keeps calling them Burbon's I guess you might be ok for a quick single......oh hell make it a double and do me one too ;)

and what is the government doing!!!

The government should legislate this menace from our work place what is health and safety for ???

This is why we need ID cards

This is the most telling piece of evidence yet for us all to be numbered and fitted with suitable devices to control our intake of dangerous terror biscuits. Remember how we were so casual in our approach to this danger that we used to eat biscuits on aircraft? Thankfully the ID cards will prevent such irresponsible behaviour in future.

@Sarah Bee

Help yourself to a Bourbon - it's only a Penguin without the chocolate coating, after all!

Research

If you get stuck in concrete retrieving a biscuit, is this dilemma caused by the biscuit, the concrete or stupidity?

Where do I apply for funding to find an answer to this question?

Wrong MindLab

Looks like the research was done by The MindLab.org (http://themindlab.org/index.html), not Mindlab International who are a totally different organisation who are more to do with educational boardgames.

Nothing about this on their website. Can't find anything on the Fox's website (who make Rocky) nor the Northern Foods website. So who put out this press release?

Translation please

What on earth is a "common-or-garden Cookie" ??

The rest of this reads like a UK-source item, so what is that all about?

WTF?

"three per cent have fallen off a chair reaching for vital nourishment"

A question for English native speakers: Does "vital nourishment" mean "a bottle of whiskey"? If that's the case, my trust in this study goes up several degrees (from 0ºK to - 270 ºC :)

@ Sarah Bee

In India, Bourbon is a chocolate cream biscuit marketed by Britannia. Ties in very nicely with this article.

OTOH, I do agree with Phil Underwood. Never too early to start on the real bourbon.

What about risk compensation?

Now we know the most dangerous biscuits, I'd expect people to treat them with more care and respect. This will, of course, lead to fewer biscuit-related injuries for those biscuit types, and thus they will no longer be so dangerous.

I now fully expect to see Jaffa Cakes being eaten without any thought to safety, quickly leading to overloaded A&E departments in all hospitals, house price rises and further economic meltdown.

This sort of information should not be given to the public!!

[PS. no-one seems to have mentioned that Jaffa cakes are officially cakes, not biscuits. doh!]

There's an IgNobel prize in here somewhere

That is all.

wagon wheels

does this mean these are safe? jam or none jam variety!

One in the eye for creationists...

"three per cent ... have poked themselves in the eye with a biscuit."

How much more proof of Darwin at work do people need?!

@AC 09:38

Gee, d'you think?

Pink wafer

We need to know...

The list includes plain "wafer", but the pink wafer is in a class of its own! Does anyone actually admit to liking these abominations of the biscuit world? You only have to see what they do to other biscuits - does any other biscuit have such a contamination ability; so surely it should be scored to warn us of the true danger they pose!

And interestingly, Wikipedia doesn't have a Pink wafer article, and my local google thinks I mean "pink water" instead of "pink wafer". The fact that these 2 esteemed institutions refuse to acknowledge the existance of the pink wafer speaks volumes!

Sue the manufacturers

I've just been into Asda and after checking 43 packets of biscuits (assorted flavours and including Jaffa cakes, which for some inexplicable reason are not in the cake section) I found not a single one with a warning of the risks associated with biscuit consumption. There wasn't even a diagram illustrating a safe method of transferring the biscuit into one's mouth without injury. It's an accident waiting to happen. Think of the children!

Paris, as she frequently has a chocolate finger

Living on the edge!

I ignored the warning sign placed on the leftovers from the meeting and have just consumed 3 custard creams and an oat cookie type afair (possibly a hobnob) and completely failed to injure myself in any way whatsoever.

Do I need to bring reality in line with statistics and start a food fight?

I've been participating in a new sport all day...

Extreme Biscuit eating!

Yes. We've been at the Oat , Nice biscuits and ... Custard Creams all day. We acknowledge that this new sport may have a few detractors because of its poor safety record but we Biscuit Eaters think you non-Eaters are a bunch of safety obsessed pansies.

@ The Indomitable Gall

yes but you are forgetting Garibaldi biscuits... For some reason every time i open a packet, there are only 4 biscuits in the pack!

/feels cheated !

Whoa

Never knew that the real threat isn't a car bomb or suicide bomber; it's a BISCUIT!

Should we raise the threat level the next time those evil biccy-terrorists put biscuits on special offers or god forbid - TWO FOR ONE!

This is scary stuff!

;-)

Big lols!

I dunno about anyone else but I cant get the "two pints" biscuit song outta my head!

Ban them!

The government should make a law banning the dunking of biscuits - it clearly causes more accidents than driving whilst holding a mobile phone. What's next - banning driving whilst holding a conversation and dunking a biscuit? Restricting the sale of biscuits to those who can pass a competancy test? Are Custard Creams the most dangerous because only old people with no teeth dunk them and then when they drop them on the floor and try to retrieve them they fall over and injure themselves? Should we force manufacturers to make biscuits that do not go soft when you dunk them? Should we put a government warning label on biscuits 'Warning: may cause accidents'...

Jaffa Cakes may be safe...

...but you definitely want to stay away from the Goa'uld Cakes.

Jaffa Cakes relatively harmless?

Surely that should be Mostly Harmless?

You think that's bad?

Down here there's things called Tim Tams...

and Lamingtons... And that godawful unmentionable marmite ripoff... And the beer don't taste right either... :(

I haven't been able to get a decent Rich Tea biscuit here in ages.

oh no...

Passes a box of lincolns round as they dont appear on the list.

Paris - more tea vicar?

@ Stef 4 14:03

The idea of an orgasm in the mouth and Natalie Imbruglia got me all confused for a moment - if Devendra Banhart tastes of chocolate biscuits then only Natalie Portman can confirm it.

Just how does one slurp tea through a chocolate biscuit snack anyway? Unlike a Twirl they're solid.

Agree with the custard cream..

..it's the biscuit I remember having coughing fits with due to crumbs being breathed into my lungs!

@Sarah Bee

Feel free to hit the bourbon--that is unless you are one of the tragic 3% who are prone to poking their eye out with cookies. If this describes you, you had better give up bourbon for Kool-Aid drunk from a no-spill cup with clowns and cute dinosaurs on it.

Jaffa Cakes

Someone sat in an office and thought "If it goes hard when stale it's a cake, if it goes soft when stale it's a biscuit", and the whole world excepts it. Where's the scientific rational behind that? As a reg reader I want experiments, a bit of physical proof! So after 10 cups of tea and 20 Jaffa cakes, I can Categorically state that; If it can be dunked it's a biscuit, if can't it's a cake. Jaffa cakes can be dunked.

@Sarah Bee's Love Slave

> Just how does one slurp tea through a chocolate biscuit snack anyway?

> Unlike a Twirl they're solid.

I have had the techinque demonstrated to me with TimTams, it is surprisingly pleasant.

* Nibble the chocolate off diaginally opposite corners to expose the biscuit.

* Place one nibbled corner in hot beverage.

* Suck on other corner until beverage reaches mouth, indicating biscuit is saturated.

* Quickly scoff resulting soggy mess before it dissolves completely.

* ????

* Profit!

The whole "cakes vs biscuits" thing

The whole "cakes vs biscuits" thing was just an unfortunate side-effect of a stupid tax régime.

If the rate tax had been the same on cakes and biscuits in the first place, it would never have mattered. But I suppose that would have been far too sensible .....

Oh Thanks!

So now some ultra-PC Nu-Labour do-gooder is going to require biscuit manufacturers to print a ciggie-pack style warning on all their packets so the poor helpless folk of Great Britain are further protected from their own inability to get through a day by themselves without some social worker watching their every move and wrapping them in cotton wool.

Critical missing info

Surely this article is missing a critical (and potentially life saving) piece of information - what EXACTLY makes a Custard Cream so damn dangerous?