I am absolutely GUTTED by what Huel have done with their flavour boosts. I used to genuinely love the chocolate and mocha, as well as very much liking the banana and mint chocolate flavours. Now the they all range from ‘meh’ to ‘bleugh’. As my supply of the old, nice powders runs out I have been trying to find alternatives but nothing is as good as what I was happily consuming day after day for well over a year.
I’ve tried them all via a few boxes of the sample packs. The new mocha is horrible. It was my joint favourite and the first time I tried it I had to pour it pour it down the sink in disgust. (I’ve tried it twice more since and I still think it is awful - so it wasn’t just the surprise of it.) The new chocolate is the best of the new versions of my formerly prefered four, but nowhere near as good as it was. Banana tastes more natural… until the aftertaste kicks in. And I prefer artifical banana-milkshake type flavours anyway… Mint chocolate just tastes like a slightly nerfed version of what it was, but that was my forth choice flavour anyway, so that is scant consolation.
Of the others in the sample pack - salted caramel, berry and strawberry are ‘ok’ but I wouldn’t want them regularly. Spiced Pumpkin is surprisingly alright, so I now have a bag of that out of desperation for variety, rather than any great love. Apple Cinnamon and Peanut Butter didn’t come through enough for me to really form an opinion either way.
So, I’ve looked beyond the flavour boosters to cacao powder, cocoa powder, peanut butter powder, decaff coffee powder and various combinations of them (not peanut butter plus coffee though obviously!). I’ve even tried Jordans Skinny Syrups, having seen them recommended on the forum. Nothing compares favourably to the old flavour boosts, even if some of them are ‘ok’. They are usually less economical too. As I say, I’m genuinely gutted, and frankly very annoyed, which I think is fair enough given that I have come to rely on this product for two thirds of my daily meals.
So, come on Huel - bring the old flavours back please, so I can get back to feeling good about Huel and actually recommend it to people I talk to with confidence that you won’t pull the rug out on them as you have done me.
And if anyone else has any recommendations for powder-based flavourings that I might try, I’d appreciate it.
I use them now and again but not bought any for a while as they do last ages, and I also try other things, but see there are some new ones since I last looked.
Thanks very much for the suggestion. Do they get on well with my usual Vanilla powder, like the flavour boosts did, or are they better with unflavoured Huel?
+1 on the “bring back the old flavours”. I scrolled back to the beginning of the year bcs I didn’t want to start a new topic so I may be making up things here but my guess is that the old flavours have been done away with bcs they aren’t “natural”. The new flavours are mediocre at best and they are certainly lacking any sort of imagination.
My take on this whole “going all-natural” thing is that ppl that like and buy Huel do so because H is convenient and it’s a no-bullshit sort of brand/food. We like it like that. You use whatever sweeteners, that’s okay for us, otherwise we wouldn’t be buying it and we would be on this forum most likely. It’s the typical example of the “if ain’t broken don’t fix it”. You had a perfectly good product line-up to which you could add new flavours if whatever research or new manager thought that was necessary but don’t drop the old ones just bcs they aren’t unicorn-rainbow-shit-natural. I have a stash of mocha, macha, and about 3 other old ones and 2 of the new ones (peanut b and whatever else I can’t even remember bcs it’s so nondescript in flavour.) – I get it that the virus is most likely screwing your plans and timelines for just about everything but do reconsider bringing back the old flavours please.
The new mint chocolate is an absolute travesty compared to how perfect the original post was. Also losing macha is a huge blow to me as I have it for breakfast everyday so when I run out I will be completely lost for a little bit…
So here’s the thing, along with my delivery of bars, I decided to get a few sampler packs of flavour boosts to test out some of the more contentious flavours.
I’ve just tried the Chocolate one.
I used 6g which is the is the usual amount I use in a 50/50 mix of UU and Vanilla powder. When I tore open the sachet I immediately got a reasonably strong smell of sweet cocoa powder (which is to be expected as that’s the biggest ingredient).
I let it stand 10 minutes before drinking and thought the taste was absolutely fine – even enjoyable. I’m not a huge chocolate fan but have previously used both cocoa and cacao powder in Huel and to me, it tasted no different at all to using normal cocoa powder. It definitely tasted natural unlike the Chocolate Cherry which I find does taste synthetic.
During drinking, I only very faintly sensed the Stevia bitterness but that was a little more obvious a short while after I had finished the drink. Usually when I use stevia flavoured shakes I leave them standing longer as this neutralises the bitterness completely.
So long story short – still none the wiser what people are expecting, it tastes like what it is – cocoa – only with about 40% less calories than sweetened cocoa and slightly less than using raw cacao powder.
After lurking here for a while I felt a need to make my first post in this thread and agree wholeheartedly. I managed to grab a few of the old boosts from the outlet but god I will miss them when they run out. Caramel, toffee and old banana in particular (couldn’t you have the old banana and call it “sweet banana” or something for us who like that banana foam taste?). From what I understand the new ones are supposed to be more “natural” but what’s so good about that fact alone? I say bring on the chemicals if it tastes good. Huel has had a tendency of trying to fix things that weren’t broken lately, both with the boosts and original powder. Let’s hope this “new original” they hinted at sees the light of day. I know I’m being the grumpy old “things were better before” kind of person but… yeah, they were. Loving Black edition though.
