Tea and biscuits. An essential part of the British experience. I actually have a hot cup of tea and a reasonably-sized stack of biscuits in front of me as I write this. Nothing soothes the soul like a hot beverage and a sweet treat. When you start to think about your favourite biscuits, you inevitably end up with one manufacturer in mind. Digestives, Rich Tea, Fruit Shortcake, Hobnobs, Custard Creams, Ginger Nuts, Chocolate Bourbons and (perhaps the most popular at all despite definitely (legally) not being a biscuit at all) Jaffa Cakes all come from McVitie's.
I sometimes think that the difference between French and British culture is really well represented in the biscuit aisle of the supermarket. With French biscuits, as with much French cuisine, there is a real, almost single-minded, commitment to butter. Sables, Palmiers, Palets Bretons, Petit-Beurre biscuits... they are simply a vector for butter. In comparison, Rich Tea and Digestive biscuits seem virtually puritanical. Of course this side-steps the fact that Digestives also come in Milk Chocolate, Dark Chocolate, Caramel, "Seriously Chocolatey" and Jaffa versions. It also avoids the fact that Britain's favourite "product in the biscuit category" is the Jaffa Cake, suggesting that the category has been somewhat remoulded to include the once-controversial orange-jelly-and-chocolate-topped-biscuit-sized cake.
To cut a long story short, biscuits were subject to tax and cakes were not. In 1991 HM Customs & Excise challenged McVitie's about the tax-exempt status of the Jaffa Cake, which was a staple of supermarket biscuit aisles. Following a long and well-publicised tribunal - including arguments from McVitie's such as Jaffa Cakes go hard when stale (like cakes) not soft (like biscuits), and baking a full, cake-sized jaffa cake to prove that the size of typical Jaffa Cakes was immaterial to its status as biscuit or cake - Jaffa Cakes were ruled to be cakes, ensuring their tax-exemption for a good while longer.
Cake or biscuit, The Trading Post's iconic selection of McVitie's goodies is guaranteed to improve any cup of tea.
