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Biscoff Cookies Were Supposed to Be Temporary. Then Passengers Fell in Love

57 points mhb 1 day ago 44 comments

el_don_almighty 1 hour ago | parent

I love these cookies

malfist 1 hour ago | parent

Me too. Have you seen that Kodiak is now making "cookie butter" protein granola? Cookie butter is the US naming of speculoos and they're amazing. Love that stuff. Tried making my own to improve the macros more, but haven't nailed it yet.

jolt42 32 minutes ago | parent

I do too, but realized i like ginger snaps, at least some varieties at least as well if not better.

MC995 1 hour ago | parent

Honestly that's one of the few things I look forward to when flying these days, and a serious consideration on picking Delta if other factors are equal between airlines.

drcongo 1 hour ago | parent

You can just buy some from a shop.

MC995 1 hour ago | parent

I do, sometimes. But when I can always get them it's less of a "treat".

There are a few things I only get intentionally when traveling for work so it's something to look forward to and brings something positive to the trip.

tigen 1 hour ago | parent

Anticipating it nervously as the attendant distributes them down the aisle and then receiving it for free makes it taste better.

tekla 1 hour ago | parent

Like half the article is about why these cookies are popular in flight

em3rgent0rdr 1 hour ago | parent

Sure, there are a lot of things like this you can do. It would eat up a minute of your time and cost a premium to buy a tiny packet of an individually-wrapped biscoff. Or you could spend ~$36 to buy a box of 300 biscoffs that occupy a space in your cupboard, and then every time you fly, you take one out of the box and put it in your carry-on, and resist the temptation to eat it unless you are 10km high.

xattt 1 hour ago | parent

Keep the box, set a chair in the middle of the living room, strap on a VR headset (viewer’s choice) and put on an airline passenger POV video from YouTube. Crunch away at your Biscoff.

You’re welcome. You just saved thousands of dollars.

Liuser 1 hour ago | parent

Tomato juice is also disproportionately popular during flights compared to what one would normally order grounded. You can also buy tomato v8 juice from a shop, but there’s a reason taste changes when you’re flying, which they explain in the article.

HumblyTossed 1 hour ago | parent

Too sweet. Much would rather p-nuts.

dieselgate 1 hour ago | parent

Are there allergy concerns with nuts?

lotsofpulp 1 hour ago | parent

https://www.aaaai.org/tools-for-the-public/conditions-librar...

>Myth: Smelling an allergen can trigger anaphylaxis.

>Fact: While people often don’t like the smell of a food they’re allergic to, smell does not provoke an allergic reaction...While smells can linger in the air, the allergen proteins do not, which is why smelling a food will not trigger anaphylaxis.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33548082/

>Allergic reactions to airborne peanut proteins are rare and cannot be predicted by high levels of IgE-antibodies to peanut or Ara h 2. Only small amounts of biologically active peanut proteins were detected in the air and seem unlikely to trigger moderate/severe allergic reactions.

dieselgate 55 minutes ago | parent

Cross-contamination risk via surfaces and touch might still remain in such tight spaces. Thanks for the articles about olfactory risks!

stevesimmons 19 minutes ago | parent

I have severe peanut allergy. If I have any exposure, my immune system stays hypersensitised for several weeks. During that period, even the smell of peanuts is enough for my throat to start swelling up. It won't develop into the full anaphylactic reaction but it is certainly bad enough to make me very unhappy.

sbennettmcleish 41 minutes ago | parent

One of my sons is allergic to peanuts (and a lot more, like dairy alas) ... but Biscoff is a saviour for a little treat! And Biscoff spread is glorious, better than peanut butter IMO

HumblyTossed 17 minutes ago | parent

I don't have a nut allergy.

garbawarb 34 minutes ago | parent

Same. All these snacks have added sugar or oils, I'd rather have something simple.

c0rruptbytes 1 hour ago | parent

Claire Saffitz makes cinnamon rolls with these cookies as the inner cinnamon filling, they’re so good with the spice

Dries007 1 hour ago | parent

As a Belgian I still dislike this new branding.

tunk 44 minutes ago | parent

Same.

Insanity 26 minutes ago | parent

It is at least easier to pronounce for non-Dutch speakers. Here in Toronto, there are a few places that put "Speculaas/Speculoos (Biscoff)" on their menu, e.g: https://www.columbuscafe.com/en/recette/cafe-latte-de-lours-....

But to be honest, as a Belgian living abroad, I'm just happy I can find it at all lol. Was surprised to even find the 'crunchy' spread in my local supermarket.

throw7 10 minutes ago | parent

If it's any help, the company denies that Delta came up with the name, but doesn't offer an explanation to the origin of the name itself.

It's also funny how they deny that the original deal with Delta was only a temporary short term deal, but that it was always a longterm deal.

SoftTalker 1 hour ago | parent

> a peanut shortage prompted Delta, then America’s fourth-largest airline, to seek an alternative onboard snack

I never knew this was the reason. I had assumed that airlines stopped serving peanuts as an accomodation to the increasing number of people with peanut allergies.

sasaf5 1 hour ago | parent

Please, make sure you try these at least once in your life: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speculoos

rootusrootus 1 hour ago | parent

Once in a while we pick up a pack of these from Costco, when we haven't flown in a while. They're pretty sweet, so we don't get them too often, but once in a while as a treat.

adzm 1 hour ago | parent

Have you heard of Biscoff spread? It's kinda like peanut butter except, it's made out of cookies https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_BZsIY6PUPU (might not be sfw)

jldugger 35 minutes ago | parent

Yea, I once brought some to game night, and another gamer brought actual Biscoff cookies. Then a third person put them together into a sandwich cookie which I thought was equal parts funny and violating some kind of Kosher rule "Do not seethe a kid in it's mother's milk" I invented in my head.

prmph 1 hour ago | parent

Aren't they supposed to be full of sugar? Each time I've been tempted to pick them up when shopping, one look at the ingredients and nutritional profile is enough to dissuade me. I guess trying them once in a while won't kill me, though.

Apparently, they are a a brand of speculoos cookies, and this Wikipedia synopsis is eye opening:

> speculaas [speːkyˈlaːs] ⓘ refers to the more traditional variant, made with a mix of various spices, which is nowadays most popular in the Netherlands; speculoos [speːkyˈloːs] ⓘ refers to a Belgian variant that omits the traditional spices in favour of caramelized sugar for flavour, and which is nowadays the most common variant in Belgium and worldwide

So the Belgians enshittified speculaas to create speculoos, pumping it full of sugar, and presented it to the world as something special.

wiether 54 minutes ago | parent

They're... cookies. A treat.

Looking at the nutritional profile of cookies doesn't make sense. You're supposed to eat them in such low quantity/frequency that it doesn't matter.

notyourwork 50 minutes ago | parent

Yes things made with sugar have sugar.

righthand 59 minutes ago | parent

Americans love sugary factory-dust garbage of course they think it’s a treat. Non-US flights have 100x better service and amenities.

HumblyTossed 17 minutes ago | parent

Wow, can I be like you?

Exoristos 54 minutes ago | parent

Soon after these became ubiquitous in grocery stores, the manufacturer stopped using butter. I don't buy them anymore.

t1234s 51 minutes ago | parent

pairs well with a coffee but with a gin and tonic pretzels are the way to go.

burningChrome 33 minutes ago | parent

And now with their popularity, they're almost everywhere now. Mcdonald's, Krispy Kreme, Cinnabon, Auntie Anne's have all had Biscoff partnered products.

Kind of cool to the explosion of popularity and them taking advantage and partnering with other brands to expand their markets.

johnnyApplePRNG 30 minutes ago | parent

Title makes it sound like Biscoff was created by an airline or something...

The bakery has been around since 1932, FYI.

eddieroger 4 minutes ago | parent

The "then passengers fell in love" portion was enough context (for me, at least) to know we were about to read about Delta Airlines, the first place I've had Biscoff cookies, and other than when I get them at Costco, the only place I eat them.

_doctor_love 29 minutes ago | parent

Dunking these in coffee is super clutch

Telemakhos 23 minutes ago | parent

Or hot tea. Along the same lines too, try the ultra-flat and crisp and dunkable Moravian cookies (specifically the spice or ginger flavors) or ginger-flavored Swedish thins.

jmpman 25 minutes ago | parent

I'd read that there are a few snack items resistant to GLP-1 induced food aversions, when I was on a GLP-1, Biscoff cookies felt like one of them. I may have an Amazon scheduled delivery of Biscoff, which every month, I intend to cancel, and somehow forget to follow through.

tombert 9 minutes ago | parent

I'm not on GLP-1s, but I am on metformin [1] which my wife says has similar food aversion properties to the GLPs, and for me I've noticed virtually anything with peanut butter I can still eat a nearly infinite quantity of. One of the worst things that has ever happened to me was finding out that peanut butter fudge is ridiculously easy to make.

[1] Off label for weight loss. My insurance wouldn't cover GLP-1s, and metformin is out of patent and super cheap, and I read that at least some people have had good success using it for weight loss. I am fortunately one of those happy few.

ardit33 3 minutes ago | parent

Does anyone voluntarily buys them? I find them barely eatable food.