Veloforte Classico, pack of three

Veloforte bars are an all-natural sports nutrition product, based on an Italian recipe that extends back to the ages of the Roman legions. They offer something really different to what's currently on the market, and I'm certainly a convert.

The bars come in three flavours, the Classico, reviewed here, the fruity Di Bosco, and the chocolatey Ciocco. All three are based around the simple trinity of nuts, fruits and natural sugars, with the Classico being made up of predominantly almonds and citrus peel.

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The Classico is a refreshing change from the majority of energy bars, in that the flavour is really fresh and vibrant. The citrus makes it a light and zesty affair; the acidic and synthetic tang that can underlie some fruity bars is absent, and it feels like the bar has just come out of your kitchen rather than having been made a month or two prior.

You can taste the nuts in the mix, but they're not overly powerful, adding just the right element of savoury to prevent the bar being overly sweet. I personally think they taste amazing. They're so different from the other stuff out there that the flavour just doesn't get boring.

Texture-wise, the bar is a nice combination of smooth moistness and satisfying crunch. The honeys and fruits make the bar almost juicy in the mouth, while chunks of nut give an element of bite to give your teeth something to work on. Aside from the obvious benefit of the moistness making the bars easy in the mouth, it means that a half-eaten bar stays together in the pocket if you're a nibble-and-stash kind of rider.

The bars are hand-wrapped in foil that can be unwrapped as one piece, should you desire to munch the lot in one go. I'm one for attacking a bar in several goes, in which case the foil can easily be torn to give you access to one end while leaving the other end wrapped.

Nutritionally, the bars pack a real hefty punch. A Classico bar contains a whopping 50g carbohydrate, 9g fat, and 4g each of fibre and protein. The fats are from nuts as opposed to any weird trans fats that you find in processed foods, and which you want to steer clear of. The carb content is the stat that stands out most to me – most sports bars contain around 30-40g of this energy-giving good stuff, so a Veloforte bar far exceeds this. Admittedly, a lot of this (42g) is sugars, but there's some consolation in that this is from fruits and honeys.

The high sugar and carb content packs a SERIOUS punch. On first trying a bar, eating half of it left me with a serious rush of energy, akin to that of a gel but somehow more powerful, with the sugar buzzing around my muscles and seemingly my mind too. However, the beauty of these bars lies in the way in which the energy release is so instantaneous but also quite slow. Come again? Well, despite that initial buzz of energy, a bar seems to act like 'proper' food in your stomach, offering a nice solid lump of food for your digestive system to work away on for hours to come, in the way that your café stop bacon sarnie does. This 'all-day fuelling' is a product of the fats and proteins in the bar, which release energy in a slow and steady way, preventing spikes of energy. So you really are getting the best of both worlds here.

> How to fuel your big ride or sportive

With a pack of three bars costing £6.99, that makes each bar £2.33. If bought in larger boxes the price per bar comes down, with 24 working out at just over £2 per bar. This is still towards the top end of the price spectrum for energy foods, with similar 'natural' bars such as the Lucho Dillitos costing around £1.40 a piece, Clif bars coming in at around £1.65 each, and Torq bars around £1.50.

Although you are paying around 50p more per bar, it's worth considering that a Veloforte bar gives you around 20-25% more energy per piece, meaning it all works out pretty equally. Personally, having experienced how well the bars work, and how good they taste, I'd pay the extra without a second thought.

Veloforte promises a '#realfoodrevolution' on its twitter feed. I'm in. Viva la revolution!

Verdict

Veloforte bars are nearly faultless: tasty, natural and providing both fast and slow release energy – awesome stuff