Bonne Maman 2018 Advent Calendar Review

I am extremely excited to share this amazing Bonne Maman 2018 advent calendar with you today! Bonne Maman is my absolute favorite brand of jellies and preserves. I discovered the brand years ago when I was looking for a high quality orange marmalade to go atop of my baked brie. The dish turned out completely divine and I have been hooked on Bonne Maman ever since.

Bonne Maman products, produced in France, are Non-GMO Project Verified, have no high fructose corn syrup, no artificial coloring and no preservatives added. All of their preserves, jellies and fruit spreads are made with natural ingredients: fruit, sugar, cane sugar, concentrated lemon juice and fruit pectin. I have yet to find a flavor I don’t like and I really enjoy trying out different preserves that I can find in my local grocery stores.

Last year’s Bonne Maman advent calendar was sold out well before I could pick one up for the holidays. I was a little bummed that I missed out but I also wasn’t sure if it would be worth the cost to me. This year I decided we should give it a shot, so mom and I went over to our trusty World Market and grabbed one (in October!) to make sure we wouldn’t miss out!

The Cost:  $29.99  (World Market)

*At the time this post was written, it appears World Market was currently sold out online and had only limited quantities available to pick up in select stores. Amazon & Ebay looked to have some available at much higher costs. 

Can we just talk about the illustrations here? I mean, WOW! I love the design and layout on this calendar. It’s whimsical and fun without feeling too busy. I really hated having to break through these lovely drawings!

This year’s Bonne Maman 2018 advent calendar has 24 doors leading up to Christmas Day. Each door contains a (1 oz) mini jar featuring limited edition flavors of jellies, preserves, and honey. The back of the advent calendar has adorable illustrations listing all 24 varieties found inside the box.

2018 Limited-Edition Flavor List:

• 3 Citrus Fruits
• Apricot & Peach
• Blueberry & Blackcurrant
• Cherry & Blackberry
• Grapefruit & Dragon Fruit
• Greengage Plum
• Honey
• Lemon
• Mango Peach
• Mirabelle Plum
• Morello Cherry
• Orange & Cinnamon
• Orange & Mandarin
• Pear & Mirabelle Plum
• Pineapple & Passion Fruit
• Purple Fig
• Quince
• Raspberry & Lychee
• Raspberry & Redcurrant
• Rhubarb
• Strawberry & Redcurrant
• Strawberry Verbena
• Strawberry & Wind Strawberry
• Sweet Orange

 

Day 1:  3 Citrus Fruits Spread (1 oz)

I knew that the jars were going to be tiny but you have to see them in person to process just how **CUTE** they really are!! The glass jars are wedged securely in the concealed plastic tray behind the calendar front. It’s nice to know they’re all snug in their spots, as advent calendars with perforated doors are notorious for revealing empty spaces due to items being displaced during transportation.

Here are all of the doors opened to reveal each day’s mini jar!

OMG! Look at all of these little jelly jars! I think I’m going to keep the box to store all of my washed empties once we’re done enjoying the contents. I love that these mini jars are identical to their full-size siblings, right down to the tiny handwritten style script labels.

Although we are not quite into the Christmas season, we had to see just how far (1 oz) of fruit preserves would go! I toasted up some bread and had my dad pick out a jar to try. He chose the Blueberry-Blackcurrant Spread.

Blueberry-Blackcurrant Spread (1 oz)

Doesn’t this little guy look AMAZING?! I did begin to question whether one jar could be stretched to coat both pieces of toast…

I did it!! This little jar had just enough preserves to spread across both pieces of toast. I will say that you could be totally greedy and use an entire jar on just one piece of toast with ZERO judgment from our family. 🙂 However, I was a good girl and cut each toast in half so my parents, Gabe, and I could each enjoy a taste.

The Blueberry-Blackcurrant Spread was delicious! We especially loved getting bits of real fruit in each bite. Gabe, being five years old, naturally got deep purple-red stains all over his face, hands and even on one of his elbows… I stop asking ‘how’ or ‘why’ anymore.

Final Thoughts

Being completely honest, I was skeptical of receiving 24 different jars of fruit spreads (and honey) for the Christmas season. I didn’t think we’d actually end up trying all of them and I was worried these cute jars would end up being another pile of “things” stuck in my pantry’s purgatory until the end of time.

I am extremely glad I took the dive and purchased the Bonne Maman 2018 Advent Calendar this year because I couldn’t have been more wrong! These little (1 oz) jars are the perfect size for sampling unique jellies & preserves each morning.

And it’s really okay if you don’t try a jar every single day either. You can choose to have a little sampling of jellies and preserves available on Christmas morning for all of your visiting family or even gift the little jellies in people’s stockings!

And as for the advent calendar’s price point, I actually found these little (1 oz) Bonne Maman jars in World Market’s stocking stuffer bins retailing for $2.00 EACH! Keep in mind, the jars available for individual purchase were for their classic flavors only as well. **The advent calendar is the only place you will see the limited-edition flavors!**

Using that pricing as a guide, I can say that I am SO glad to have purchased the Bonne Maman advent calendar when I did! My family is going to have a blast opening each door in December and we can’t wait to dig in to some of these seriously unique flavors!

What do you think of the Bonne Maman 2018 Advent Calendar?

Are you going to grab one? Let us know in the comments below!