Croissants

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference butter croissants
£2 for 4, sainsburys.com
Good colour, smells buttery. The lamination is not consistent … (when cut into, it should look like honeycomb). I wouldn’t be like, “Oh, I want that croissant again.” But good flavour.
★★★

Waitrose 1 Charentes butter croissants
£1.55 for 2, waitrose.com
It doesn’t have the nice rounded shape. You can see a decent honeycomb pattern inside. It tastes OK. The flake is good.
★★★

Asda Extra Special all butter croissants
£1.75 for 4, asda.com
This looks the best. It’s not as deep in colour but in terms of overall form and unison, it’s definitely a good-looking croissant. The taste is a bit comme ci, comme ça.
★★★

Brioche Pasquier croissants
£1.50 for 6, ocado.com
I’m not a fan of this one, it looks a bit sad. The honeycomb is apparent. Seems a bit dry. It doesn’t have the buttery smell … just tastes like dough and sugar. It doesn’t taste fresh.
★

Pains aux raisins

Marks & Spencer pain aux raisins
£1 each, marksandspencer.com
Good colour, weight and distribution of fruit. It’s got height, you can see the swirl, and on the edges it’s flaking. I can’t fault it.
★★★★★

Sainsbury’s pain aux raisins
70p each, sainsburys.com
It’s pretty. Smells good. Some of the raisins are plump and the pastry has a buttery flavour. I fear it’s a little under-baked … but it tastes fine.
★★★

Starbucks pain aux raisins
£1.99 each, starbucks.co.uk
It smells OK. It deceives you … from the top you think there’s going to be loads of raisins, but when you cut into it, there’s not. The custard has a citrus vibe. I don’t like this.
★

Co-op pain aux raisins
£1 each, food.coop.co.uk
Looks depressing; the custard looks luminous. Some of the raisins seem burned and I think it’s undercooked in the middle.
0 stars

Pains au chocolat

Waitrose 1 pain au chocolat
£1.55 for 2, waitrose.com
The flake is banging. Hmm, I’ve been shortchanged… the chocolate isn’t filling the whole hole. The taste is good, though.
★★★★

Starbucks pain au chocolat
£1.85 each, starbucks.co.uk
A nice golden colour on top, evenly baked, chocolate poking out on both sides. It’s a bit soft. There’s loads of pockets in there, but it’s not flaky. Does the job, but a bit forgettable.
★★★

Tesco all butter pain au chocolat
£1.25 for 4, tesco.com
It’s got a decent flake. Smells nice, I can taste the dark chocolate but the richness of the butter is not there. The chocolate is solid.
★★

Brioche Pasquier pain au chocolat
£1.75 for 6, ocado.com
This looks like a sausage roll from Greggs. Inside, it looks more like a bread loaf with chocolate. It tastes like bread. It’s not the one, not good. No offence.
★

Jam doughnuts

Marks & Spencer raspberry jam doughnut
50p each, marksandspencer.com
Good proportions – sugar coating, dough, jam. If anything it could be fluffier but it’s still the fluffiest. Tastes like it was fried this morning.
★★★★

Asda Baker’s Selection jam doughnuts
79p for 5, asda.com
Every doughnut should have an aeration ring … this kind of has it. Looks like a jam bap. The jam to dough ratio is pretty sound but the jam is really too sweet... and I like sweet stuff.
★★

Essential Waitrose raspberry jam doughnuts
£1 for 4, waitrose.com
This looks like it’s had time to do its thing; a solid aeration ring and it’s covered in more sugar. The jam is on the tight side. The dough is not really that nice, not airy.
★★

Co-op jam doughnuts
75p for 5, food.coop.co.uk
It looks like the last one in the pack, there’s no love in it. The colour doesn’t look right either. A bit doughy, that jam doesn’t taste like anything … just sugar.
★

Blueberry muffins

Marks & Spencer blueberry filled muffin
£1 each, marksandspencer.com
Ohh! They put a bit of blueberry jam in the middle! This changed the game. Powerful. The blueberries are evenly distributed too … and it’s in the tulip wrap that I like AND it tastes nice.
★★★★★

Co-op blueberry muffin
£1 for 4, food.coop.co.uk
Strangely blue in the middle – I don’t think there’s enough blueberries to make it this colour. But well baked.
★★

Waitrose wild blueberry muffins
£1.75 for 2, waitrose.com
Looks like there’s a bit of crumble on top. These look like legit blueberries. It has a weird sour taste to it.
★★

Tesco blueberry muffins
£1.20 for 4, tesco.com
They look too blue to me. Smells like blueberries, though. The colour is even, apart from around the edges … but there are hardly any blueberries in it. No.
★

Sultana scones

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference sultana scones
£1.50 for 4, sainsburys.com
Good colour. Doesn’t taste bad at all. It’s not doughy, easy to break apart. But it’s a scone for people who don’t really like sultanas.
★★★

Waitrose all butter sultana scones
£1.65 for 4, waitrose.com
I like this one, it’s big, rustic, well baked … you can tell someone called Margaret made this. It looked like it was going to be insane but, when it came down to the taste, not that great.
★★★

Aldi Village Bakery sultana scones
79p for 6, aldi.co.uk
This one is sad, colour is not great, looks more like a rock cake. The distribution of fruit is pretty decent, breaks apart nicely, doesn’t seem over-mixed. Tastes OK.
★★

Becky’s Bakery sultana scones
50p for 4, iceland.co.uk
No height, which is sad because I love to slice a scone in half. Good distribution of fruit but I think that’s because they’re so small. Taste-wise, it does the job … but meh.
★★

Liam Charles is a columnist for The Guardian’s Feast