Vegemite and other ‘mite’ reviews

Products

We tested yeast extract and vegetable extract spreads that are available nationally through at least one of the major supermarket chains.

Price is based on the pack price in Sydney stores (not on special) in October/November 2019. We tested a total of nine spreads.

Tasting

A total of 31 people took part in our taste test. Of the 31 participants, 25 grew up eating Vegemite, one grew up eating British Marmite, and five grew up eating neither. Two of the 31 participants had never tasted Vegemite. 

We served all the samples on sliced white bread. Participants tasted the samples ‘blind’ (without knowing the brands) in a randomised order, which was different for each person. Each sample was tasted by all 31 participants. For each sample, participants decided if they ‘disliked’, ‘liked’ or ‘loved’ it and wrote comments.

Scores

The CHOICE score is made up of taste (90%) and nutrition (10%). We calculate the taste score as an average of all responses, whereby ‘dislike’ is scaled at 25, ‘like’ at 70 and ‘love’ at 100. The nutrition score is based on the product’s Health Star Rating, which we calculated from the details in the nutrition information panel and changed to a percentage.