July 23rd: Lindt Tropical Temptation

Kcal ??? Fat ??? Fat(sats) ??? Carbs ???

Following on from my review of the Lindt Carribean Dream the other day I today tried another similarly themed bar named 'Tropical Temptation'. Of course as is normal practice I must thank Dean-German-Grocery for providing me the opportunity to sample this product - my mind boggles sometimes at the thought of what the chocolate store shelves look like in German supermarkets as there just seem to be a never ending amount of different flavours and formats. The added ingredients to todays milk chocolate bar were mango, pineapple and passionfruit which I thought made for a pretty interesting if a little busy sounding mix.

The bar came in a standard 100.0g format that I ate over the course of three sittings with the help of some willing friends. I thought the packaging had nice stand out as the pictures of the fruit immediately grabbed my attention and highlighted the fruity nature of the product with their variance in colours. As always the bar was nicely sealed by a branded silver foil layer which did its usual job of maintaining the aesthetics of the chocolate itself. On pack the wrapper displayed the chocolate to have small bits embedded in it - when I inspected the bar these were very sparse in their integration and when it came to eating it didn't have a notable impact on the texture. Up to this point the product really had been billed up in my mind to provide a big fruit punch and this was only further cemented by the sweet fruity smells that were emitted when I broke the foil seal.

One thing I must say about this bar was that the taste was very consistent despite there being three different fruits involved. Part of me was expecting each of them to come through stronger in certain blocks but what I found was that each block pretty much tasted the same. In terms of cocoa strength the milk chocolate was a little underpowered for me and at times I thought that too much of an emphasis had been placed on the milk flavours making it more of a carrier for the fruit elements involved. Despite this I don't think this chocolate could ever be accused of lacking flavour as the fruit elements certainly built upon the creamy base taste. The first fruit to come to the part was the pineapple which had a constant sweet sugary presence throughout the majority of the taste. As the smooth melt of the chocolate progressed the more distinct flavours of the mango and passionfruit came in to play with their slightly tarter more soured fruit notes. The contrast between the sweet pineapple and slightly more acidic flavours of the mango and passionfruit were on the whole pretty well balanced, though I must say that in the aftertaste of some blocks I did get a slight burning sensation at the back of my throat which put me off consuming this chocolate in any great quantity.

Overall the sheer amount of fruit flavoured chocolates I have tried this Summer has meant that this one has sort of just blurred in my memory. By that I mean that as far as it goes it was a pretty decent chocolate, yet it did nothing to make it really stand out in my mind as something spectacular like say the Hotel Chocolat Tutti Frutti. The milk chocolate was prehaps a little on the weak side for me but on the balance of things I guess the milder cocoa taste allowed the different fruit influences to come into play a little more. The fruits flavours were balanced reasonably well though at times the acidic nature of all them combined did get a little wearing on the throat. If you fancy getting stuck into some fruit flavoured chocolate this summer this is a very decent one to get involved with, but just not the best.

8.4 out of 10

Head to Dean-German-Grocery for all your German Chocolate Needs!