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I'm not entirely convinced that words are even needed today - well done to the 'Old Man', this I would say is his finest work to date ...
Hotel Chocolat say: "Discover our irresistible twist on classic petit fours – as treats at elevenses, for a touch of afternoon tea elegance, or for relaxed after dinner nibbling. With stunning chocolate recreations of silky soft Chocolate Mousse, Tiramisu, Crème Brûlée and fruity Strawberry Trifle"
Strawberry Trifle - A delicious, tarty berry truffle with real tasting fruit flavours and a creamy finish. Very Good.
Tiramisu - Disappointing as a Tiramisu flavour as it lacked rum or coffee flavour notes. There were tones of mascarpone amongst the creamy chocolate at least. Standard.
Chocolate Mousse - Part of me believed this plain option was unnecessary for a four-pack of chocolates, but the chocolatey flavours were rich and bold making for a sensational, pure chocolate indulgence truffle. Superb.
Creme Brulee - Multi-layered/textured and with a compelling creamy, butterscotch taste that captured the Creme Brulee dessert amazingly. Superb8.5 out of 10
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Hotel Chocolat say: "Discover our irresistible twist on classic petit fours – as treats at elevenses, for a touch of afternoon tea elegance, or for relaxed after dinner nibbling. Contains: Caramel Pecan Pie, Christmas Mess, Chocolate Souffle, Apple Strudel"
Chocolate Souffle - Is this really a Christmas/Winter flavour!? Whatever, this dark chocolate truffle had the creamiest milky centre ever and it tempered the strong earthy cocoa tones brilliantly. Very Good.
Caramel Pecan Pie - This had a wonderful variety of flavours that took you from a taste of savoury, salty nuts, to sweet sugary caramel. Just lovely. Superb.
Christmas Mess - Hotel Chocolat's Eton Mess is one of my favourites so I never doubted I was going to love this. With the simple replacement of cranberries for the strawberries this was just as brilliant. A creamy, fruity truffle of utter class. Superb.
Apple Strudel - The delightful apple flavours were evident from the first few seconds of the melt, and the taste had a progressively creamy edge. The dried fruit pieces were an outstanding finale. Superb.8.7 out of 10
------Overall these were both excellent mini-truffle packs that I believe delivered on Hotel Chocolat's usual exceptional standards. Quite how they managed to pack such flavoursome and variable taste bites of some of these desserts in to such small pieces is a mystery to me, but without exception they execution all to a Very Good standard. Would I buy for someone for Christmas? Sure I would! Exceptional stocking-filler potential here I think.
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64 comments:
Those mixtures sound wicked though me being Mr Fussy I would mix and match between them. If I could choose I would have the christmas mess, creme brulee, tiramisu and then the strawberry torte. That would be my dream mix.
I wish Hotel Chocolat did a service where you could pick and choose your own truffles. I find it a annoying sometimes that everything is set and prescribed because there's always something in there that I don't like. You could say that's true with 90% of chocolate boxes you buy but I still find it's true even with Hotel Chocolat.
Jim, I'm trusting you copletely here and will be buying these for my mum and sister each. I hope you haven't got it wrong lol. I know where to find you if you have :P :P
They should have made a chocolate profiterole flavour and loaded full of cream. That would have been sweet as.
Oh god I have so much to catch up on. I haven't been on this site for yonks.
Some of these photo shots are the definitiion of food porn. Does your Dad read the site Jim or do you just tell him that we all thinks his photos are amazing.
Dx
I question your massive scores for'selection' when there are only four flavours in each. They aren't even done twice either by the looks of it. 4 chocolates is poor for that amount of dollar.
A few of those truffles sound terrific. I wish I could buy just a whole pack of those creme brulee ones. They are annoyingly not one you can buy on their own =[
If I get a pack of either of these in my stocking this year I will squeal with delight lol. In all likelyhood there is far more chance it being crummy cadburys or something galaxy =( =( Hmph.
Now you are really rubbing salt in the wounds. Personally I think you are reviewing way too expensive stuff for 90% of us reading.
I would much rather you review some of the cheaper chocolates around. Stuff that your average persome can afford to buy.
Are these meant to be mini sampler versions of bigger ones? I can't see the bigger ones on the site if that's the case.
The good thing with Hotel Chocolat is that you get style and substance. I've had so many great looking/sounding chocolates before that have been such a let down when it's comes to tasting them. They sound like they didn't do that here with some of these. I'm ultra keen on trying that Strudel one.
2 actual chocolate reviews in a row. This is unprecedented :-)
Hey J
You must have been happy with the Man U result this weekend. You still don't look at your best but I guess if you are just winnign one nil the whole time it doesn't matter. Annoyingly we aren't playing our match until tonight. It's away at Fulham but I think we should be ok ..... actually scratch that. I think we will thrash them lol.
I will only echo what everyone is saying about your photos today bud. Big pat on the back to you old fella, hes done one hell of a job making all of these look special.
Cheers for the review.
N
God you could have made a little more effort with the pics today ;) Lol only joking Jim they are drool worthy as per norm. I like the fact you didn't feel the need to go in to too much detail on each of the chocs either. Simple and straight forward, I love it m8.
I need a lie down in a dark room now. Those truffles have got me way too exciteable. Talk about yummy looking.
3 out of 4 superbs for that last Winter one. Very impressive congrats Hotel Chocolat.
Wooop wooop Hotel chocolate monday Xmas special. I'm so needing some of those winter truffles right now. I'm confused by Chocolte Souflee being classed as a winter one but hey who cares when it tastes as good as you say so.
The only thing missing from all your fab review this year has been a comp for us all to do. You could run one alongside the awards you said you are doing!? Just an idea.
Jim if you were pushed in to choosing just one of them which would it be?
I see the Winter lot has a higher mark though the flavours in the other sound a little more exciting. Did you get the chance to try the cheesecake ones?
These are on the expensive side but yeah they would look outstanding if you gave them as a gift. I'm sure they would be appreciated by the person that got them.
<3 <3 <3 Hotel Chocolat perfection again <3 <3 <3
I think I spend too much time on this site. All those targetted adverts you get on some websites are all starting to show hotel chocolat to me now. Lol Im being followed roung by them!
I've just about stopped myself from licking my screen lol.Thats one nifty set of chocs you got yourself there. I almost get the sense from you that you might think these Hotel CHocolat people might know what they are doing lol.
They are a lot of money but they sound worth it to me.
I can see myself buying these sometime but I wont be paying that much to give them away as gifts. For that sort of money I would be looking for something bigger. They could look a bit pathetic size wise even when they are wrapped up.
I question the funky pink on the Petits Desserts one but apart from that it all looks good to me.
I'm so pleased these have scored well. I've been thinking of getting them for my sisters. I shall go pay Hotel Chocolat a visit today to ge them. Thanks for the review lovely.
X
x
More high scores all round for these guys. They don't miss a beat, they are just so consistent all the time with their quality. They must be good cause more and more people are starting to know who they are.
MUST.CLOSE.MOUTH. :-O
Such amazing looking chocolates. My tummy is rumbling so loud right now.
Overpriced again. Come on! Seriously! 4 chocolates for £6.50 ....... are you having a laugh!??
Thanks for the review Jim. I'm so pleased you reivewed these now cause I wanted to see what you thought about them. This sounds all cheesey but I can now buy with confidence :)
Thanks love X
Your consistently high scores are only believable because the photos you do justify what you say. These have to be the best truffle pictures I've seen on here before. Well done to your dad Jim.
I'm so asking for these for Christmas. I want all three though! Why did you give the cheesecake ones a miss Jim?
Keep the reviews coming Jim. Your the guy in the know this Christmas matey.
By the way if anyone is wondering you can now buy some of these flavours on their own and in multiple quantities.
I'm so blatantly doing that for the Xmas Mess ones http://www.hotelchocolat.co.uk/Christmas-Mess-P140404/
Strudel, creme brulee and chocolate souflee all sound amazing. Some of the rest sound bit mundane though. It's not nice hearing that the tiramisu didn't do the business like we would have expected. I remember the review you did of the slab which got a very high mark. It must have been annoying you didn't get the same level of decency from the truffle version of it.
I agree with you Jim I think that these have to be up there as some of the best stocking filler things I've seen.
They are special looking etc but aren't over the top in how big they are or what they cost. Pretty much perfect for exactly that.
Hotel Chocolat Mondays' back in the game. I like, I like!!!!
God I can't believe it's December already. I'm going to have to start thinking about present buying now. Everyone says that it is the best bit of Christmas but I genuinely think it is. I love giving presents to my small sisters especially because they get so excited. I wish I was that young again when it still had all that magic :(
Rxxx
Whats the diff between the Eton Mess and the Christmas Mess? The Christmas one looks smaller.
I cant believe so many of you people are getting hung up on the price. Hotel Chocolat has never come cheap. The prices have always been like that, its not new news.
I find Hotel Chocolat chocolate a funny one.
At their best they are excellent and make some of the best chocolates going.
At their worst they can make some right old stinkers. The tiramisu doesn't sound to clever for what it was intended to be.
I do hope you realise just how out of pocket you make me here fella. My girlfriend is obsessed with this site, especially when you do blogs posts about Hotel Chocolat. I've got no doubt she will see these at some point this week. Review some stuff with nuts in, she doesn't like them lol.
Suck it up and deal with it. You have to pay for quality.
Right I swear this is the last time I'm going to check this site before Christmas. You are coming up with way too much stuff to spend all my £s on and I need it for presents for other people lol not myself.
I'm part of the tasting club and we've been sent a few of these flavours in recent months. By far the best one I've tried is the pecan caramel. It doesn't sound as cool as something like Mess or the Cream Brulee but trust me everyone it's lush.
It must be so much hassle getting those chocolates staged exactly like each other. I would be tempted to just eat them straight away lol I would be useless at that sort of thing.
Well I was expecting these to do well and they have done :-) My favourites were the christmas mess and the souflee one. The souflee surprised me because I thought it was going to be all chocolate. It was great when all the cream came oozing out.
Those truffles look outstanding. The quality of the photography doesn't half help either ;) I saw before that people were saying how good they were. I 100% agree with them. The only downside is they made me really hungry now.
These do look really nice I have to say. They do seema bit pricey though for four chocs, nice though they are. If these had come in a bigger box, these would appeal more.
Hi All,
The march on towards Christmas is really on now. The reviews should be coming at a nice steady rate covering off the best of Hotel Chocolat, Heavenly Cakes, Artisan du Chocolat and anything else I felt like reviewing at the time.
In a way it's nice to see you speak so highly of the photos on these reviews, but I just know the 'old mans' head will be growing with each and every comment. Thank you for taking the time to show your appreciation - we are just glad that it is worth going to all the effort to do them like that.
Apologies I didn't get the chance to post a '7Days of Chocolate Reviews' at the weekend. It has all been very hectic my end as of late but I will reveal more on that after Christmas and when we move forward to 2012.
NIGEL - The United win was very comfortable for a one-nil. As comfortable as it could have been really. I expect a good game tonight. I will say 2-1 Liverpool.
RE: People asking about the Cheesecake Selection - I will be reviewing this in an upcoming post soon. I didn't forget about them. I just thought 3 packs in the one post would have been too much.
RE: People querying the price - I would agree with you guys today that £6.50 for 4 chocolates is pretty dear. The only defence I think HC have in this regard is that the 4 chocolates you get are some of the best ones you will probably have ever. Which is true.
Thanks for the comments today everyone. It's still great to hear from you all even if I can't be as personable as I once was. Please keep reading the site!
Thanks
JIM
Hotel Chocolat are going to do outstanding business this year if they keep getting rated like this. I just hope they dont go the Thorntons route and move away from quality once everyone knows about them.
Sorry but I honestly can't bellieve the prices here.
Do they honestly think they can justify £6.50 for these tiny boxes? I know they are high quality and all that but there is a point where you have to say that even Hotel Chocolat can't be worth that much. 4 truffles for £6.50 doesn't sound right to me.
I've been lucky enough to try a few of these in other selections Hotel Choc have made before. The ones I remember are the Eton Mess, Brulee and Tiramisu ones. I'm surprised you didn't like that Tiramisu one btw. I remember it being one of the better ones from the milk chocolate selection I had. The one I had was very boozie yet you say your's wasn't like that at all :-S Oh well they must have changed it at some point.
Mega sweet photos dude. I so want to eat those. I think you are right that they are some of the best ones you've done. Very professional looking.
I hope they wont have sold out of these when I get my bum in gear and start ordering. I can still seeing it being a few weeks tbh and im sure these will be popular. Especially with reviews like this.
Can you review the Petits Cheesecakes next pls. Was there any reason why you missed them out?
I think all these chocolates sound gr8 but I would have expected more for that amount of money.
If you look at what that could buy you from somwhere like Thorntons you soon realise how much it really is - £1.50 for just just one chocolate is pretty shocking.
They totally ripped off Lindt with these. Lol they didn't even change the name of one them! Have they not heard of Lindt Petits Desserts before. It's very cheeky of them not to change them up at all.
Those truffles look outstanding. The quality of the photography doesn't half help either ;) I saw before that people were saying how good they were. I 100% agree with them. The only downside is they made me really hungry now.
These look hella good but they just aren't big enough to satisfy me :P I will be requesting a big box of chocolates from HC not piddly ones like these are. More = better blatantly.
Boy your photographer made one heck of an effort making sure these all got shot in the same way. It must take hours cutting them up so they look all perfect like that. Is it a ballsaching process doing it J?
Now all I want is pecan pie...those pictures don't help nor does the delicious description ;) one of my aunts bakes eggless pecan pies specially whenever I visit, and when she judges it's been too long since the last visit she starts dangling them in front of me till I cave and buy plane tickets.
PS That HC red dress ad is hilarious. JCM Senior's pics make much better advertising ;)
It's not fair I pass on too much of an opinion as I've not tasted them but these do sound expensive @ 1.50 for a single chocolate. They would have to be v v special to justify it.
Thank you so much for reviewing these. They caught my eye a while ago and I was really curious about them. The tiramisu one from the first box doesn't sound like my kind of thing, but the other ones seem just perfect.
@Stu: I thought about the same thing...
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