June 15th: Lucky's Mad Hatter Bars

Back in March we had the ChocolateMission debut of a brand called Lucky's. If you need reminding, Lucky's produce 'unique luxury cakes covered in pure chocolate', and they managed to really impress me with their Honey Time Collection gift pack. I was so taken by their cakes, you may recall that I concluded that they were 'the best product I had reviewed on ChocolateMission so far in 2011'- thats some high praise! Well given that experience you can imagine my excitement when Lucky's offered me the chance to try some of their latest additions.

The three cakes I will be showcasing today are the three new 'Mad Hatter Bar' variants. The Mad Hatter Bar range consists of Lucky's special dark brownie cake which they have flavoured with three different types of Valrhona chocolate, as well as several flavour variations that I will make clearer below. As with my last experience these cakes came beautifully presented in transparent plastic box cases which had been wrapped and hand sealed with an Alice in Wonderland themed label. I probably needn't point out the marvellous look of the cakes themselves - I hope my photos showcase that. They had obviously been crafted with real care, and the clear Lucky's moulded branding on the top of each was a clear reminder of the premium quality at hand.

Going Bananas - 'Dark brownie with banana and ginger, covered in milk Valrhona chocolate (40.0%)'. Banana cake is a real favourite of mine at the moment so I had high expectations for this one. The melt of the milk chocolate was smooth and provided a rich set of creamy chocolatey flavours for every mouthful. This great quality chocolate was only superseded by the deliciousness of the brownie that sat at the heart of this chunky block - boy was it phenomenal! The banana flavours were true and forthcoming, and a subtle undertone of ginger added a remarkable hint of warming spice to the rich cocoa flavours of the brownie. A thin layer of some sort of caramel or creme could have made this utterly outstanding, but frankly it was almost near perfection - an outstanding synergy of fruit, cake and chocolate. One for banana cake fans that's for sure!

8.8 out of 10


-----
Looney Raspberry - 'Dark brownie with raspberry and pistachio, covered in white Valrhona chocolate (35.0%)'. Out of all three this did admittedly sound like the weakest to me though I was still quite excited by the prospect of the pistachio nuts and Valrhona white chocolate. The white chocolate did it's job of establishing a milky, vanilla hinted initial taste, however it soon became a bit of an after thought with the other stronger flavoured constituents taking a lead. When chewing the cake by far the strongest flavours came from the raspberry element, which like the banana above was as real tasting and fruity as you could ever hope for. The pistachios were notable for bringing a slight saltness and added crunch texturally, though their true flavours were understandably hampered somewhat by the stronger flavoured brownie and fruit. Again, all these different fruit, brownie and nut elements combined made for an outstanding cake.

8.4 out of 10


-----
Salty Insanity - 'Dark brownie with salted hard caramel covered in dark Valrhona chocolate (70.0%)'. You saved the best until last right? Well so I thought, but it wasn't to be I'm afraid. The dark chocolate as I thought it would be was absolutely delicious (I really need to get around to doing some Valrhona reviews don't I!!) and the contrast of the unsweetened, earthy cocoa flavours of the exterior shell contrasted perfectly with the sweet, cakey cocoa of the brownie below. Where I feel this one let itself down to a degree was the implementation of the caramel - which for me just didn't come through in the taste to level I wanted it to. Indeed, the caramel element was nothing more than a minor suggestion of sweeter brown sugar tones. The butter, salt and cream flavours just weren't there no matter how much I searched for them. The combination of the superb chocolate and gorgeous brownie still made for a delicious product at hand, but it didn't live up to my sky high expectations.

7.3 out of 10



Overall not all of these Mad Hatter Bars came off quite as well as I hoped but being frank they were all still exceedingly tasty. Banana fans will seriosuly want to look at getting involved with the 'Going Bananas', and raspberry fans will no doubt be just as pleased with the 'Looney Raspberry'. As I stated above the 'Salty Insanity' was a little bit of a sore point for me, though luckily I was able to comfort myself with the other gift set that Lucky's sent my way (review coming soon :D). These are damn expensive cakes, but some of them are worth the money and them some.

June 13th: Hotel Chocolat Mississippi Mud Pie

My adventures with the Hotel Chocolat Summer Peepster Collection continued today with me trying another of their dessert themed offerings - the Mississippi Mud Pie. Doing my background research like I always do, I was informed by WIKI that ...

'Mississippi mud pie is a chocolate-based dessert pie that is likely to have originated in the US state of Mississippi (Duh!!). The treat contains a gooey chocolate filling on top of a crumbly chocolate crust. The name "Mississippi mud pie" comes from the dense cake which resembles the banks of the Mississippi River. It is believed that this dish was created by home cooks after World War II because it was made of simple ingredients that could be found at any supermarket and did not require any special cooking tools' .... isn't that fascinating :D :D

Though the recipe may have originally hailed from the States this hasn't stopped Hotel Chocolat serving up their own version of this chocolatey treat in their own unique form. This chocolate slab variation of the dessert came billed as 'solid milk and white chocolate, decorated with chocolate biscuits and dark chocolate'.

No surprises what size this one came in - 100.0g!! It came packaged inside the standard cellophane packet (should be foil I think!) and looked attractive on the eye with the swirled appearance of the differently toned chocolates creating an exciting visual sight to behold. Upon breaking open the seal to the wrapper, forthcoming scents of chocolate and sweet honey biscuits could be detected - I wasn't going to hang around getting to work on this one.

With my handy taste assistants in attendance I put my bulging, manly biceps *ahem* in to action and went about the task of splitting the slab in to smaller mouthful sized pieces. Hopefully from my photo above you can determine that the biscuit pieces were proportionately distributed across the slab, and were generously integrated in to both the surface and middle parts of the bar. As you can probably also see from my photo the majority of the slab was comprised of milk chocolate - Hotel Chocolat's 40% recipe to be accurate. I've described this chocolate countless times beforehand, rest assured all the usual cream based cocoa flavours were on offer here, and they were delivered with the usual flavour layerings of milk, butter and honey - Yum! The aforementioned biscuit pieces proved to not only be enhancing visually but also rather damn tasty, with one of my work colleagues hitting the nail on the head describing them as 'oreo-like' in taste. From a personal point of my view, I though the best parts of this slab were where the white and milk chocolates were intertwined, as the white chocolate brought further flavour depths of vanilla noted dairy cream to the party. As you can imagine there was a great scramble for the pieces that included the white chocolate, milk chocolate and cookie pieces in one. My only slight disappointment was that the dark chocolate seemed more there for decorative purposes rather than to enhance the taste a great deal.

Overall I was always confident I was going to enjoy this slab given that it was a pretty pure chocolate offering and not one that contained any outlandish enhancing flavours. I always think it is a sensible thing that Hotel Chocolat choose to put a plainer slab amongst their Peepster Selections. Don't get me wrong I love the fact that have more variable chocolates such as the Eton Mess (See - HERE), however at the end of the day I think its wise that they at least have one offering in a selection that sticks to their core principles of simple great tasting chocolate. This Mississippi Mud Pie slab fulfilled this role superbly and combined their staple milk chocolate recipe with the white chocolate and biscuit pieces to create something that was simple yet utterly delicious. This was a slab that was well liked by all that tried it, and it was hoovered up by myself and fellow taste testers in a matter of minutes after its opening. Whether it be as part of this Peepster Selection or in it's own large sized grand slab form, I can recommend this one with a great deal of confidence.

8.9 out of 10

June 10th: Ritter Sport Amarena Kirsch

Kcal 572 Fat 38.0g Fat(sats) 24.4g Carbs 50.1g (per 100.0g)

As I get older I get more and more scared at just how quickly time flys by. It genuinely feels like only a few months ago that I was reviewing Ritter Sport's Summer line up for 2010, however looking at the dates on the review HERE its almost exactly a year to the day since I wrote of those delights. Indeed, the Summer season is again upon us, and of course that means only one thing - more Ritter Sport chocolates. The Ritter Sport summer range this year again consists of three flavours that have been based on popular European ice creams. Keeping their places from 2010, the Stracciatella and Mango-Passionfruit bars are this year joined by an Amarena Kirsch flavour.

As we would all expect the bar this year has been delivered in the traditional 100.0g square block format, in the usual sixteen block grid. Those of you aware of the packaging from last year will notice that very little has changed - in fact nothing has changed on the Stracciatella and Mango-Passionfruit bar wrappers aside from the year stated for development. Though this may sound a little boring to some of you, I more think along the lines of why fix something that isn't broken. In my opinion the packaging is good and encapsulates the fresh feel nature needed for a summer chocolate. As always I was also impressed by the definition of the filling when I split the bar into it's blocks - there were visible red cherry pieces evident amongst the cream coloured filling.

If you hadn't of guessed from the photographs this was of course a Ritter Sport 'milk chocolate bar filled with an Amarena Kirsch creme filling'. For those unaware as to what Amarena Kirsch is, allow me to consult our longtime friend Wiki - "an Italian specialty, consisting of dark cherries that have been placed in a syrup of sugar, almond oil and vanilla. It is traditionally eaten with ice cream". This all sounded well and good to me, and I felt a little more encouraged by the strong sweet red fruit scents that emerged when I split the wrapper. Being the lucky recipient of a number of samples I tasted this alongside a few friends and I'm pleased to announce that the general consensus was that this was a decent fruit flavoured chocolate. In my experience, the flavour journey started off well with the outer milk chocolate establishing a fair, yet unspectacular milky cocoa chocolate flavour hit from the outset. The inner creme initially came to the party offering incremental creamy tones to the taste, though as soon as the small pieces of red cherry were founded (and they were plentiful!!), a sweet red cherry flavour set soon firmly announced it's arrival. The cherry influence was remarked upon as being too sweet by some of my taste panel, however on the whole it was met positively by the majority who agreed with me that it was notably real tasting and had a small hint of savoury nuttiness to take off it's sugary edge. This was a chocolate that I felt comfortable eating in blocks of four (25.0g), this seemed like a nice amount for a quick chocolate hit with a touch of sweet fruitiness.

Overall as I'm not a massive cherry fan I wasn't as excited about this particular flavour than I have been with some of the more recent Ritter innovations. Despite my slight lack of enthusiasm to begin with, I'm happy to report that I was pleasantly surprised by the time I had finished my first taste test and I continued to be so for the next few that followed (Second taste tests are always necessary of course haha! At first I was a little sceptical that this bar might just come across as simplistic compared to last years 'busier' Wildberry Yogurt variation, but in truth I think this one was equally as good with it's more focused one fruit focus. As I alluded to above, some of the taste panel I conducted this with were a little put off by the overall sweetness of the chocolate by the time the sugary fruit had been enhanced by the sweet milk chocolate. The majority however were aligned that this was a very tasty cherry flavoured chocolate, and that it made a nice change from the more traditional strawberry and raspberry flavourings that we get in the UK. Fans of cherries will feel right at home here with this one. If you fall in to that category I can highly recommend it.

8.3 out of 10

June 8th: 'Bits n Bobs' Cadbury Superpost # 2

The review backlog has become increasingly large over the course of the last year, so I have decided to have a bit of a clearout. Today you have the pleasure of a Cadbury Superpost - featuring some bars that I have recently tried from all across the globe ... in the interest of post length I suggest we just get on with it :D

-----
Cadbury Boost Stix
Cadbury Boost Stix
Kcal 140 Fat 7.7g Fat(sats) 5.4g Carbs 15.7g (per stix)
'Chocolate flavoured centre with biscuit pieces, surrounded in caramel, all covered in Dairy Milk milk chocolate'
Origin: Australia

The Cadbury Boost Stix bar is one of the latest products to come out in Australia and essentially comprises of a standard UK Cadbury Boost split in to two smaller thinner 'Stix' pieces. I was a little confused by the branding given that the Boost bar in the Southern Hemipshere is usually called the Moro (!??), but that aside the packaging and presentation looked reasonable enough and struck me as attractive.

Taste wise there was very little variation from a standard Boost, with the real only point of difference coming in the scale and size. The Dairy Milk chocolate was noticeably a touch thinner in melt compared to our UK stuff, but it was still creamy tasting and led nicely into the surrounding layer of caramel and centre filling of chocolate truffle and biscuit pieces.

Overall this bar was fine for what it was, but I see little point for it unless you are someone who fancies their fill of Cadbury Boost in a more manageable sized portion. To be honest the only time I ever eat the normal Cadbury Boost is when I am in need of a very fulfilling chocolate to satisfy my hunger - so that sort of rules out the point of existence for me with this bar. Despite it's smaller size these Stix bars still deliver the Cadbury Boost taste experience, I just honestly don't see little point in paying the same amount for 5.0g less chocolate.

7.8 out of 10



-----
Cadbury P.S.
Cadbury P.S.
Kcal 240 Fat 13.7g Fat(sats) 9.8g Carbs 28.8g
'Layer of wafer and caramel flavoured cream, covered in Caramilk chocolate'
Origin: South Africa

I'm not one-hundred percent sure about the intended brand positioning of the P.S. but from what I have ascertained it is probably targeted predominantly at female consumers given the colour scheme and suggestive 'You light up my life' blurb featured on the wrapper. Although I was hardly overwhelmed by the aesthetic proposition, the smell of the bar did excite me more, and the sweet, dairy based white chocolate scents did raise my anticipation to an extent.

The taste was what I can only describe as polarising in that was very sugary, but still on the whole quite pleasant with undertones and hints of toffee and golden syrup present throughout. Given the sharp directness of the sugary natured outer chocolate, the wafer was very much needed, as the more savoury wheat flavours offered by the wafer that balanced out the sweetness of the coating.

Overall it wasn't one of the better chocolate bars I have ever reviewed from Cadbury, but I wouldn't be surprised if I was to find out that out that it has quite a few loyal fans. The Caramilk chocolate that coats it is very distinct in terms of taste, and I can see people that love really sweet chocolate like Caramac, White Mice etc would very much enjoy this bar. Personally speaking it wasn't a product well matched to my tastes, it was nice enough, but I wouldn't actively encourage you actively seek it out.

7.2 out of 10



-----
Cadbury Mr Big Original

Cadbury Mr Big Original
Kcal 300 Fat 14.0g Fat(sats) 7.0g Carbs 41.0g (per bar)
'Layered vanilla wafer, coated in caramel, peanuts and rice crisps, covered in a chocolate coating'
Origin: Canada

Getting bars from Canada certainly isn't the easiest of thing to do, but after a little endeavour I did manage to lay hands on one of these Mr Big bars thanks to a ChocolateMission reader who wished to remain anonymous. This Mr Big Original is one of the Cadbury bars I have been eyeing up for a while now, as I have always thought the prospect of a Lion bar equivalent with added peanuts and vanilla creme sounded like an attractive prospect.

The first thing that struck me when I layed hands on this bar was how it really did live up to it's name. The 60.0g bar was literally huge in size - it was a real pain to photograph getting the entire wrapper in to focus. In relation to size this was probably about the size of a Mars Duo we have here in the UK, though annoyingly this bar wasn't split in two prior to me doing the cross-section you see above. As sizable as the bar was in hand, when it came to the taste test I felt it let itself down somewhat. The outer coating of chocolate, nuts and caramel all seemed to lack the usual Cadbury charm with the chocolate especially notable for it's sweetness as opposed to Cadbury's usual differentiated creamy taste. Similarly the peanuts and caramel struggled to create much of an impression against the wafer and inner creme elements, which both themselves mustered only brown sugar noted wheaty flavour suggestions that you would get from any average wafer based option.

Overall I did feel a little letdown by the overall quality of this bar given the promise it had in concept. As I described above, none of the key five constituents really took hold of the taste to the extent I wished - the chocolate and peanuts most notably faded in to the background with the generic tasting wafer acting more as a flavour dampener rather than an enhancer. I can't deny the Mr Big is a hunger satisfying option thanks to it's size, but I wont mislead you all by saying it's the tastiest Cadbury option available.

6.8 out of 10



-----
Cadbury Cherry Ripe Cherry Roll

Cadbury Cherry Ripe Cherry Roll
Kcal 242 Fat 13.2g Fat(sats) 10.3g Carbs 28.4g
'Cherries and coconut in Old Gold dark chocolate, sprinkled with coconut'
Origin: Australia

The Cadbury Cherry Ripe Cherry Roll was yet another new product launched in Australia earlier this year and has been doing the rounds in the Southern Hemisphere. Those of you who haven't ever seen the Cherry Ripe brand before want want to familiarise yourselves with my review of the original bar (See HERE), and also the Cherry Ripe Double Dipped which was another limited edition I tried in 2009 (See HERE). Essentially this Cherry Ripe Cherry Roll looked and sounded like the original bar, just with a few cosmetic changes.

Out of it's foil wrapper this bar was immediately more welcoming than I remember the original bar being. The shredded coconut on the side caused a heck of mess when handling, but it generated some a nice coconutty scents and gave the outer chocolate an additional crispness when first bitten in to. The outer chocolate was as expected not the greatest in terms of it's cocoa richness, but for the main part it was insignificant anyway as the inner assembly of cherry and coconut took the lionshare of the taste what with it establishing it's juicy red fruit and creamy nut experience.

Overall I really enjoyed this bar and felt that in many ways it was superior to the long standing original Cherry Ripe. That said if I were an Australian or New Zealander and this had been the biggest 'new launch' from Cadbury for the year I would probably had been disappointed with it given that it was essentially the normal Cherry Ripe with some minor improvements. Much the same as I have said about the other three bars today, this is more of a 'nice to have' bar rather than one I would say you need to go out there and look for.

7.7 out of 10

June 6th: Hotel Chocolat Lemon Cheesecake

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

Last week I gave you all your first ChocolateMission Hotel Chocolat Summer collection review looking at the fantastic Hotel Chocolat Knickbocker Glory Neapolitan Truffles. In the feedback from that review I heard from plenty of readers enquiring whether I would be checking out the new slabs that have been made for 2011. Well ask and you shall receive :D (eventually haha!!). As part of my summer sampling box I was sent the Peepster Summer Collection box (See HERE) which you may have worked out is a product containing mini slabs of the new summer flavours. As you will have gathered from the post title, the first slab to get it's place in the ChocolateMission spotlight is the Lemon Cheesecake flavour.

All of the flavours in this Peepster Summer Selection came in 100.0g slabs that presented the usual Hotel Chocolat conundrum. The presentation of the single slab was gloriously appetising and unique with it's sleek pattern work, however the thickness of it made it incredibly difficult to break into smaller pieces as there were no grooves on the underside to help break it apart. This is a particular bug bare for my mother, who adores Hotel Chocolat chocolate, yet it is often frustrated by this issue. Those gripes aside all of us taking part in the taste test agreed that the chocolate smelt nice with the fragrant dairy and lemon smells enticing one and all.

On the packet this chocolate came billed as 'lemon white chocolate with cocoa cookie pieces and shots of milk chocolate' - a fair proposition for the flavour promised upfront. With full family in close proximity (surprise, surprise!!), we all set upon the 100.0g slab, breaking off mouth sized chunks (with a little difficulty haha!). After a few rounds of tasting it became apparent that this was a chocolate that had created a divide - half liked it, half thought it was 'nothing special'. Unfortunately I sat in the latter camp, and wasn't all that inspired by what I tasted. Personally, I thought that the base white chocolate didn't have the crispness or milky freshness of other Hotel Chocolat white chocolates I had tried previously. I felt the lemon influence, although real tasting in it's fruity delivery, somewhat muffled the white chocolate. Additionally, whilst I enjoyed the integration of the milk chocolate and cocoa cookie pieces to the fold texturally, when it came to the taste I thought a ginger biscuit option would have been more appropriate for the cheesecake theme. Ultimately I thought this was a chocolate not lacking in flavour, but I still didn't get the greatest amount of satisfaction from it.

Overall my description above may sound a little on the negative side, but it is really worth keeping front of mind the alternative view expressed by both my mother and father, both of whom thought this was a tremendous white chocolate. For all the reasons expressed above, I personally thought this was one of the weaker white chocolates I have tasted from them, and I think it could have executed a little better with the suggestions stated. If I had my way I might have possibly of had the score a little lower for this one, though I was told by my fellow taste testers that I was taking the high quality chocolate for granted. Putting some thought in to that I see their point to a degree, however I also see the flip side of the argument which I present to you in the form of the Eton Mess slab (See HERE)! The Eton Mess is similar in proposition (white chocolate with an added fruit!) and I think it is a far superior offering. My conclusion on the matter!??? ... Its just a case of each to their own :D

7.8 out of 10

June 4th: '7Days of Chocolate Reviews' - Edition 75 - Hotel Chocolat 'For My Daddy'

SITE UPDATE

Hi All,

It should be a hot one this weekend so I'm going to keep this update short and sweet so we can all go play in the sun :D

The reviews all seemed to go down well this week - if you haven't checked out the reviews I suggest you head to the links supplied below:

Hotel Chocolat Knickerbocker Glory Neapolitan - See HERE
William Curley House Dark 70% / White - See HERE
Cadbury Flake Allure - See HERE

The Cadbury Flake Allure certainly attracted a lot of feedback and thoughts from you all :D If you haven't had your say be sure to stop by the review and leave your thoughts.

Reviews next week will include Hotel Chocolat, Bits n Bobs and hopefully Ritter Sport after they were delayed this week! I'm off now to enjoy the sun :D I suggest you do so to after getting your ChocolateMission fill of course!!

JIM

SNACK OF THE WEEK ..... a new part of '7Days of Chocolate Reviews' which will feature any manner of snacking product I have been products munching on in the week

Get this date in the diaries! The 19th of June is Father's Day here in the UK and Hotel Chocolat have ensured I'm ready to arm all you loving and caring Sons and daughters with the finest chocolates available :D Indeed Hotel Chocolat thought it only right to send me a sample of their mini-selection box for Fathers Day this year - the Hotel Chocolat 'For My Daddy' collection. This small selection of eight chocolates is one of many Fathers Day offerings from Hotel Chocolat this year - I wont give you a full run down of what they have, but you can of course view everything they have to offer for 2011 by Clicking HERE.

As I mentioned I was given one of these 'For My Daddy' selections, which I of course had to sample myself in order to make sure it was fit for purpose for my old man :D :D The mini-selection included four different chocolates that you will recognise from previous reviews - Crispy Praline (Standard - See HERE), Orange Praline (Very Good - See HERE), Billionaire Shortbread (Superb - See HERE) and Mousse au Chocolat (Standard - See HERE). From my own perspective I thought this mixture could probably have opitmised by subsituting one of the pralines for an alcohol filled option such as the Whiskey Hot Shots, but that small build aside I thought it was a nicely presented little package that I believe will go down well with many an appreciative Father. I just wish my own old man didn't do my Hotel Chocolat photography for me - if anything he just thinks its 'run of the mill' these days :D I'm sure 99.9% of the population wont be having this problem :D Recommended!

7.2 out of 10



CHOCOLATE NEWS

Visit the ChocolateMission news page for all the latest developments in the Chocolate market ... Click the banner below ....

June 3rd: Cadbury Flake Allure

Kcal 170 Fat 10.9g Fat(sats) 6.5g Carbs 15.2g

Apologies for changing the posting order this week but with the amount of people requesting this review it made sense to fast track it to the front of line. Behold Cadbury's latest new offering - the Cadbury Flake Allure bar. For the first time in a long while the Flake brand has been given a bit of attention - it feels like forever and a day since they last put some investment behind this part of their portfolio. Since the middle of May our taste buds have salivating at the promise of 'The much loved delicate and crumbly Flake chocolate, enrobed in smooth truffle and coated in Cadbury Dairy Milk chocolate' - trade article HERE. The addition of the Dairy Milk to the usual Cadbury secondary recipe chocolate that we are all used to with the original Flake sounded like a step forward for the brand - this week I got a chance to judge for myself.

The new Cadbury Flake Allure weighs 31.5g, a touch under the standard Flake bar which comes in at 32.0g. When I saw the initial press release I was impressed by the style of the wrapper and I was even more so when I had the bar in hand. Unlike the rest of the Cadbury Flake range this new Allure bar came presented in a swish looking matted foil wrapper (the same used on the Cadbury Dairy Milk range!!). This combined with the less feminine brown design pattern work made the bar feel stylish and modern - a tick in the box for Cadbury there! Out it's wrapper, the bar emanated the usual glorious Cadbury milk chocolate smells, though I couldn't help but notice it's slimness compared to the standard Cadbury Flake.

Studying the bar closer and in greater detail a few potential issues immediately became apparent. The first glaring issue was that this Cadbury Flake Allure was just as messy to eat as any other Flake product. Despite the supposed 'coating', I created a right old mess, crumbs of chocolate everywhere :D The next most apparent thing was that the descriptor stated above and on the wrapper appeared to be quite misleading. The promised dual layered combination of 'truffle and Cadbury Dairy Milk Chocolate' appeared to be just a single half coating of milk chocolate on the underside of the bar. This wasn't a massive issue by any means but I couldn't help feel somewhat mislead by what was described to me previously. Putting this all to one side I ate the damn thing and felt somewhat better about it all :D The distinct sweet tasting, creamy Cadbury milk chocolate flavours were all offered in abundance, and the textural interplay created the by the smooth outer coating and crumbly centre portion provided a compelling mouth feel. The entire bar wasn't exactly the most fulfilling thing I have ever eaten but it performed its role as a mid-afternoon snack to a sufficient level.

Overall this is a tough one to call! Half of me wants to appreciate the great tasting chocolate and nice looking snazzy wrapper etc, however the other half of me is wanting to let loose on one big rant about how we are being cheated by Cadbury with this supposed 'new' offering. Essentially you can look at this all from two different perspectives. On one hand we have a tasty, textured milk chocolate bar that comes in an attractive new wrapper. Looking at it from the other side it could be viewed that this new Cadbury Flake Allure bar is simply just the Cadbury Flake Dipped, with half the chocolate coating, in a smaller size (39.0g vs 31.5g) and being sold at the same or higher price (RRP for the Cadbury Allure is £0.60). I don't wan't to be a cynical so-&-so but I find it extremely hard to gloss over the facts I've just pointed out. From the Cadbury perspective I understand that margins are being constricted with the cost of cocoa rising etc, however I still think is no excuse for 'window dressing' the removal of the Cadbury Flake Dipped with the replacement of this cheaper to produce alternative. The ChocolateMission score may still be relatively high, but that is a measurement solely of it's attributes and not of it's morals.

7.9 out of 10

June 1st: William Curley House White & Dark 70

Several of my UK readers have been clamouring after some more local UK chocolatiers to appear on the site, so it is with great pleasure that I bring you the ChocolateMission début of William Curley (Website HERE). Indeed over the course of the next few weeks I will be taking a look at a wide range of the William Curley collection - starting today with their House Dark 70 & their House White chocolate.

Before we launch into the taste tests let me first bring you all up to date with who and what William Curley are (credit: WIKI)

"William Curley is a UK based luxury Patissier Chocolatier with stores in both Richmond and Belgravia. The company is owned by William Curley and his wife Suzue Curley. William has won a variety of awards including ‘The Craft Guild Pastry Chef of the Year’, ‘The Caterer’s Acorn Award,’ ‘The Academy of Culinary Arts Award of Excellence’ and ‘British Dessert of the Year.’ Both William and Suzue have represented Scotland in international culinary events, winning Gold medals in Chicago and Basle, and at the Culinary Olympics in Germany in 2004. In 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2011 William Curley was named ‘Best British Chocolatier."

Those are all some pretty incredible achievements for such a young company/couple. Suffice to say expectations were sky high when they offered me the chance of a samples from their current collection.

As I alluded to above, today I will be showcasing their House White & House Dark 70 chocolates. Both bars came in a smallish 50.0g size and in some of the most beautiful packaging I have seen for a long time. Those of an eco-friendly disposition may want to divert their attention elsewhere for a minute, however I really must stress the beauty of the design work on the outer boxes - it made them look highly premium and only further fueled my excitement.

William Curley House White

We all know that white chocolate isn't my chocolate type of preference so I roped in a few fellow taste testers to help sample this with me. Aesthetically the bar looked terrific and I loved the way it broke with a definitive fresh snap and it's pleasant vanilla scents.

Buoyed by the promising signs being displayed by all alluded to before, its unfortunate for me to have to report that the taste test ultimately felt like a let down. Although far from being the horrible sugary messes that we get from most mass produced white chocolate nowadays, this white chocolate could be best described as lacking character. All three of us that tried the bar were surprised at the lack of flavour generated by the soft melt, and I think all round we were expecting a far stronger tasting chocolate. To say it was tasteless would be a massive over reaction, however the cream and vanilla tones on offer were terribly mild and for me not all that satisfying.

7.3 out of 10



William Curley House Dark 70

Back in my more comfortable area of dark chocolate I made sure I tried this one in what I deem my perfect dark chocolate tasting settings - mid afternoon with a freshly brewed black filter coffee.

Just like the white chocolate, this House Dark 70 broke with a terrific fresh snap and emanated some appetising cocoa scents that raised my expectations once again. Well what can I say about this dark chocolate!? ... I was almost tempted to cut and paste a few of the lines from the above white chocolate perspective. Indeed, unfortunately this was another chocolate lacking the desired flavour depth I was hoping for. The dark chocolate on offer here finished as it began - with little flavour development from the initial unsweetened mild cocoa flavours. Like the bar above a mild hint of vanilla was detectable in the finish of the melt, though that aside the layering of flavours was pretty limited. This bars stronger overall taste made it a more satisfying option than the white chocolate, however in the context of other higher end chocolates it did lack presence.

7.6 out of 10



Overall my first experiences with the William Curley range have to be described as somewhat underwhelming. With my expectations fueled by the historical awards, glorious packaging and recommendations from other bloggers, I guess these chocolates were facing a tough task from the outset in order to match up. Even when looking upon them from the generous point of view that they were better than OK standard chocolates, I still cannot hide my disappoint that I didn't think these were a little more special. Luckily for me these two are only the first few chocolates sent from William Curley so there is still plenty of opportunity for them to WOW me.

May 30th: Hotel Chocolat Knickerbocker Glory Neapolitan

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

One would naturally assume that the summer season would the quietest for the chocolate market given there are no holidays where chocolate is naturally gifted (Christmas/Easter etc!). Summer 2011 however is proving as hectic for me as ever, with the like of Thorntons, Ritter Sport and of course Hotel Chocolat all releasing some of their biggest summer ranges ever. Over the course of the next few weeks I will be taking you through a pretty extensive run through of Hotel Chocolat's summer line up - starting today with these Hotel Chocolat Knickerbocker Glory Neapolitan truffles. FYI, you can see all that they have to offer HERE - if you have any review requests please don't hesitate to get in contact.

These Knickerbocker Glory chocolates are just one of the new truffle ranges for 2011 and today I (along with a few helpers!!) had the delight of trying the Neapolitan flavour. The 110.0g package contained ten individual truffles, which came described as 'strawberry ganache in milk and white chocolate, decorated with white chocolate'. In a few reviews recently I have remarked that the standard of some Hotel Chocolat ranges might be slipping. This was not such the case here, and I would say this Knickerbocker range demonstrates a fine return to form. Hopefully from my photos above you can see just how much effort they have put into the outer cardboard sleeve. In my opinion the design work is fantastic and I think it finely communicates the summer feel good spirit as well as the correct Neapolitan flavour theme.


Taking the truffles out of the inner transparent packet, I was met with a chocolatey set of scents that offered just a minor hint of sweet strawberry. Up until this point the truffles looked like a lot of other Hotel Chocolat individual truffles I had tasted before, however biting in to one soon revealed that they were truly beautifully crafted. Again I hope you can see by my photo above that each chocolate had three very distinct layers - a milk chocolate outer shell, a white chocolate ganache inner ring and then a strawberry flavoured ganache centre. This three layer craftsmanship made for a fantastic flavour and textural journey with the starter milk chocolate outer portion creating a familiar creamy cocoa taste with it's fresh snapping yield. Next to the party the white chocolate creme provided a softer feeling, milkier taste that led beautifully into the strawberry centres. Despite the ganache fillings disappearing rapidly with their butter like mouth feel melt, they left a glorious impression of real tasting red fruit flavours in the mouth for a long time after. Suffice to say these were loved by all that tried them.

Overall these Hotel Chocolat Knickerbocker Glory Neapolitan truffles have got the summer 2011Hotel Chocolat reviews off to a cracking start and they deserve some serious praise. You can never go far wrong with Hotel Chocolat truffles of any sort whether they be praline, caramels or liqueur, but fruit flavoured ganache ones seem to really be where their talents lie. Personally I don't think there are many brands out there that can be said to be so consistent with the quality of their fruit truffles. I don't know how they do it, but they manage to always create the fruit flavourings without making them too sweet or artificial - these strawberry truffles were as good as any in terms of how real tasting the fruit came through in the taste. If you then factor in the quality of the other milk and white chocolate layers I'm sure you can all start to imagine just how good these really were. ChocolateMission recommended!? You bet ya!!

8.7 out of 10

May 28th: '7Days of Chocolate Reviews' - Edition 74 - Suntory Sparkling Chocolate Soda

SITE UPDATE

Hi All,

So another week passes on ChocolateMission and I hope you lot were pleased with the reviews you got this week.

Following on from the packages I got from Hotel Chocolat etc the week previous, I this week managed to lay my hands on some goodies from Ritter Sport, American Soda and Thorntons. I don't want to spoil the review, but the Thorntons Liqueur chocolate provided a rather humorous evening ... that stuff is way, way to easy to drink :D :D

Apart from celebrating Manchester United's 19th Premier League title (sorry I had to drop that in there!!) it has been a relatively quiet week for me. Good luck to the United lads versus Barcelona tomorrow - lets hope we are toasting victory with pints of Thorntons Liqueur chocolate (the thought of that makes me feel queasy haha).

Want to know what to expect for this Bank Holiday week? Well Monday will see the return of Hotel Chocolat, Wednesday will see the ChocolateMission debut of a well known UK chocolatier, and lastly Friday you should be getting my low down on the latest Ritter Sport offering.

Have a top Bank Holiday weekend - Please take a look over to the newspage for the latest Chocolate covered news :D

JIM

SNACK OF THE WEEK ..... a new part of '7Days of Chocolate Reviews' which will feature any manner of snacking product I have been products munching on in the weekKcal 49 Fat 0.0g (per 100ml)

Well isn't this all a bit clever eh!? I've flipped the tables on yesterdays drink flavoured chocolates, with the 'Snack of the Week - a chocolate flavoured drink :D A stroke of genius come on :D Taking the limelight in '7Days of Chocolate Reviews' Edition 74 I present to you the Suntory Sparkling Chocolate Soda.

A few days ago I gratefully received 6 bottles from my pal Peter at J-list who insisted I try out these 'cool new sodas' that he was selling on the site. Now we all know I normally don't review drinks, however I sort of broke those rules with my Hot Chocolate reviews earlier in the year. After a short duration in the fridge I cracked open one of these and poured the contents into a glass as pictured above. I don't like my fizzy drinks too highly carbonated - this Suntory offering was just about right and I was pleased with the level of fizz. Taste wise the drink had a strong vanilla led flavour set (very much like cream soda), however there was definitely a suggestion of chocolateyness left in the mouth once it had slipped down.

Overall it was a unique tasting soda that was on the whole enjoyable and thirst quenching. Would it replace my normal choice of fizzy drink? ... the almighty Pepsi Max? Probably not, but I would see it as a more than viable option if I did fancy something a little different.

7.2 out of 10

CHOCOLATE NEWS

Visit the ChocolateMission news page for all the latest developments in the Chocolate market ... Click the banner below ....

May 27th: Kit Kat Lemonade & Cola

Kcal 100 Fat 5.8g Carbs 11.3g (per 18.0g Kit Kat)

The hot summer time in Japan is coming about again soon so if you are thinking of putting in a J-list order soon I would get on it rather sharpish. In an attempt to remind you all of the crazy confections they have going on over there, my pal Peter @J-List has sent along another batch of goodies for me to review on the site. I almost take it as a given these days, that when I receive any package from these guys, there will no doubt be the latest flavour Kit Kat somewhere amongst it - I wasn't wrong! The flavour (or flavours I should say!)on offer this time was this double pack of Lemonade & Cola. This was a limited edition released a few months ago, and was the first dual flavoured Japanese Kit Kat package I had come across.

The total pack was divided into two separate two-finger bars that each weighed 18.0g each (your standard two-finger supermarket Kit Kat size!!). Both variants came presented in a rather groovy looking box that did a highly efficient job of indicating the Lemonade & Cola flavour with it's bright branding and use of on-pack pictures. Inside the bars were easily identifiable by the colour of their foil wrappers - Lemon of course the yellow one, and the cola unsurprisingly the red. Opening both up it soon became apparent that these were not going to be the Kit Kats notable for their 'real' or true tasting credentials - they smelt particularly sweet with strong suggestions of both lemon and cola.
Taking my least favoured flavour first I initially started with the Lemonade flavour, though it was long before I was experimenting trying little bits of each at the same time :D The reason I have chosen not to rate these flavours individually is because they would have been given the same scores each, as they delivered exactly the same sort of flavour experience. Both bars had a grounding of milky sweetness from the outer white chocolate, which I thought worked well for each variant. In both bars, the wafer in the middle of each bar acted as a nice savoury counter-balance to the very overt kiddie sweet like flavourings of both the cola and lemonade. Indeed, both the lemonade and cola influences were very reminiscent of other sweets - the cola bottles from Haribo Starmix and Bassetts Lemon Sherbets should give you some sort of idea what the flavour delivery was like. As you can imagine the delivery of the flavours in this manner was highly sugar based, so I can see how a four finger version of one of these flavours might have proven to be very monotonous and sickly. The idea of having two different flavoured smaller bars proved to be a good one - there was just about enough differentiation between the two to keep my tastebuds from being affected from the cola/sugar and lemonade/sugar overload, and I ultimately enjoyed the whole experience.

Overall I think this is going to be one of those flavours of Kit Kat that really splits opinion. Being someone that loved sweets like Haribo when I was younger I found these to be a nice little nostalgia kick and I enjoyed the cola bottle and lemon sherbet like experiences dished out by both the different bars. I wouldn't say these were flavours you would like to eat everyday, far from it, but as a one-off occurrence I was more than happy with what these bars delivered. Some will think that both the cola and lemonade influences are very artificial tasting, and I wouldn't dare argue with them as they are certainly right in that respect. If expectations are suitably set at enjoying the kids sweets like experience though, I see little reason why these wouldn't be Kit Kats you would really enjoy. Like so many of the Japanese products these were a real pleasure to try if only for the experience rather than any grandioso taste pleasure.

8.2 out of 10