We like Maltesers. The inner crunchy comb has this yummy malt flavour that goes so well with chocolate. We spotted new Maltesers Gold and had to try them. Caramel white chocolate doesn't usually trump milk or dark chocolate for us.... but this is the exception!
The caramelly flavours are just so yum with that Malterser centre. The family demolished these pretty fast.
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We have a new addiction: Griffins Flat White Toffee Pops This toffee pop is a collaboration with L'affare Coffee, (one of Joni's favourite coffee brands).
You can taste the caramel toffee flavour, combined with espresso coffee flavours and biscuit, and then topped off with the sweet white chocolate. YUMMO!! 12 in a pack.... well I think there is. Hard to tell when there is only 2 left. 200g. Chocolate, oat milk, and coffee, all the things we like. Wellington Chocolate Factory's Oat Flat White has 40% cocoa, oat milk powder and coffee from Havana Coffee. This chocolate felt like a winter warmer. Milky chocolate with oat flavours, vanilla and coffee, sweetness and it was all smooth and creamy. This was nice. A little too sweet for Joni, but Johanan liked it a lot.
Flint Chocolate have brought out a new flavour, Sans Abracadabra, so it was a great excuse to buy this and 2 more bars we hadn't tried. SANS ABRACADABRA This bar is a collobaration with Sans (Ceuticals), who do skin and hair care. The bar is 70% cacao, sweetened with coconut sugar and has Himalayan Pink Salt and Tremella Mushroom. Tremella Mushrooms look like a frilly ball, and is said to have beauty, hydrating and rejuvinating skin benefits. It has a strong dark chocolate taste. We liked the salt with it. The flavour notes were like an ashy wood and vanilla. We liked it. DOMINICAN DARK 70% cacao from Oko Caribe in Dominican Republic, stone ground. Sweetened with coconut sugar. This is smooth with a dark tang. There is a slight smokiness to it and plum notes. We are describing it as plum tree branches on a campfire with a bit of moss. CASHEW AND COCONUT 55% with cacao beans from Oko Caribe, Dominican Republic. Sweetened with coconut sugar. The ingredients also state coconut chips and organic cashews, all stone ground together. This was really smooth. There was raisin flavours and a hint of coconut. We also picked up a faint nut taste. This bar was really yummy and was our favourite of the 3. FINAL THOUGHTS
We liked all three of these. We love the smoothness of Flint chocolate. It makes it a really enjoyable bite. Looking for some new chocolate makers to try in New Zealand, we spotted Lake Hayes Chocolate amongst the medal winners in the NZ chocolate awards. Lake Hayes is based in Queenstown. Their 'Truth' bar was a bronze medal winner. We bought the Truth bar and 2 other inclusion bars. TRUTH - 66% Unadulterated dark, organic, single origin chocolate. We couldn't find where the single origin cocoa came from, but they do state it is ethically sourced. There is a sweet vanilla taste to this chocolate. There is also notes of raisin and red berries, a bit like a chocolate fruit pudding. The texture is what we really liked with this. It is a really firm break, but has this really lovely melt in mouth. This is nice. BUZZ - the bee's offering The same Truth 66% dark chocolate with manuka honey brittle. There is not a lot of brittle, but what you get tastes nice with its honey flavours. The honey goes nice with this berry like chocolate. This was Johanan's favourite. GEMSTONE - ruby and emerald The Truth 66% dark chocolate with cranberries and pistachio. Again there is not a lot of the cranberries and pistachios, but the cranberries really go nicely with the dark chocolate. The cranberries enhance the berry notes in the chocolate even more. This was Joni's favourite.
FINAL THOUGHTS These bars were nice. The inclusion ingredients were just a scattering, but the flavours work really well with the dark chocolate. The texture and melt is what we will remember most about this chocolate. We decided to start our new year of chocolate tasting trying out some international craft chocolate. We bought this stash from The Chocolate Bar NZ. We started with a remembered favourite brand Cuvee chocolate. CUVEE CHOCOLATE YULETIDE Cuvee Chocolate is made in Australia. This is their christmas season bar. It is 42% Milk Chocolate encasing a fruit mixture of wild cherry, candied orange, raisin and spiced brandy. We love the Cuvee packaging. It is very deluxe looking. The aroma of the brandy is the first scent when you open the packaging. The chocolate taste is first off the orange, then the cherry followed by a light hit of brandy. The chocolate is there as a background flavour and it lingers on after eating. This bar was pleasant. Johanan is not so much of a fan of fruit and chocolate, and their could have been a bit of a stronger brandy taste for Joni. Next we went to Suffolk England with, PUMP ST CHOCOLATE CROISSANT BAR This is a 62% Dark chocolate with beans from Ecuador, and croissant bits mixed through. This had a sultana fragrance and reminded us of eating a chocolate sultana bread. The croissant bits were crunchy and a nice texture. There wasn't a strong chocolate taste, but it blended in nicely with the croissant. We liked it. We then took a trip to Austria with a chocolate bar made by Zotter. ZOTTER LABOOKO NICARAGUA 50% MILK CHOCOLATE The twin bar packaging was perfect for us. We also love our dark milks. The fragrance is like a hot cocoa drink and tasted like it too. This bar reminded us of hot chocolate with cocoa, cream and sugar with a raisin biscuit dunked in. Really nice. This was one of our favourites from this stash. Back over to the United Kingdom, we next tried, CHOCOLARDER KUAPA KOKOO ASOKWA, GHANA 65% Another dark milk chocolate with a 65% cacao content. We liked trying to pronounce the cacao beans origin, Kuapa Kokoo. This was sweet, with notes of vanilla and wood, almost a sandalwood flavour note. The chocolate flavours were quite mild which surprised us with the dark colouring of the chocolate. The Chocolarder Frankincense and Myrhh is still our favourite from them. Our next trip was to Iceland with chocolate maker OmNom and their Milk Cookies bar. Our experience with cookies and cream chocolates, have been crushed up biscuits mixed in with the chocolate, so we laughed when we saw two whole cookies on top of the chocolate. This was 42% milk chocolate with beans from Madagascar. The cookies were spiced almond and oat. It had a fragrance of cloves and bikkies. The first taste is the spicey biscuits and then you can taste the milk chocolate after. This was yummy in flavour and texture. This was another favourite. Another trip to the United Kingdom with Firetree and their, FIRETREE INNOVATIONS OAT MILK BAR This has single origin beans from the Solomon Islands with a 55% content. This has a nice yummy looking red brown colour. You can taste the chocolate and the oat milk as well. This is a firm, not creamy chocolate. It was a little too sweet for us, but we did like how you could taste both flavours. Then we went to Vietnam with TBROS SOCOLA TRA SUA OLONG, OOLONG TEA MILK CHOCOLATE This was a dark milk, 40%, with 6% Oolong tea. You can smell the tea and chocolate when you open the wrapping. The taste is a mild tea with a slight wood, fruitiness to it. It is slightly gluggy, but smooth. The chocolate is like a foundation flavour that is there to highlight the tea flavours. It was a nicely blended flavour combination which we really enjoyed. This was another favourite. Our last stop was in Brooklyn, New York, with RAAKA MAPLE AND NIBS 75% The beans from this bar are from Semuliki Forest, Uganda and are unroasted. The bar is sweetened with organic maple sugar.
It looks really yummy with dark shiny chocolate and crunchy nibs on the back. It has a fragrance of a chocolate pudding with raisins. The chocolate has flavour notes of slightly sour dried apricots, fermented plums and cream. There is a nice amount of sweetness with a firm texture and a crunch from the nibs. A really flavoursome chocolate that was a surprise for us with unroasted beans. We really liked this one, another favourite from the selection. FINAL THOUGHTS A fun international tasting journey. Our favourties from this selection were: 1st: Zotter Labooko Nicaragua 50% Milk Chocolate 2nd: TBros Oolong Tea 40% Milk Chocolate 3rd: OnNom Milk Cookies 4th: Raaka Maple and Nibs 75% Dark Chocolate We can't help ourselves. Popping into Capers Cafe in Rotorua, to buy a wedding present, their craft chocolate selection is always a distraction. This time as a quick pick me up instead of buying coffee to go, we bought a cute little 20g chocolate espresso bar made by Bennetts of Mangawhai.
100% Colombian coffee beans from Rush Coffee with 55% Dark Chocolate. This was yummy and a great size for a quick chocolate coffee fix. A new limited edition Whittakers block hit the supermarket shelves this week. Blondie and Biscuit. 24% Cocoa, Caramilised White Chocolate with Cocoa Biscuits. The look is nice. Good sized biscuit bits, nice texture. The caramilised white chocolate is slighty smokey, sweet and quite milky in flavour. We can't taste the chocolate biscuit.
We weren't huge fans of the original blondie, and I think we like this less. It was very milky and bland overall, and the biscuit seems to a texture element, rather than a taste. We really love the chocolate from Lucid Chocolatier, so we are determined to try each type of bar he has made. The two we bought this time are 2 fruit bars, Mulberry Lait and Yuzu Noir. MULBERRY LAIT 54% Milk Chocolate from the Piura White bean of Peru. Mulberry looks like a long boysenberry or blackberry as a fruit. This has strong chocolate flavours for a milk chocolate. It goes with a sweetness and tanginess you get from the berries. I nice blend where you get a good hit of everything with a hint of cream. YUZU NOIR 70% Dark with Yuzu Confit. Piura White cacao bean from Peru. Yuzu is a citrus fruit that looks like a lemon coloured tangerine. This was a pleasant surprise for us. We are not overly keen on citrus and chocolate, but if we hadn't read the ingredients, I'm not sure we would have picked up citrus notes. We got flavour notes of dried figs, earth and coffee. This chocolate was strong and dark in flavour that lingered in the aftertaste. We liked it.
FINAL THOUGHTS Even though these were chocolate bars with fruit inclusions, the chocolate was still the strong prominent flavour of these bars which we liked. The Mulberry bar, even though it was a milk chocolate was like eating a good dark chocolate with a hint of cream. We are still enjoying Lucid Chocolatier chocolate very much. Solomon Gold is based in Mt Maunganuit , New Zealand and produce chocolate bars from single origin cacao beans from the Solomon Islands. Their bars are ethical, vegan and organic. We love Dark Milk chocolate, so when we saw they had vegan versions, we had to try. The milk ingredient in these bars is organic coconut milk powder. DARK MYLK 45% The chocolate is lovely and smooth. It is tangy and coconut is the prominent flavour, followed by the chocolate. This is more on the dark side than milky. It is a pleasant bar. DARK MYLK ORANGE 45% This chocolate is flavoured with orange oil. It is smooth also and quite sweet. The orange is the prominent flavour and even covers the coconut milk flavour. Mild chocolate flavours come through, but it mostly orange. We are not a huge fan of citrus oil flavoured chocolate, so this was our least favourite. DARK MYLK BERRY 45% This chocolate is flavoured with natural raspberry. This is smooth as well. You can taste the raspberry, which really enhances the fruitiness flavour notes of the chocolate. Alongside the coconut milk, the raspberry made this bar taste like a raspberry lamington. This was nice. DARK MYLK CARAMEL 45% This is flavoured with natural caramel flavour. The coconut milk alongside the caramel flavour makes a slightly smokey butterscotch flavour which is very nice. This was our favourite of the Dark Mylks. SMOOTH DARK 70% As well as their Dark Mylks, we also bought their Smooth Dark 70% which is also vegan and organic.
It is also cane sugar free and uses coconut sap sugar instead. The chocolate is smooth yet snappy. There is flavour notes of sweet mollasses and a smokiness and tanginess. It is a nice flavour note combo, with none overpowering the other. FINAL THOUGHTS Solomon Gold chocolate is so smooth! We really liked the texture of all the chocolate. The Dark Mylks are nice, being on the darker side in flavour. The Smooth Dark 70% is our new single origin favourite from the Solomon Islands. |
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