One of the things I like best about Thorntons is that they just ‘get’ social media. Even if we don’t give them an overly positive review on a particular product, they keep talking to us (and other bloggers). They listen to feedback, take criticism in a constructive manner, and are always willing to meet and interact in person.
So it was that I and three other food bloggers got invited up to the Thorntons factory in Derbyshire yesterday. In the morning, we had a full factory tour. This was followed by a delicious pub lunch with Thorntons’ master chocolatier Keith Hurdman and marketing director Peter Wright. After lunch, we spent some time with Keith in his development kitchen, tasting some incredibly exciting chocolate he has in development, including some wonderful new blocks and a range to celebrate Thorntons centenary next year.
Most interesting for me was the fact that they are considering a limited edition block of chocolate as it would have been 100 years ago. A coarsely ground, crumbly bar not unlike the DeAngelis modican chocolate we tasted last year. There is apparently still some debate as to whether this will make it to the shelves, but I would love to see it on sale. Not just as a piece of history, but because it was an exciting chocolate with a texture that I think people will love.
There’s so much else that I could talk about, but I wouldn’t know where to start and I think the video and pictures say more anyway. Suffice to say, the thing that makes Thorntons special for me isn’t the fabulous machines dripping with melted chocolate, it’s the people. Everyone we spoke to were friendly, helpful and happy, despite the fact we were clearly getting in the way at times.
So thank you to everyone at Thorntons for an interesting, informative and fun day out. We’re coming back next week, right..?
Every so often when chocolate shopping, I go nuts. I just get caught up in the moment and pick up all kinds of bars that I wouldn’t normally try but for some reason I convince myself that it would be the perfect complement to the rest of the chocolate I’ve selected. Such was the case with this bar of Porta Waldfrucht, helpfully translated as Forest Fruit flavoured although I had figured out the gist of it all.
The local shop seems to have gone German chocolate crazy, and I was on a bit of a fruit kick, so that’s why milk chocolate with a forest fruit filling jumped out at me. I suspected it was going to be very similar to Lindt’s fruity bars which have been reviewed before but with a slight twist on the flavour. From the front of the pack, it looked like Forest Fruits consisted of a mix of strawberry, raspberry, blackberry and blueberry flavour, but the ingredients listed were a bit more vague and that was reflected in the nondescript colour of the filling which definitely didn’t mirror any of the fruits.
It definitely did have a generic berry taste, but nothing that mirrored all that lovely fruit pictured on the wrapper. Plus it was exceptionally sweet to the point that was hard to eat more than a couple of squares. Rather peculiarly, the alcohol in the filling really didn’t come into play for some reason, maybe because of the sugar or the fact that the centre was creamier than it needed to be. That meant no literal flavour explosion when biting into a square and none of that crunchy, sugary goodness left behind at the end like in the Lindt bars. Coupled with some unremarkable milk chocolate and this isn’t very good at all.
So my impulse buy turned out to be a bland, unmemorable bar, the remainder of which will be saved for one of the desperate times when I run out of everything else or need an excessive amount of sugar in a short period of time.
I have been fortunate enough to have received this little bag of delights (well, not so little actually – the bag will make an excellent picnic hamper, thank you very much) and over the coming week or two I shall be delivering my (and other people’s) verdict on the products contained therein.
Today I am looking at these.
These Millionaire’s Flapjacks are made with jumbo oats, caramel and Gü’s quite respectably chocolatey 36% cocoa milk chocolate. The packagng blurb says “So simple and so good, we’re surprised no-one’s tried it before” and I tend to agree. These aren’t terribly complicated little bites but they are one of those things that keep drawing you back for one more.
As I had been gifted a couple of boxes I decided it would be fun to take them with me to the offices of a company I was visiting for some training to see what a cross section of people there thought of them. I offered them round and asked people’s opinions on appearance, texture, flavour, sweetness and the obvious final question – would you buy them?
Appearance wise, I had responses ranging from ‘OK’ to ‘a little firm’ but opinion was generally positive. Personally I think they look just like they do on the box, and yes they’re firm because if they weren’t they’d never survive being transported anywhere. Texture wise, I think the jumbo oats caught a few people unawares. I know when I had my first bite I was a little surprised, probably because I half expected a shortbread base for some reason. The oats are big, and once you start chewing one of these the base quickly breaks up, so the mouthfeel is dominated by them a little.
Flavour wise, almost everyone said they could distinguish all of the ingredients, and that the balance of flavours was good. The flapjack base uses salted butter and it’s possible to pick up a hint of saltiness in there, but it’s the sweet, gooey caramel that tends to dominate when you start to chew. The chocolate coating is quite generous, and seems to do the job of keeping the flapjacks together. It’s not too sweet (and doesn’t need to be with the caramel there) and works very well with the other elements. Personally I found them a little too sweet, and while the sweeter-toothed among the office workers loved them, I did et a couple of comments to the effect that ‘one or two is enough’, but bear in mind that these aren’t meant to be devoured in one sitting. They have a decent shelf life, and the tub is re-sealable for a reason you know!
The last (and probably most important) question was ‘would you buy them?’ and my test subjects were unanimous, although the obvious ‘How much are they then?’ was thrown my way.
I quite like these flapjacks. They’re marketed as a mid-afternoon tea break snack – that little extra sugar boost to beat the four o’clock slump. Bigger than a biscuit and made with good quality ingredients, I think if enough people try them Gü could find themselves onto a winner here.
Mothers Day is one of those holidays that it’s all too easy to forget. And if you have forgotten, then you’d better get your skates on because it’s this Sunday! Luckily, we’re here to remind you with the help of this little selection from Liverpool’s Chocolate Cellar.
What we have is a hessian tray with a large “Happy Mothers Day” milk chocolate bar and some dark, milk and white mini chocolate buttons, a small assortment box, a milk chocolate shoe and a dark chocolate… handbag, I think!
Oh – and a little book of Quotations for Chocolate Lovers – “There is no love more sincere than the love of chocolate”. Quite.
Unfortunately, that little book also contains less flattering quotations like “Destiny shapes our ends, calories shape our middles” and “Some people grow up and spread cheer. Chocoholics just grow up and spread”.
I’m not sure why a chocolate company would send me (or anyone) that. It’s not really the kind of thing I’d want to read along with my gift of chocolate. And unfortunately, it’s representative of this little selection as a whole. First impressions are favourable, but things go down hill a bit when you look beneath the surface.
As this is intended as a Mothers Day gift, I wanted a female opinion of this little selection, so I took them over to our friend Jennifer Earle to get her impressions. Jen runs London’s Chocolate Ecstasy Tours and definitely knows her chocolate.
Her first impressions were similar to mine. They’re pretty enough if you’re going for the home-made look, but they’re more arts-and-crafts than artisan. Nothing wrong with that though.
We then started tasting and were immediately disappointed. The chocolate was universally too sweet and lacked any real flavour. That wasn’t as much of a problem for the milk and white chocolate, but the dark chocolate pieces tasted of nothing much at all.
The little box of six assorted chocs looked rather appealing, but again, the chocolate lacked any real flavour the shells were too thick. Neither of us were fond of any of the overly sweet fillings either. There was a nice pecan filling, but the rest tasted a little artificial. Unfortunately, we had no way of confirming that as there were no ingredients listed anywhere, but that could just have been our review samples.
So as chocolate lovers, we were both a little disappointed by this selection. The average mum who doesn’t eat chocolate every day might not notice some of the shortcomings, but that doesn’t change the fact that there are higher quality alternatives available on most High Streets. I know The Chocolate Cellar can do much better than this.
