Walmart is filled with controversy, yet despite their questionability, they do have an impressive chocolate selection these days. The usual averages are there, but so are some nicer brands. I’d never heard of Hageland, a Belgian company, before; the five or so bars on the shelf looked worth giving a try. I came away with just the first one to get my attention.
It was all about the picture — not your usual chocolate cover. I wish they said something about it, though. Did they just think it looked cool? Or is it an artifact from Costa Rica, where the trinitario cacao is from? Anyway, for a first try, 71% is a good place to start. The Rainforest Alliance stamp implies that Hageland is a serious company. As does the no-junk ingredients list of cocoa mass, sugar, cocoa butter, and vanilla.
I found myself intently studying the design of the bar itself once I’d ripped off its coverings. The eight large, Lindt-sized squares have raised edges on the top and bottom, with the face in the middle lifted to a gentle curve. It makes the chocolate look elegant and strong at the same time. The aroma is filled with deep cocoa.
The flavor is a bit bitter, but tempered with plenty of cocoa notes. The spice is even held down by some shy sweetness hiding in the dark. It has a good mouthfeel, as well. I’m rather liking it. I can’t decided whether I should call it “simple” or “bold,” so turning to the back of the box, part of the description calls it a “delightfully traditional smooth dark chocolate.” “Traditional” encapsulates it. The simplicity comes from going for a chocolate format that works, while the boldness comes from the enjoyable flavors. Traditional, not average.
It’s certainly nice to find something like this in a place like Walmart, where you can actually find it without going out of your way. This bar seems like it’ll appeal to a variety of dark chocolate lovers. I don’t know what the “limited selection” on the front means, though; maybe you’ll need to hurry if you want to try it.
Another Christmassy offering from Waitrose here – a sibling to the rather yummy truffle boules I reviewed recently. This 100g box is the same size and shape as its sibling, but somehow not quite as pretty.
The same goes for the contents. Inside are 12 rather dull looking caramel chocolates wrapped in equally dull plastic.
Unfortunately, that dullness carries through to the caramels themselves. The 31% milk chocolate coating is bland and barely even tastes of chocolate. There’s no vegetable fat in the chocolate, but it’s mainly sugar, and that’s exactly what it tastes like.
The caramels themselves aren’t much better. They’re hard and chewy and very like the jaw-breaking caramels you get in a Quality Street tin. The flavour is passable, but there’s a slightly odd plasticy aftertaste that I can’t quite put my finger on. It’s certainly not what I would call ‘Waitrose quality’.
According to the ingredients, they’re made from glucose syrup, sugar, condensed milk, butter and vegetable fat, emulsifier, fatty acids and salt. That’s an awful lot of ingredients for some very average caramels.
These are a world apart from the kinds of caramels you’d find in any decent chocolate shop, and I’m a little baffled how they ended up on the shelves of an upmarket supermarket like Waitrose. One to avoid.
We’ve had a few incidences of exploding chocolate recently. What with Gorvett & Stone’s Exploding Frogs and Galler’s Volcaniques, we seem to have been experiencing a fair bit of fizz and pop. No surprises then that Terry’s have come up with a Chocolate Orange with popping candy.
Chocolate Orange has been around forever (since the 1930’s apparently), and you can’t argue with that sort of longevity. Over time we’ve seen it turn Dark, White and now it explodes.
As someone who remembers the original ‘Just tap it, unwrap it, and share a little luxury’ tagline, I was amused to read the new instruction. No more gentle rapping on the table (for twenty minutes). No, Terry’s acknowledge that the Chocolate Orange is a bugger to get into. ‘Father, fetch the cricket bat.’ – or indeed ‘Dawn French, get the roling pin’.
As for the chocolate itself, it’s what you’d expect. 25% cocoa, sweet, run of the mill milk chocolate as beloved by millions of Britons. It tastes like most of the popular milk chocolate brands, probably because they’re all trying to emulate Cadbury’s for milk/sugar/cocoa balance (more than likely in that order). The popping candy is also quite sweet, but does have the promised natural flavours, being made of orange and sugar. If you like your chocolate sweet and, well, sweeter, then look no further.
Chocolate Oranges must sell in their squillions. They used to be around at Christmastime, but now they’re just ‘there’. Adding popping candy to the chocolate will just mean they sell more Chocolate Oranges. I’m sure quite a few people reading this LOVE Chocolate Orange, and who am I to argue with that? All I can say is that there is such a lot of much better chocolate out there now that I for one begin to question the point of this sort of chocolate. Most kids and a lot of adults would disagree.
I tasted two pieces and gave the rest away. Enough said.
Please welcome guest Chocablogger Sian Meades from the incredibly awesome DomesticSluttery.com with something a little…. weird…
I get giddy with excitement when I discover new chocolate. It’s like a fabulous little secret. It could be the best chocolate you’ve ever tried in your life. Unfortunately, when I got some samples of Feeding Your Imagination at a press event, I wasn’t excited any more. I was just very disappointed.
I’m a firm believer that when it comes to sweet treats, taste should always come first. But this chocolate is a bit like a herbal medicine lesson. And that might be a good thing, but that’s not why I buy chocolate. I don’t want to be walking around my local supermarket and buy something because it has a “healthy balance of Yin and Yang”. I just want something sweet and yummy. I honestly don’t care if you’ve thought about “natures elements of thought, passion, enthusiasm and emotion.”
Because Feeding Your Imagination chocolate doesn’t taste very nice.
There are so many flavours going on at the same time, that I can’t keep up. I’m all for unusual flavours in chocolate. Green tea works exceptionally well, and chilli chocolate is a genius invention. But they don’t need another flavour alongside them. They work on their own. So the ‘Seductive’ bar (why do the bars all have such stupid gimmicky names?) with its ginger, green tea and goji berries just doesn’t work. Because you can’t taste anything but a great big mash up of flavours. Their Yang bar has treats such as Ashwagandha, Gokshura & Kapikachu in. I wish I knew what they were so I could decide if the flavours went together. But as they tasted the same as the other flavours I tried, I doubt it. A little bit spicy, a little bit sour and nothing distinctive going on. It’s a shame, because the chocolate itself appears to be good quality and had a lovely shine to it. It would taste pretty good if they hadn’t messed it up so royally.
It’s not the worst chocolate I’ve ever had. But it’s just really rather pointless. Gimmicks are great if you’ve got a good product. But considering Feeding Your Imagination’s RRP is an astonishing £3.99 for a 100g bar, I certainly won’t be buying.
