Another of London’s masters of chocolate, William Curley works over in Richmond rather than North London, and has been garnering many a plaudit for his chocolates for some time now.
Last year I investigated a couple of his products, but I also wanted to try some of his prize winning chocolates, so I bought a handful to see what all the fuss was about.
The first one I sampled was the Thyme & Scottish Heather Honey, and the moment my teeth cracked the dark Toscano chocolate shell I found myself breathing in the sweet smell of the honey.
The centre continued to deliver that rich sweetness in combination with the buttery cocoa flavours to the very last, leaving a lingering hint of the honey on my palate. Delightful.
Next up was a Caramel. Simple as that – a salted caramel cup.
Although after Dom’s Caramello review I was a little wary about the corn symbol on the top!
Here’s where the chocolate started to really shine. The thicker chocolate base allows one to experience the lush, sweet, burnt sugar flavours of the caramel before hitting you with a grand finale of huge wafts of dark, citrussy cocoa. as Deanna might say, the finish was a deep, dark reddy flavour, earthy, rich and very enjoyable indeed. The two flavours continued to do a little pas de deux in my mouth for a while after the chocolate had physically gone, and it was lovely.
My final choice had to be William’s multi-award winning Chuao chocolate.
This little beauty has garnered a multitude of plaudits from chocolate tasters all over the world, so I knew I was in for a treat, and what a treat it was.
Made using Venezuelan cocoa, Chuao is the name of a village in the region (now reportedly being dveloped into a tourist attraction) and is reputed to be some of the finest cocoa in the world.
There’s no doubting the pedigree of this chocolate as you bite down. The balance between flavour and texture is sublime. Hugely chocolatey and yet amazingly light and delicate at the same time, the cocoa flavours are as near to perfect as you could wish for. In the mouth this chocolate delivers a wonderfully deep, complex set of flavours without once becoming even slightly heavy or cloying. I didn’t realise it was possible to find cocoa with such richness of flavour and such light body. Try one of these and you can see how it has amassed so many awards. Truly top notch confectionery.
It’s fairly obvious from the stack of awards that they have amassed that the Curleys are at the top of their game. Anyone serious about top quality chocolate has to try some of their creations, and I am glad to report that they do live up to all of the hype. A must-do for any chocolate fiend.
Eldest Son has been berating me for converting him to the Dark Side. He doesn’t much like milk chocolate any more, and at age 15, he’s pretty unimpressed that something he used to enjoy is not seen as so flash any more. Of course, its all my fault. But what’s the big deal? He likes dark chocolate! And there is not exactly a shortage of that!
Demonstrating that he’s not completely serious in blaming me for his ills, he came home from an after-school trip to the supermarket, proudly bearing a block of Nestle Club Classic Peppermint Cream – a gift for me, he says, though I suspect a gift for us both is more like it.
Given his involvement, and that he rushed to open the pack before I could photograph it, I think it appropriate that he describe this feast for the senses in his own words. So here goes:
“The Club Classic Peppermint Cream combines a rich dark chocolate and a very strong taste of peppermint. Just smelling it is enough to tell it contains peppermint – or maybe fake peppermint. The ingredients contain no mention of peppermint at all !
The chocolate is 70%, and there is also sugar, cocoa mass, butter oil, cocoa butter, emulsifiers, glucose syrup flavours and colours.
The appearance is a little disturbing, as the chocolate looks fine on the outside. But when you split a piece open, from what appears to be a normal block of chocolate, Alien Blood appears!
The ‘Peppermint’ comes out in a big, sticky, green pool and doesn’t look very appetising. But somehow, even without containing any peppermint, it tastes great.”
I’m inclined to agree. The aroma when the pack is opened is very strongly pepperminty. The taste is the standard Club dark chocolate, which is rich and very pleasant. Then when you burst into the peppermint cream filling, it’s very strong. Breaking it open IS disconcerting. I’m sure Kath would pull less punches, given the colour. It is a rather lurid, bright green – the product of a fevered imagination and plenty of artificial colour. Aliens Blood, for sure.
Peppermint chocolate seems to be one of those love / hate things. I quite like it, as does Oldest Son. So we close our eyes, ignore the Alien Blood, and think this is pretty good. Toning down the green colour would make it even better.
Amano has, to my great delight, sent me their two new single-origin milk chocolate bars and dark chocolate bar (which I’ll get to in another review).
That Amano would choose to make milk chocolate isn’t surprising, giving their approachable sophistication, but the 30% content of both of these is lower than many other quality chocolatiers usually go for. After spending so much effort perfecting the cacao, they must want it to get at least a certain amount of say in the final product.
Yet Amano’s cacao still gets its expression through with only 30% of the total. I went for the Jembrana first, since I’ve already tried its dark counterpart. It dissolves nice and slow for being a meltier milk chocolate. Only on the second piece did I realize that it’s very sweet. Its supposed to have notes of “licorice and honey,” so this is a natural thing when you’re combining that honey flavor to the added sugar. I still find it very nice, tinged with that good vanilla taste of milk chocolates.
The Ocumare, from Venezuela, seems to have more of a cinnamon flavor and a soothing kind of taste. There’s another flavor that at first I only picked up on at the end. It’s also stronger when you chew the chocolate. Caramel, maybe?
I’m really not quite talented enough to choose a favorite. I can taste the difference, though. It’s even more vast if you go back and forth between the two, without allowing time in between to forget each one’s taste. What I can say is that their full-bodied tastes are uniquely delicious, and I’m finding that Amano’s weakening my will concerning moderation.
I love the new KitKat Dark and am quite partial to the milk chocolate KitKat Chunky or Chunky caramel when I’m starving but was put off any new flavours in the chunky range by the very ordinary Cookie Dough I reviewed a while back. As such the Cookies & Cream variety was not high on my taste test list to be honest.
Having said that, this morning I was absolutely famished after going for a run, hanging out the weeks’ washing, sweeping up leaves, walking the dog, cleaning out the kitchen and decluttering my desk. So hungry that even the studiously-ignored KitKat Chunky Cookies & Cream looked like an attractive prospect for morning tea.
Well ram my face into a brick wall and call me Amy Winehouse because this is absolutely scrumptious!
It’s nice to be pessimistic but then be pleasantly surprised. They’ve added a chocolate wafer with chocolate cream on the bottom with a generous splodge of milk chocolate and cookie crumbs on top and slathered it all in the usual KitKat chocolate. Think of a Cadbury Top Deck but with added interest due to the double crunch factor of the wafer layers and the cookie crumbs. The white chocolate – or ‘smooth filling’ to use the wrapper’s description – is a pretty good addition and complements the biccie bits.
Time to look at the ingredients. They unfortunately do not make comforting reading because this one bar gives out 19.9 grams of fat of which 11.5 grams is saturated. Or roughly a third of your daily fat allowance in an easily-forgotten match up with your cup of tea. Hmmm, fruit for lunch and then salad for dinner for me today then. Despite these dreary facts, it’s a nice bar for those times you’re feeling like something naughty but noshable.
