A couple of weeks ago, I reviewed a Marks & Spencer Lemon Mousse bar, when Chocablog reader Jim pointed out that Thorntons do a suspiciously similar range of bars themselves. I decided to track one down so I could do a proper comparison.
As you can see, it looks very similar to the M&S bar, but there are a couple of differences. The Thorntons offering is decorated with milk chocolate rather than dark, and the pattern on the top is different.
The filling is the same sweet, tangy and lemony mousse that the M&S bar had, but this time I think it goes a little better with the white chocolate. The contrast between the citrussy filling and creamy coating isn’t quite as jarring as it is on the M&S bar.
As a result, I really quite enjoyed this. I’m guessing that Thorntons manufacture the M&S range, while giving them some minor tweaks to differentiate them. But in the case of the lemon mousse bar at least, those little tweaks give the Thorntons offering the edge.
As I said in the M&S review, this isn’t really a bar for out and out chocolate lovers, it’s a bar for lemon mousse lovers. But it is still enjoyable, light and refreshing, and I’d certainly be tempted to pick one up again.
My last ice cream sample was this rather interesting idea. I always love eating chocolate from lighter to darker, so I was looking forward to experiencing that in ice cream. Or ‘fudge bars’, I should say.
I was a little disappointed, though, that they’re all wrapped in the same generic white plastic, which makes it hard to tell which flavor you have. The white is easy to see through the plastic, but the milk and dark aren’t so easily discernible. I ended up opening two milks before I got a dark. At least once you do have them all out, they look obviously different from each other. That may not be much to ask for, but it doesn’t always happen.
With the white, I was amazed that the singular taste of white chocolate was there, not a kind of substitute. But it also had a milky taste, which, as I don’t drink milk, was a little annoying to me.
The milk chocolate was a pretty average fudge bar. It would’ve been nicer just a little bit smoother. The dark was of that variety of dark chocolate flavor that’s thick and weird, unnaturally heavy yet also too sweet. It’s kind of similar to Nesquik. Maybe if I were eating it more casually I wouldn’t say so much, but it should still hold up to scrutinizing.
I still like the idea. The quality could’ve been better, but it wasn’t horrible. What I think would be nice, though, is to put all three together, maybe onto one ice cream. Three layers instead of three kinds. Because the only way to really get “the idea” I like is to eat all three together like I did, and that isn’t really recommended.
These unassuming little 100g tubes of well, ‘pastilles’ have been available in Australia for years now and, like their Dutch makers, have tended to be a quiet achiever not garnering lots of international fuss or attention, despite the fact that over 65% of their product is sold overseas and they make 5,256 every sixty seconds. Droste has been around since 1863 when they started as confectioners selling ‘cups of water chocolate’ and developing their now-famous round pastilles.
Having visited their website, I discovered that there are in fact eight varieties of pastilles, but I can only get my hands on two kinds here – the milk (35% cocoa solids) and Extra dark (75% cocoa solids).
There are twenty 5g pastilles in each box which makes them nice to sneak into your handbag and share with a mate at the movies, or, as Love Chunks and I did, scoff them in front of the telly. Actually that’s not being fair – we let the first couple of pastilles from both boxes dissolve slowly in order to fully appreciate the taste before scoffing the rest. We were both extremely impressed with the 75% dark – it is very smooth and silky (instead of gritty like some very dark varieties) with a hint of burnt coffee (but in a good way), finishing off with a buttery cocoa taste at the very end.
The milk flavour, on the other, now-sticky hand, was rather cloying. Perhaps it’s merely a European vs Antipodean mistranslation, but it seemed too milky to our palates; tasting a bit like warm milk that’s gone past it’s sell by date and mixed in with a bit too much sugar. Not surprisingly, the first ingredient is sugar, and sugars comprise 55% of the chocolate compared to 25% in the Extra dark.
What intrigues me are the flavours we can’t get here in Australia – Stracciatella (is it like Lindt’s Lindor?), orange, milk/dark and the milk/Madagascar combinations. Droste also have ‘tablets’ available, which make blocks sound so much more sophisticated and grown up. They even have a downloadable ‘homework’ information booklet and their own hotel and restaurant complex. Frustratingly, the details are all in Dutch, so I can only assume that Droste pastilles are placed on the guests’ pillows every evening. In addition, Droste, like my own country’s Haigh’s Chocolates, make their chocolate all the way from starting with the raw cocoa bean, so I’d love to see some of their tablets and specialty flavours make the trip down under some day.
In the past, Simon & I have reviewed After Eight and After Eight Grand Marnier Straws, and in both cases we’ve noticed something missing on the packaging; an indication of cocoa content. Instead, Nestlé prefers to call After Eights simply “plain chocolate” – a description it has managed to live up to quite well.
So when I saw this bar on the shelf in Tesco, it caught my eye. A big bar of After Eight with “Dark Chocolate” and “70%” both featured prominently on the label. Obviously someone at Nestlé is reading Chocablog…
They’ve clearly made a bit of an effort with the presentation too. Inside the thick paper and gold foil, you’ll find eight large, glossy squares of dark chocolate, deeply embossed with the After Eight logo. As soon as you start to unwrap it, you’re immediately greeted by that familiar, overwhelming minty aroma that takes you straight back to 1979… and that’s not necessarily a good thing.
So does this “70% Dark Chocolate” taste any different from the old “plain chocolate”? Well frankly, no. The chocolate tastes just like it does in classic After Eight mints. In other words, it doesn’t taste of much at all. Granted, that’s partly because the sweet, gooey, minty filling overwhelms all other flavours, but even when taken in isolation, it doesn’t have anything special going on.
Glancing at the back of the wrapper, I notice the small print still describes this as “Plain chocolate with peppermint flavoured fondant cream centre”. It seems they just can’t get away from that plain-ness.
But here’s the interesting part. Despite not being able to muster a great deal of enthusiasm for this, I still demolished that bar pretty quickly. I guess the conclusion is simple – if you liked the original After Eights, you’ll like this. If you didn’t, you won’t. They’re exactly the same.
