This is the second chocolate bar from Manufaktura Czekolady we’ve reviewed and this one came to us courtesy of Chocolatiers.co.uk.
Manufaktura Czekolady are a Polish bean-to-bar chocolate maker, and this particular bar is made with 70% Ghanaian cocoa beans. That’s somewhat unusual for a small artisan chocolate maker, as Ghana is better known for its bulk cocoa than fine flavours. The bar Simon reviewed last year also used Ghanaian beans but the company does make chocolate using cocoa from other origins as well.
Like the other bars in the range, this one comes wrapped in thick, textured paper and gold foil. When you unwrap it, you’re immediately hit by a wave of intense, chocolatey aromas. This is certainly not a subtle bar of chocolate, but it is very inviting.
It’s not just the chocolate that’s intense either. There’s a generous – if somewhat uneven – sprinkling of salt on the underside which hits you the moment you place a piece on your tongue.
Nothing about this chocolate is understated. It’s incredibly dark and chocolatey, but it lacks the refined flavour notes of finer quality cacao. There’s a slight hint of fruitiness to it, but the overwhelming feeling I get when eating it is a memory of when I first tried dark chocolate as a child. It’s robust, slightly bitter, and very, very nice.
It’s the kind of chocolate that kicks you in the face, but leaves you coming back for more. Or maybe that’s just me.
This probably isn’t the kind of thing that someone who only ever eats milk chocolate would enjoy. But I like it a lot, and would recommend it to anyone who wants to try something a little different.
I found this chocolate hiding out in a purse I don’t often use. As one does. I’d stowed it away there for safekeeping after a Trader Joe’s trip, then completely forgotten about it. Maybe my reason for forgetting was that this little 43 gram bar doesn’t look particularly memorable. Its dull, dark purple wrapper I imagine is supposed to look high end; it just looks grocery store high end. Inside, the chocolate looks slightly better, having at least a healthy shine. Six rectangular chunks have the appearance of a cityscape, sitting with as much height as they do.
Although there is no cacao percentage listed, I would put the chocolate around the fifties range. Fortunately, the chocolate buttercream doesn’t make a mess even when you break off pieces; it stays right in its place. Its mouthfeel is lighter than ganache, being not at all stiff despite the fact that it doesn’t spill all over the place. Texture is, in fact, the main addition it adds to the bar: its flavor isn’t prevalent over the chocolate’s. Together, though, they taste all of fudge and chocolate cake mix. Think of a Dove bar taken up a step.
This is another item with the vague label “product of Belgium.” But I care little where a chocolate is from, unless I have specifics or know its from a company that has proved itself to me. Still, the kind of person who would buy a chocolate because it says its Belgian is probably going to like this bar: it comes under the same scope of similar offerings. Its the sort of chocolate you do buy, as I did, while running errands, though only stowing in a purse long enough to get to your car, home, or office; by its nature, it’s a chocolate to break up the doings of the day for a few moments. That isolation, coupled with the fairly flat middle range of the chocolate, will be positive for some palettes and forgettable for others. I put myself in the latter category.
More Finnish finery from my recent trip to Helsinki and once again these are available at the ‘posh food’ section of Helsinki airport’s Tax Free shop.
In contrast to the Hemgården Archipelago chocolates I reviewed previously, the packaging design for this selection is much more understated in it’s simple elegance.
Mercedes Urbano-Winquist sells her delicious chocolate pralines at Chocolaterie Amorina in Mariehamn. In summertime you can also enjoy them at Café Lugn & Ro in Eckerö Mail on the island of Eckerö in Aland. Mercedes’ love for chocolate and sweets was born in her home kitchen in Caracas, Venezuela, where her mother baked cookies and beautiful wedding cakes to order. So there you have it – a Venezuelan woman who married & moved to Scandanavia and began making chocolate.
So what of these nine chocolates?
Well to start there are in fact only five chocolates, as each of the flavours is duplicated with the exception of the Cardamom Praline, which I was a bit disappointed by as I happen to rather like cardamom. The Cardamom and Raspberry Pralines were the only milk chocolates in this box, so I shall start with them.
I have made no secret of my liking for Cardamom, and this example did not disappoint. The creamy milk chocolate shell was home to a darker, richer praline which balanced very well with the spice. It was a similar story with the Raspberry heart. Creamy milk chocolate mingling with raspberry to start, then the darker cocoa flavours of the middle coming through.
The other truffles bore more than a passing resemblance to the Archipelago selection. Once again there’s sea buckthorn & blueberry, both of which were superior examples. The balance of fruit and chocolate was excellent, particularly the sea buckthorn. The light, soft flavours of the fruit complimented the darker, richer praline perfectly.
It’s been a while since I tried any chocolate with honey and this one was (once again) beautifully balanced. The honey wasn’t overly sweet but it was definitely the first flavour I detected and once the dark chocolate shell & praline filling had melted that soft, floral sweetness was never lost.
These chocolates were bigger than the Archipelago range, both in terms of physical size and taste. The fruit flavours seemed to sit better with the dark praline centres and the presentation of the product (with the simple brown box reminiscent of Rafaella Baruzzo’s chocolates) is definitely more upmarket. This was also reflected in the price. This little box set me back €16 which is comparable with other handmade chocolates. Of the two boxes of chocolates I bought in Finland I’d say this was definitely the superior offering. Worth lookig for if you ever find yourself in Helsinki airport.
It’s been a while since I reviewed any Thorntons chocolates, but these Mint Batons were part of the goody bag at their recent Christmas launch event, and I couldn’t get them go to waste. And of course, I can’t eat chocolate without reviewing it.
All the big chocolate companies launch their Christmas ranges in July in order to get featured in magazines that have a long lead time. I could wait until Christmas to post this review, but these particular chocolates happen to be available right now on the Thorntons website.
As you can see, you get pretty much what you would expect in the box. Two layers of eight dark chocolate fingers decorated with white chocolate stripes. When you open the box, you’re immediately hit by that after dinner mint aroma; mainly mint, with a hint of chocolate.
In this case, it’s a peppermint flavoured truffle, which actually looks quite nice.
As for the taste, well it’s quite similar to that other well known after dinner mint. The chocolate is a little thicker, and a healthy 60% cocoa solids, so while the mint does overpower any interesting flavour notes, it still tastes sufficiently chocolatey.
The texture is a little more interesting than the average after dinner mint too, as the filling contains tiny pieces of honoeycomb that give it a little bit of a crunch.
Would I buy these? Well actually, I might. Not to eat myself, but to share around with guests, they’re fine. I’d probably take them out of the slightly cheap looking box and present them a little more artistically, but for £3.99 I think they’re pretty good value for what they are.
