William Curley Truffle Selection

Posted by in Chocolate Reviews on May 18 2009 | Leave A Comment

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.

William Curley Truffle Selection

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.

William Curley Truffle Selection

Next up was a Caramel. Simple as that – a salted caramel cup.

william-curley-choc-4

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.

William Curley Truffle Selection

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.

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Comments On This Post

  1. Too…jealous…to….type….anything…..profound…..

  2. Christine

    Another salted caramel – I’m jealous too! I’m just dying for a version to turn up in Australia as some point.
    Honey and chocolate is a great combination as well. This one looks almost identical to the ‘honey ganache’ chocolate from Mornington Peninsula Chocolates. Kath – say you’ll do a review of that place sometime? You won’t regret it!

  3. Ruth

    I love this blog – thank god other people care as much about chocolate as I do. This particular post was a ray of sunshine in an otherwise terrible day at work – so I ordered myself some of the chocolates to cheer myself up. It’s a bit more expensive than the usual dairy milk but it’s going to be worth the wait!

  4. Christine I’m planning on reviewing the Mornington Peninsula stuff. I tried their wonderful samples during the ‘Melt’ day that was part of the recent ‘Melbourne Food and Wine Festival’ and am longing for more….

  5. Lara

    I’m eating a William Curley sea salt caramel bar at the moment. It’s bloody lovely. I have always been more a fan of milk chocolate (I know, I know, but it’s just a preference!) but this dark chocolate is delicious, not a hint of bitterness (which is what usually puts me off) and the caramel is superb. And I don’t think I’m going to be able to look at a bar of Cadbury’s Caramel in quite the same way ever again…

  6. Gail

    I’m looking at the salted caramel cup and I don’t think that is a corn stalk on it, it sure looks like a cocoa pod. Anyone else agree.

  7. river

    Interesting but unattainable. I’m far more interested in the 1kg tin of Quality Street chocolates sitting right beside my left elbow.

  8. rferne

    It’s definitely a cocoa pod; it’s too fat to be corn and besides, corn would be sort of random on a caramel, wouldn’t it?

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