New Continent Explored!

Hi everyone,


I've just gotten back from a holiday in Marrakech, and it was an amazing experience. I encountered some strange and new things there - camels on the roadside (for tourists, obviously), mile after mile of winding souk (although after a while, they all begin to feel like a variation on the Camden Markets), full body exfoliation at the hammams (ultimately rewarding, but at the time - ouch!) and perhaps the strangest and most unexpected thing of all - a Moroccan chocolate bar!


Ok, so technically, it isn't actually Moroccan. It's from a company called Tiffany, based in Dubai. But you can BUY it in Morocco (from a hole in the wall -literally - shop around the corner from my riad, where you could also buy cigarettes and a wide selection of French-inspired cookies, and where the shopkeeper showed me how much it cost by laying out the correct coins on the counter), so I'm going with it. 

The bar in question is a Team Up, with not one but two skinny chocolate bars to delight. Not entirely sure why the bar has an English name (and the vaguely unappetizing-sounding description of 'cocoa coated fingers'), but whatever. Like what I imagine any authentic Moroccan candy bar stored in the hot desert sun would be like, this one is part melted, slightly flattened and reconstituted. So far, so good.

Turns out the melting didn't do anything to mar (and maybe even improved?) the taste. The two chocolate bars are layers of soft, crispy chocolate wafers (think Loacker wafers) covered in a thin layer of chewy caramel, and then covered in a thick-ish layer of milk chocolate. And the end result is a tasty bar indeed!


Perhaps due to the melting, perhaps to the bar itself, the bar is lovely and chewy. The wafers, used to disastrous effect in previously reviewed bars, works in this case because the soft caramel that surrounds it keeps it from being too dry and flaky. There might also be some sort of Loacker-esque chocolate cream between the wafers, but the bars I tried have been flattened a little too much to tell. :P


The milk chocolate surrounding it all is fairly passable - a little too sweet but no weird flavor to it. The bar actually really reminded me of the Caramel deLites (the dear departed Samoa) Girl Scout cookies without the coconut. Maybe it's the sweet chocolate and caramel combo? Weird.


In any case, after not even expecting to find something resembling a chocolate bar in Marrakech, I found myself very pleased indeed about what I did find. This is an eminently eatable  bar, and a somewhat less robust but fairly passable Kit Kat substitute while traveling the Arab world. Yum - 3 bars.   

Bar-o-Meter



Eastern Europe and Egg Cream

So while the original purpose of this blog was to familiarize myself with strange and different British chocolate bars, I've managed to get in quite a few international guest stars through traveling (and through the generosity of traveling friends). The latest exotic acquisition? A Laima dark chocolate bar filled with egg cream, of all things, from Riga, Latvia. (Thanks, Oli!)


Egg cream, you say? I KNOW, I think. But it was all a huge amount less gross than it sounds. The bar itself appears to intriguingly have no name - I originally thought it was called a 'Laima', but then figured out it was the name of the chocolate company - reportedly the 'Cadbury's of Latvia'. Personally, I think this is selling Laima a bit short. The exhausting list of products on their webpage includes ice cream bars and Russell Stover-type variety boxes, which is where this bar appears to have originated. 

The bar consists of a nice thick layer of dark chocolate covering little segmented sections of egg cream filling. The chocolate is nicely sweet, kinda like a Hershey's Dark, but much better quality. The filling is absolutely delicious - it's this yellow, custardy consistency that is thick enough to keep from oozing out of the bar, but creamy enough to leave a nicely soft texture on your tongue. The chocolate is thick enough to provide a good contrast to the filling. The entire thing has a vaguely alcoholic taste, like so much Eastern European chocolate (although I don't think there's any actually in it).

This is DELICIOUS. Maybe it's because I didn't have huge expectations, but I ate this bar so quickly it wasn't long before I sadly realised it was all gone. More than anything else, it reminds me of those little assorted Polish chocolates that Barb used to bring back from Ohio (some awesome, some disastrous). Yummm, nostalgia. I'm totally going to have to visit Riga now, if only to go on the factory tour and stock up on all the many varieties of Latvian chocolate favorites. 


Four bars! International win! 


Next weekend I'll be in Marrakech, which for some reason I highly doubt has cheap chocolate bars sitting around just waiting to be reviewed. Mint tea, yes, cheap cocoa, no. Who knows, though, I could be surprised. If not, see you in two weeks, when we're finally back in Britain!

Bar-o-Meter



A Not So Triumphant Return

Dear Readers,


I know you all have been waiting desperately for me to return from my self-imposed chocolate holiday (ok, maybe it was just Carol), but you'll be pleased to know that I'm back at a near target weight after my summer o' bingeing, and feel comfortable sampling a candy bar here and there.


So, which bar to choose for the grand return? I went for an international one from my (rapidly growing) store. During my travels this summer, I picked up a quaint and local-looking Mint Crisp from a cute little town in Ireland. The wrapper is made of an unpretentious matte material, and looks like the basic design hasn't changed since the 40s. It's made in Ireland and I haven't seen it anywhere else. It doesn't get more authentic than this, I think. Plus, mint and chocolate - what could be better?

Turns out, a lot of candy bars could be better. Carol's really built up this one, telling me I'll love it, as she knows well that mint + chocolate = my downfall (Put a box of After Eights in front of me at your own peril). However, it just doesn't work here. 

The bar is a thin, solid slab of milk chocolate, with microscopic crunchy little mint bits that give it a bit of texture. I thought this would be similar to a minty Crunch Bar (and wouldn't that be amazing!), but the 'crisp' aspect of the Mint Crisp leaves something to be desired. To be honest, the 'Mint' aspect fails as well. This bar is middling to downright bad, oversweet milk chocolate with not enough of the minty crispness that might save it. In fact, it tasted like nothing more than those weird little chocolate-dipped mint stirring sticks they only seem to serve with coffee at weddings. I mean, they're ok in a pinch, but with all the other insanely good mint/chocolate combos out there, how can this compete?


A half bar. I'd be hard pressed to eat this one again, but can't give NO bars at all to mint and chocolate - it would just be wrong.


So maybe it all boils down to the fact I prefer DARK chocolate with mint. Or maybe it's just that the Mint Crisp is best tasted through a nostalgic fog of a childhood in Ireland - a childhood I never experienced. In any case, a disappointing return to the blog, but a return nonetheless. And with the cold, dark afternoons of winter approaching quickly, you can expect many more uninterrupted reviews - that is, unless I have a new bridesmaid dress to fit into.

Bar-o-Meter