Product: Goody Bag For Every Season
Made By: Hotel Chocolat
Purchased From: Hotel Chocolat
Price: £13.50
Review By: chocadmin
Welcome to the second REVIEW EXTRA. Once again those nice people at Hotel Chocolat have sent me a product worthy of one of these in depth reviews. This time it's one of their goody bags with a varied selection of Hotel Chocolat products to sample.
Packaging: Hotel Chocolat's usual high standards here. The individual chocolate items come in a special windowed card bag complete with carrying strings! The two bagged items are tied (as usual for Hotel Chocolat) with branded ribbon (rather than twist ties as you might expect for a cheaper product).
What you get: A bag of chocolate curls for making hot chocolate, 6 chocolate truffles, 2 dipping chocolates, a small bar of milk chocolate and cookies, and a bag of caramelised milk chocolate drops.
Taste: I'll go from least interesting upwards. First the bar - it's good but it's just a bit too small to really savour. It's enough of a taster to help you decide on getting one of their large big blocks though. Also mine had an oddly bitter aftertaste, which didn't seem to fit with the cocoa content present. Next the hot chocolate - it's a pain to get it to dissolve completely (I probably didn't have hot enough milk - but if you're used to instant drinks it's a lot more effort) and certainly won't be to many people's tastes. The high cocoa content means the resulting hot chocolate is not very sweet; if you're used to regular hot chocolate products you might find this a bit of a shock (although I guess you could always add a handful of sugar). If you're happy with high cocoa chocolate you should find this a welcome change and much more refined than you might expect. Next up are the mini chocs. The fruity ones are a bit extreme for me, but I'm sure those of you who are happy with such flavours will find them very appealing... Then we have the dipping chocolates for the hot chocolate (or any other hot drink you happen to have). These are great with a lovely praline taste. You could just eat them on their own, but they melt very nicely. Finally, possibly what some might consider the 'cheap' element of the bag, the caramel drops - these are inspired. Posh chocolate buttons if you will, with decent chocolate instead of cheap Cadbury (Buttons are nice, but a bit too sickly after a few) and a lovely aftertaste of caramel. You'll be lucky if you can make these last a while, despite the fact that the bag in which they come contains so many.
Conclusion: All in all a good round collection from Hotel Chocolat. The only disappointment being the small bar with that oddly bitter aftertaste, perhaps that was just a quirk of the batch. Some of you might not like the hot chocolate without a hefty amount of sugar, but really that is just indicative of the quality chocolate you're getting.
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