Seed & Bean Chili & Lime Extra Dark Chocolate

When a chocolate bar has "spicy" in the title, I usually take it with a grain of salt. My husband and I are spicy food junkies and our tolerance for heat is pretty high. So when a chocolate bar actually does have a nice kick to it, it's a very pleasant surprise.

This Seed & Bean bar is another gift my boss brought back from the UK. This bar is organic, fairtrade, and vegan (though it might have traces of milk). While 72% cocoa is not what I'd call "extra dark" it's right where I like my chocolate bars to be. Everyone's got a chili chocolate bar, but this is the first chili lime bar I've tried.

The chocolate was glossy and quite pretty with a nice, hard snap. Right away, I could taste the crisp hint of lime, but as the chocolate melted, the chili heat began to build. This bar was pretty hot! Even after the chocolate was gone, the pleasant burn lingered for several minutes.

The chocolate itself was fantastic. Despite the heat, the bar still had a nice, mildly bitter cocoa flavor. It melted so smoothly and cleanly, leaving just the heat behind. In fact, all of the flavors were very clean, with no odd pepper flavors or sour notes from the lime. If you're not a fan of hot stuff, you may want to skip this one, but it's one of the best spicy bars I've ever had!

A

Seed & Bean website

Marks & Spencer White Chocolate Crème Brûlée

Work, grad school, and trying to have a social life have all kept me very busy, and unfortunately this blog has suffered as a result. Sorry for going missing again, but I'm going to keep trying to do it all! So, you may remember that my boss is British, and that when she goes to visit her parents in Scotland, she often brings back British chocolate to try. She brought back so much this time that I have consumed most of my calories from chocolate today, and it's just after noon.

This Crème Brûlée (thank goodness for autocorrect, it saved me a lot of trouble with those accents) bar came from the large department store chain Marks & Spencer, which sells a wide range of chocolates branded with its own name. The ingredients list was quite simple, and the label said the white chocolate contained at least 21% milk solids.

The speckles in the bar were quite pretty and reminded me of Easter. The chocolate smelled of vanilla and butter, almost like butterscotch. It was quite sweet, but it had a pleasant milky vanilla flavor. The little flecks turned out to be crunchy, toffee-like caramel granules that evoked the first wonderful crunch of stabbing crème brûlée with a spoon (definitely the best part of eating crème brûlée).

While the bar was a little too sweet for my liking, it thankfully wasn't cloying. The crunch from the caramel granules was fun, and against the smooth and creamy melt of the chocolate, it captured the feeling of the dessert. I'm not a big fan of crème brûlée (aside from the stabby part), but this bar had some nice textures. Still, one little square at a time was enough for me.

B+

Marks & Spencer website

Extra Dessert Delights Lemon Square

When it comes to lemon bars, "Go big or go home" is what I would say if I ever said things like that. Nothing is more disappointing at a bake sale than a lemon bar without enough zest. Take whatever the recipe calls for and double it, unless it's a really good recipe. Then, you probably only need a little extra.

The newest Dessert Delights flavor from Extra to hit shelves in my area is Lemon Square. Although some Dessert Delights flavors miss the mark, Extra always nails the packaging. The bright, sunny yellow and bold text caught my eye immediately. But what about the taste?

The gum smelled very lemony, with a hint of buttery shortbread. That's some pretty impressive chemistry. When chewed, the gum tasted like very sour lemon with powdered sugar, and I couldn't taste the crust without using my imagination. The lemon was nice and zesty and didn't taste like cleaning chemicals.

Unfortunately, the flavor was only strong for about a minute, then it faded to something like cotton candy. The gum was soft at first, but it firmed up as I chewed, and after about three minutes, I didn't want to chew anymore. That initial flavor is great, and it definitely tastes like a lemon square, but enjoy it while it lasts.

B-

Extra website

Uji Matcha Tirol

Please forgive me, because I'm about to go full-on Japanophile for this review. My college Japanese teacher was trained in chanoyu (tea ceremony), and every year, she would demonstrate tea ceremony for the public. The university had an actual tea room that was designed and donated by a successful alumnus. I'm not sure which style of tea ceremony she did, but it was always fascinating to watch her in the tea ceremony mindset. Every motion was full of purpose.

Everyone got to try the tea, which was made from the powdered green tea leaves (aka matcha), but my professor always asked one student to be her tea ceremony guest for the demonstration, and one year, it was me. Just being the guest required a bit of study, which made watching her perform the ceremony all the more impressive. All I remember is sitting in formal Japanese style, rotating the bowl before I drank the tea, and finding the bitter matcha to be delicious. This whole story leads me to this Uji Matcha Tirol because it reminded me of tea ceremony. A sweet such as yokan (jellied bean paste) is usually served with the matcha to compliment the bitterness of the tea, much like this particular Tirol.

The deep green chocolate was beautiful, and it smelled like matcha and yokan. The chocolate wasn't very sweet at all, and the matcha flavor got stronger as it melted and was bitterest at the finish. The jelly center reminded me very much of yokan, though not quite as beany. It was sweet and lightly flavored, and helped to balance the bitterness of the matcha.

The texture of the chocolate by itself was a bit sticky and soft, and it reminded me of candy melts rather than white chocolate. That was the only issue I had - the chewy center had a pleasant gummy texture, and it cancelled out the slightly odd texture of the chocolate.

A-

Tirol Website

Mindo Cinnamon Rustic Chocolate Bar

My sister and her husband showered me with chocolate this Christmas, including this pretty Mindo Chocolate bar. Mindo is a single origin chocolate company that operates out of Ecuador and Michigan. Take a look at that ingredients list - just the good stuff.

The Cinnamon Rustic bar is a dark chocolate bar (the percentage isn't given, but everything on Mindo's website seems to be either 67 or 77%) with a pretty cinnamon/white chocolate garnish in the center. The bars were also given a lovely dusting of demerera sugar.

The chocolate smelled of cinnamon and dark-roasted coffee beans, and it tasted very fruity with just a bit of acidity (almost like a raspberry). I'm not sure if there was any cinnamon in the bulk chocolate, but I couldn't taste it. The drizzle was sweet and creamy with a mildly spicy cinnamon flavor. Cinnamon can be overpowering, but I wish the cinnamon had been a little stronger, or that the drizzle had been uniform across the whole bar (it looks better on the website).

The bar had an interesting texture. There were sugar crystals throughout the chocolate that gave it a grainy crunch (in a good way - maybe that's what makes it "rustic"). The bar itself had a nice snap and a smooth melt. It had a clean finish with no stickiness or lingering aftertaste. The bites that had both drizzle and chocolate were the best; I just wish there had been more of those bites.

A-

Mindo Chocolate website