This chocolate bar is a gift from my sister upon returning from a trip to Scotland. She knows that anything unique catches my eye, and that’s what prompted her thoughtful gift of this Rococo “Orange & Geranium” chocolate bar.

For a chocolate bar, it’s beautifully packaged. A orange wrapper with geometric shapes and a blue and white logo with hand written ink script in indigo ink. Has a very exotic and antique feel to it.

The bar is a minimum 65% dark chocolate, which is stated on the back of the wrapper by the ingredients. So really it lies in my favorite chocolate % (I prefer the 50% to 70% range). The wrapper has a long paragraph on it that explains the artistic nature of the chocolate bar. I was going to wait to read it so I could paraphrase it for you all here, but then I decided I didn’t care much for what they said, so I doubt you would too. Lets just say they put a lot of thought into the flavors of this bar.

Opening the bar the chocolate has a wonderful red/brown color to it and a pretty sheen. The aroma is extremely powerful with strong hints of spices and flowers. It’s intense and reminds me of a perfume shop.

The flavor is…sadly just as strange as it smells. It’s overwhelmingly soapy with flavors I can’t really describe but I know they’re flowery and strong. I don’t taste any orange at all in here, just this odd, odd taste.

I couldn’t take more than a bite of it since the flavor is just too much like soap. I couldn’t bear it. The additions to the chocolate just overpowered the flavors so much that it really ruined it for me. I hope to try some of their other flavor varieties sometime so my opinion is tainted by this one bar.

Rating: Inedible

Links Rococo Chocolate’s Website

Looks like Terry’s Chocolate Orange is no longer a Christmas season item! I’ve seen them in regular packaging for the rest of the year, but this is the first time I’ve seen them in packaging decorated for another holiday. Which, they did a really good job on, it captures the feel of Easter nicely with its colorful package and design to make the chocolate orange look like a decorated Easter egg.

The orange once out of the package is a regular chocolate orange though. No oblong egg shape for this one! I was a little perplexed by this at first, but then I realized it was just a candy re-packaged to look festive, like the Easter Reese’s and Kitkats.

If you ever had a Terry’s Chocolate Orange, you’ll know what to expect. First comes the pleasure of whacking the orange so the pieces separate. The the fun of eating it! It tastes the same to all the milk chocolate oranges I’ve had. The chocolate has that nice dairy twinge to it and is very sweet. The melt on the chocolate is extremely rich and smooth. The orange notes compliment the chocolate beautifully, which is what make Terry Oranges so addicting.

A nice addition to any chocolate lover’s Easter basket.

Rating: Will Eat Again

In my family, a Terry’s Chocolate Orange is a traditional Christmas treat. They’re a perfect stocking stuffer and me and my sisters and I always enjoyed opening on by whacking it hard on the coffee table and enjoying it with coffee as we spent Christmas morning with our family. Over the years it seems that Terry’s Chocolate Orange was hard to find at points, as I recall a few years where we went without them. I’ve seeing them resurface in recent times and I always feel the impulse to purchase them when I see them now. That is why this new variety of Terry’s Chocolate Orange, the Toffee Crunch, caught my eye when I saw it at my local Target.

One of the things that makes a Terry’s Orange so much fun is the fact that they’re interactive. You have to “whack and unwrap” them, because the segments are fused together by a chocolate center. You need to whack them loose in order to eat them. It’s pretty fun! So I whack the Toffee Crunch orange and start to work on the wrapper.

Once unwrapped, the orange smells surprisingly…like orange. I was expecting more toffee here, hence the name, but I guess I’m mistaken. Then popping a slice into my mouth, the orange flavor soon transformed into a creamy toffee flavor. The toffee flavor is very buttery with a nice toasted caramel flavor and blends beautifully with the creamy chocolate. There’s also a texture element at play here, as there’s bits of toffee mixed into the chocolate that provide a crunchy stickiness. It’s really delightful, as it’s not as cumbersome as a Heath or Skor bars where the toffee is ample enough to cement your teeth together.

This is a tasty remix of a classic. I really enjoyed it, and this is a good addition to any holiday tradition.

Rating: Will Eat Again

Bassetts Allsorts are an iconic candy in my life. They’re the one consistent sweet I’d see my Mom buy for my Dad, as he’s just crazy for them. He learned to enjoy them from his dad, so I guess it’s fitting for tradition that I learned to love them too. I’d always seen and enjoyed the black licorice variety, so when I saw these red licorice ones in an Irish market in Queens I could resist them. I never knew such a thing existed, and since I am a fan of red licorice too, I was eager to see how it compared to the traditional black kind.

Out of the box these are just stunning to look at. They’re so beautiful. For some reason, the red adds just that extra spark of color to them, so instead of feeling old fashioned and classic like the black licorice Allsorts, these has this funky, psychedelic vibe to them. It was such a pleasure to photograph them. 

As far as flavor goes, they’re pretty similar to regular Allsorts. The sweet coating on the bits of licorice are lightly flavored of fruits: orange (orange), lemon (yellow), strawberry (red), blueberry (white) and currant (purple). The original Allsorts has coconut too, but alas that is omitted here. The texture of the coating is grainy, a little crumbly and greasy. It’s similar to shredded hard-packed coconut.  The flavors were all pleasant and juicy and were very satisfying. But combined with the red licorice, they just stood out on their own. Or should I say, they were so flavorful that the red licorice, which tends to be mind in flavor to begin with, was just lost in the fray. I did take a piece apart to eat some of the red licorice on it’s own, and it’s very nice. Fragrant, bright, and juicy of berries and “red” flavor.

I prefer the black licorice Allsorts of these. The black licorice is strong enough to compete and balance out the flavors of the sweet coating, whereas with the red, it’s just lost. Then again, I eat Allsorts for the licorice, so if you eat them because you enjoy the coating, or aren’t a fan of black licorice, these are worth checking out.

Rating: Might Eat Again

Links Bassetts Webpage on Cadbury’s Website

When I saw this bar, I immediately assumed it was the UK version of the Twix. It comes in a package with two fingers, starts with the letter “T”....you see where I’m headed, right? Having made such quick assumptions about the bar led to much surprise once I opened the Twirl bar to finally taste it. I was totally unfounded with my guess, as Twirl is a totally different kind of bar.

What I did surmise correctly was the style of the Twirl, as it is like a Twix: two separate slender “fingers” make up this bar. The only description on the wrapper reads: “the Intense chocolate hit”.

I picked up a finger to smell it, and I couldn’t help but feel like I was sniffing a cigar. It smells very milky and tangy and it reminds me of cheese. The tops of the fingers have texture on them that’s bumpy and uneven. I can’t help but wonder: “What’s under there”? There’s no cookie in the ingredients list…..

I eagerly took my first bite and I almost immediately had to stop. The texture is very light and crumbly and crumbs fell all over into my lap. I used more delicate force the second try so I didn’t make a mess.

The inside is just like a Flake bar: little ribbons of chocolate packed together in a tube. The difference is that the Twirl takes things a step further and enrobes the bar in chocolate so you get double the amount of chocolate. The flavor is so intensely of the dry milk powder. It’s really creamy, tangy and has an almost “stinky” taste to it, again, like a blue cheese. Then there a sweetness that envelopes the flavors and washes it all away. I don’t really taste “chocolate” at all, just sugar and cream.

Interesting, but not chocolatey enough for me.

Rating: Might Eat Again

Links Cadbury Website