Let's talk chocolate. I promised you a review of Hotel Chocolat's Valentine's Day offerings. Hotel Chocolat is a British chocolate company that recently launched their treats in the US, available online. They are also hosting a contest for Valentine's Day. But in case you were on the fence about entering, perhaps this will help you make up your mind.
The Goody Bag of the Season changes but when I tried it there were two scrumptious slabs of chocolate, a bag of caramel and Florentine canapes, praline butterflies and a chocolate dipper.
I really loved the milk rocky road chocolate slab. A super thick chocolate bar has chocolate chip cookie, puffed rice and white chocolate bites. It tasted like a candy bar with lots of textures in every bite, it's crunchy, crispy and creamy. It kind of reminded me of a mix-in ice cream, without the ice cream! Very silky and high quality.
The caramel canapes might have been my favorite treat of all. This is a high cocoa milk chocolate so it's much richer than what I think of as milk chocolate. Each mini tile has little chunks of chewy florentine and a drop of caramel. Just a couple of these are satisfyingly sweet.
The raspberry creme slab tastes a bit like a raspberry milkshake. The dried raspberries that are embedded in it are unsweetened so they provide a tangy counterpoint to the sweet white chocolate that is creamy, not waxy and not too sweet.
The butterfly pralines were my least favorite. Mostly wrapped in white chocolate they were just a tad too sweet for my taste, though I did appreciate the hazelnut filling and they were awfully cute.
Want your own goody bag? One person who enters the Hotel Chocolat contest, using this link, is guaranteed to win. To enter, explain in 200 words or less why Hotel Chocolat should surprise your loved one with a luxury chocolate gift. Dig deep and tell a moving tale, as the most compelling entry will win! And it can be a funny story, an inspiring story, a beautiful story, or even a romantic story. The competition closes on February 8th, 2008 and entries will appear live on the Hotel Chocolat site.