5 Chocolatey Tea Treats

Afternoon Tea Collection, Hedonist Chocolates

Did you know that today is National Tea Day in the UK? Since Your Chocolate Priestess dislikes tea so much that we have a specialist who test all tea related products, I just learned about this fun food holiday myself. Our second highest readership is folks in the UK so in their honor let's look at some tea truffles that we were sent from Hedonist Artisan Chocolates. The Afternoon Tea Collection comes in either a set of 10 or 20 but each has 5 flavors -- Earl Grey, Lapsang Souchong, Matcha, Roch-cha Chai, and Rooibos Ginger Lime -- so you get 2 or 4 of each flavor depending on the size you originally buy. Honestly the larger box is a better buy in terms of price per truffle. One of the five flavors (Lapsang Souchong) has an almond so our specialist turned to another tea lover to help him out. Thus, for the first time in The Chocolate Cult history, we have two tea specialists testing and revealing their experiences! I'll label them T and J for their names so you can tell their opinions apart when they differ. Hedonist Artisan Chocolates sent us this 10 pack for free in exchange for us testing them out and writing about our experiences here on this blog; no other form of compensation was received in exchange for the honest evaluation from our testers.

We'll start with the Lapsang Souchong truffle because it has both white and milk chocolate and is thus the less cacao intensive of the collection. T: Can't eat because of almonds.
J: The almond is crunchy and very salty. That's why they look kind of white. Salt, almond, sweet milk chocolate, and then the bitter from the filling of chocolate which looks and tastes dark not white or milk chocolate. I got no tea flavor at all. (she tries the second truffle and really focuses) There is a slight smokiness but is that supposed to be the tea? The almond and the salt really hides the tea. Inside is smooth and slightly resistant. The salt dominate throughout. If you don't like salty chocolate this is not for you. 

Next is the Roch-cha Chai that is milk chocolate so let's see what our tester has to say about these. T: I can smell spiciness. It has a smell like generic spicy chocolate. Dull crunch when I bite into it. The chocolate outside is very smooth. Very milk chocolatey flavor. The inside is very tasty -- savory, no hot spiciness to it at all. It does taste very much like chai. Chai plus milk chocolate.
J: I can detect a slight spice to the scent. I think it is a little salty but otherwise I agree with T. There is a nice balance between chocolate and chai but not really a tea flavor.

The Matcha is white and dark chocolate again so our experts tried it next. T: Smell chocolate and nothing else. Makes a loud snap that breaks off the side when I take a bite.  The chocolate on its own isn't as bitter as some dark chocolates are. The top green is identical to the decoration on top. The inside is quite sweet with a light matcha flavor.
J: I smell dark chocolate. I carefully bit off a corner but it made a snap. The matcha filling is green as I expect and has slightly buttery texture and fatty flavor but also a bit of tea leaf that makes it more interesting. I think the green on top is very pretty. Matcha should be very bitter if you have it in its traditional form but this is not and you wouldn't watch it to be.

The Rooibos Ginger Lime has dark chocolate but the lime might make it taste lighter so your testers trid that one next.
T:  My ginger pieces are smaller... I get a dark chocolate scent but nothing from the crystal. I bit off a piece of the ginger which is like a little tiny coal on my tongue. I try that tiny piece that is very crunchy but only a slight citrus flavor. Only a little rooibos flavor. With all these flavors the chocolate is there but it is only one of many. Not sure the rooibos is strong enough.
J: Yum, yum, yum. I love this type of tea! I can smell a faint ginger from the crystal. I tried a piece of the gritty stuff next to it and I do not like that. The ginger on top overpowers any rooibos flavor though the lime comes out more in the filling. If you just eat it in one or two bites it is good but don't try those tiny pieces on their own. The ginger was not too hot. If you don't like dark chocolate this might be good because it is just part of the whole.

Finally, the Earl Grey suggests intensity by both the tea and the dark chocolate and so our two testers ended their adventures with those truffles. If you look closely you can see tiny flecks of tea.
T: The entire thing has the Bergamot fragrance. Same dark chocolate so it is makes a loud snap. Oh! I got the Early Grey flavor when I took a bite of just the external dark chocolate. Tests like Earl Grey tea with dark chocolate exactly as advertised. Different texture experience than the earlier ones, slightly gritty not smooth as the previous.
J: Bergamot scent. Oh, weird. There is a crystal sugar crunchy texture to it and a bit of crunch, kind like the frozen crust you can get on ice cream that you have had in your freezer too long. I'm not sure I would guess this was Earl Grey but it has a bitter citrus flavor to it that could Earl Grey. I like it but I'm not a huge fan of that tea to begin with so this is a surprise.

What was their favorite flavors? Surprisingly J liked the Earl Grey most followed by the Lapsang Souchong. T picks the Roch-Cha Chai as his favorite, he'd enjoy an entire box of them. There you go, another example of how each person has an individual experience with any type of chocolate.  I hope to have an interview with one of the owners of Hedonist Artisan Chocolates published before our next feature article about their creations. To the left you can see all 10 truffles laid out in their box. I love the insert that labels each flavor clearly. Did you notice that I used that label in our photos as well so you can remember the name of each truffle as I transcribed our tester's words? Today I hope you enjoyed our report on their Afternoon Tea Collection in honor of National Tea Day and out of respect for our UK readers and our tea lovers here in the USA. Please leave a comment and let us know what you think.