16-Type Chocila Chocolate Gift Box

It has been a while since I’ve had to tell you all about a box of chocolate or candy that had so many different types of treats inside. While that evenly spread out, there are 16 types of treats in this 32-piece box from Chocila, a brand I’ve never heard of before and who I could not find a website for. That isn’t unusual for brands that only sale on a huge online retailer, but usually I can find something about them. This seems to be the only way they sells these treats, too. The Gourmet Chocolate Gift Box these came in is metal and has a gold peddled design and could easily be reused. Given how many photos I’m going to include in this review, I’ll start off with a shot of what top layer looked like. Would you guess that it was three layers and sometimes four layers deep? I was surprised by that. I was sent this box for free via the Amazon Vine program in exchange for writing a review on that website about my experiences; this article is a bonus that goes into a lot more detail, but no additional compensation was received.

Chocila Gift Box Assortment Total

As you can see, this is a huge number of treats so let’s break it down into the three main groups and look at their treats in smaller groups. I'm doing this to try and cut down on the amount of scrolling you will need to do to read this entire review.

The “White” treats may or may not be chocolate, since no extensive list of ingredients was on the cardboard or metal box, I couldn’t check. Only four pieces fall into this category: Butter Pecan Clusters and Pretzel Clouds, two of each. The “White” type are not like any of the milk or dark chocolate treats, so we’ll tackle those first. Butter Pecan is one of those flavors I remember my mother enjoying, so I try that one first. They smell very much like white candy coating, too sweet and a bit waxy, not like white chocolate which should be more creamy in scent and flavor. The flavor is overwhelmingly sweet and not creamy at all, I’m betting this is candy not chocolate. Biting into it was really hard and make a loud snap. I could barely taste the pecans at all and I wouldn’t guess this was “butter pecan” in any why either. Disappointing. I’m not hopeful about the Pretzel Clouds because I bet these are also not white chocolate but a candy coating. I can see little pretzel pieces in it. It has the same scent; two sweet and not creamy. Biting into it is hard and it makes a loud snap. The overly sweet is countered by the salted pretzels. However, I’m disappointed that this too is most likely not white chocolate at all. My partner for testing who often prefers white or very light chocolate, he thought the pretzels were too small compared to the amount of white candy. 

The largest number of treats fell into the Milk Chocolate range with 18 treats of nine types. These included: Haystacks (which our Coconut Acolyte will tackle at a later date), Peanut Butter, Sea Salt Caramels, Peanut Clusters, Pecan Melt-Aways, Pecan Snappers, English Toffee, Pretzel, and Cashew Clusters; two of each type. Some some of the varieties of treats are only in the milk chocolate version, we'll look at those next.

The Sea Salt Caramels are only in the Milk Chocolate variety. These are a good size at 1.25 X 1.25 X 0.5 inches in dimensions. They have a sweet chocolate scent with salt. The caramel is more chewy than gooey, and the chocolate coating is rather thick compared to the caramel. The first flavor is the sweet chocolate, followed by the buttery caramel, and then the salt kicks in hard. The caramel is quite sticky, too. My testing partner liked this better than I did, but I wouldn’t toss these out if someone gave me one to eat. I wonder what these would taste like in a dark chocolate version.

The English Toffee was next and as you can see it also was drizzled as well as dipped. Toffee should have almonds in it according to some folks, but treats are labeled “toffee” which do not have almonds. Let’s see if I can taste to discover if these do. These measured 1.75 X 7/8 X 5/8 inches. These take effort to bit into because the toffee center is so thick and hard, I see little spots that could be almonds and I do believe I taste more almond along with the buttery and tang of toffee. The chocolate tastes stronger than in the caramel this time. I did like this one but once more, I wondered what a dark chocolate version would taste like.

While my tasting buddy this time around isn't a tree nut fan, he does love peanuts so he helped me with the Peanut Clusters which came only in milk chocolate. These look quite different reminding me of more spooned or handmade treats. The peanuts are visible yet when I bit into one, there were large areas with no peanuts at all. Neither biting into nor chewing made much of a sound so the peanuts were not crunchy. The chocolate was a bit too sweet for me, but my tasting buddy thought it was more creamy. The lack of salted peanuts brought out a more roasted flavor but it wasn't balance with the mil chocolate. Neither of us were impressed by this.

I was on my own for the last three milk chocolate only treats, but since I love most tree nuts, I was willing to take on that task solo. I began with the Cashew Clusters. The non-standard shape and size suggests these were spoon dropped to cool after the cashews were added to the milk chocolate. The cashew scent is strong, particularly from the bottom of the treat, while the chocolate is less sweet compared to the previous treats we've looked at thus far. The nuts are visible but when I take a bite which is surprisingly easy and nearly noiseless, I see there are a few spaces with just the milk chocolate. The nuts are soft but that often happens when you cover cashews with chocolate I've noticed. The chocolate is much sweeter than I was hoping and it quickly overpowered the cashew slightly salted flavor.

The next two treats both had pecans, which are my second most favorite tree nut. I started with the Pecan Snapper. These were similar in shape and size but if this is what I expect -- pecans, caramel, and chocolate, that would make a lot of sense because the caramel tends to hold the pecans firmly. Indeed these smelled like tangy caramel, the less sweet chocolate compared to many other of the milk chocolate candies in this box, and even a hint of pecans. These were large at 1 7/8 inch diameter and about 0.75 inches thick. They made a snap when I took a bite but not when I chewed because the pecans were softer and cushioned by the thick buttery caramel. While this was  good blend of flavors, I really want to try this brand's dark chocolate version of their snappers.

The last milk chocolate only treat was the Pecan Melt-Away. It was even more uniform in shape and size at 1 X 1.25 X 0.5 inches. The drizzle was a bit messy on what, reinforcing my idea that these might be handmade candies.  These had a strong sweet milk chocolate scent with a hint of pecans. Taking a bite made a fairly loud snap because the coating was so thick and the inside fairly firm like the Silk candies covered below. The pecans were very tiny and not particularly noticeable in either texture or flavor, which allowed the sweetness of the milk chocolate to overwhelm my taste buds.

Finally, the Dark Chocolate category included five types of treats unevenly divided: two Haystacks (again looked at by our Coconut Acolyte), three Double Dark Silk, two Peppermint Patties, two Dark Peanut Butter, and one Pretzel. Let's look at the dark only treats next.

There are two types of treats which only have dark versions: the Double Dark Silk and the Peppermint Patties. We'll begin with the three silk ones which you can see have this lovely shell design to them. The shells are fairly large at 1 1/8 X 1 1/8 X 0.75 inches. They have a smooth, sweet yet dark chocolate fragrance to them before I bite into one. That bite takes some effort because this is fairly firm piece yet it makes only a soft sound when first bitten. The inside seems to be solid chocolate, not any type of filling at all. It is slightly sweet to begin with then gets a bitter as you let a bite melt on your tongue. Chewing a bite decreases the bitterness, but I really loved this and would be happy with nothing but a gift box of these.

The Peppermint Patties are round as one expects with such a treat but these are thicker than most such candy measuring 1.25 diameter and 0.75 inches thick. The peppermint scent is light before you take a bite. I discovered that the bottom is softer than the top which I bit into it, the top made sharp snap while the bottom simply folded inward. A peppermint semi-soft center oozed out just slightly when I took that bite. The peppermint was the secondary flavor but the nice smooth yet slightly bitter dark chocolate mixed well with it with each chew. It left my mouth feeling tingly and cool. I really liked this one, too.

Since we have copies some of the milk and dark treats, we'll finish this long article with them. Let’s tackle the Pretzels which have both Milk Chocolate and Dark Chocolate versions. These are fairly large, each just over 3 inches at the widest, 2.25 inches across the narrow section, and over a quarter of an inch thick. It looks like not only were the pretzels dipped but also drizzled with their respective chocolates. The darker one has a stronger chocolate scent but it isn’t as dark as I usually like, I’d guess it would come into the 50/55% range for chocolate liquor/mass. I was able to snap the pretzels in half and they made a nip loud snap. Each bite and chew was crunchy. The flavor of the milk chocolate is very light and sweet, the pretzel is lightly salted so not overwhelming. This is not the level chocolate liquor I really enjoy in my milk chocolate. The darker pretzel's chocolate builds up in intensity with each bite, eventually being that lovely edge of bitter that I love. Of the two, I much prefer the Dark Pretzel.

The Peanut Butter treats came in both a milk and dark version in this gift box. My tasting buddy helped me out here, too. These were nearly identical in size at 1 1/8 inch squares; the milk chocolate was just a touch thicker. As you can see, these, too were drizzled as many of the pieces in this box were though the quality of the drizzling varied a great deal, again suggesting a handmade quality versus machine manufactured. The coating on each was much thicker than the peanut butter center which was solid and had a roasted and sweet flavor. The only sound was when you bit into it. The dark chocolate's bitterness countered the sweet roasted nature of the peanut butter filling making it a more balanced treat. Still, this was not as good as most similar candies and chocolate we've tried in the past.

This is a lot of treats for one gift box. If your loved one or yourself doesn't care if these are chocolate or candy, this would be a great gift frankly for any occasion.