Wawel Chocolate Bars

Wawel are a Polish company and I've reviewed a few of their chocolates before.

Polish chocolate bars are sold near enough everywhere in the UK now and all the supermarkets and smaller shops near me are rammed full of either Wawel or E.Wedel chocolate bars. Asda had a huge display on the end of the world food aisle pushing four new Wawel chocolate bars, the two I've got to review today and two which didn't really appeal to me - though most people on my Twitter at least would disagree - ordinary dark chocolate and a filled peanut butter bar. 

Fresh & Fruity 

Milk chocolate with jelly. 

This was the first bar to catch my eye. It's a 100g bar with nice thick squares as seems to be standard for Wawel, no 89/90g mucking about like Cadbury! I was suprised opening the wrapper that I couldn't smell chocolate at all - not even a tiny whiff - the only thing to be smelt was a fruity jelly. 

I tried a square which had no jelly pieces first though there was a gap where some must have been before I'd snapped it off. Strangely it had no chocolate flavour at all (the packet has stated in bold that this bar contains vegetable fats as well as cocoa butter, I wonder if that contributed) instead, it just had a hint of jelly like taste to it. It really didn't taste like chocolate. 

I picked this bar as I thought it would combine two of my loves - chocolate and jelly bean/sweets. But no these aren't jelly sweets at all, they're actual lumps of jelly! Not only did they have a weird texture, as in where's the custard to go with this wobbly jelly texture, but most had absoloutly no flavour. In the photo above you should be able to see two different coloured jellies, the red had a nice fruity flavour but most of my pieces were the clear/white jelly which was plain. 

So add the wibbly wobbly jelly on a plate texture, the mostly plain flavour of the jelly and the complete absence of chocolate taste and it all adds up to an unimpressive bar. 

I had one square with no jelly and none that seemed to be touching it and the chocolate had a little flavour there, quite milky and creamy but nothing I'd go out of my way to buy. 

5/10

Cocoa Mousse Limited Edition 

Chocolate with cocoa filling (28%) and chocolate filling (20%)

Like when I opened the Fresh & Fruity bar the chocolate scent took a back seat, instead of awful jelly there was a delicious cocoa smell this time round. 

I broke a piece of just chocolate off to see if this one had any flavour and pleasingly it did. It's 55% so not very dark but not too sweet or milky and was perfectly tasty alone. 

The cocoa filling is the star of the show though, I know mousse is in the name, and it's described as filling but this was so thick it was almost like a paste - and for once I didn't refrigerate the bar so there's no chance of it thickening up because it was cold. It has a beautiful rich cocoa flavour, I wish I knew what they used I'd like to buy a tub of purely that! 

There's also a chocolate filling, if you look carefully in the photo you'll be able to see two different colours in the paste centre. To be honest it takes a back seat to the cocoa flavour and blends in with the actual chocolate but it does add some sweetness that I didn't notice when I tried the chocolate alone. 

Overall the bar is fairly sweet but the cocoa filling is what stands out the most. It's such an intense, creamy, rich flavour but manages to stop short of being too much which I think is due to the sweeter chocolate filling balancing it out. Polar opposite to the Fresh & Fruity bar! 

8/10 

E.Wedel Dark Tiramisu

I've come to the last of my E.Wedel bars from Poland and I've stuck with the dark chocolate flavours, this one is Tiramisu. 

E.Wedel provide a long (especially to translate!!) blurb on the back of the wrapper stating "Tiramisu is administered heavily chilled. In Italy dessert is traditionally eaten for lunch, because thanks to the content of biscuits soaked in very strong coffee is stimulant. The remaining components of this dessert are mascarpone and amaretto" Thank you Google translate! 

The dark chocolate comes in about usual for E.Wedel at 50% although it looks a lot darker. 

It also follows the previous bar shapes with those funny pods on the top. I knew from the Panna Cotta and Créme Brûlée bars that most of the filling would be held inside those little blobs. Despite appearances it actually smelt a little sweeter than other E.Wedel darks I've had and felt a bit thicker to hold and to bite into. 

Again running through the bar is a thick sweet cream, this time round it had tiny Amaretto flavoured biscuit granules dotted thoughout it. The cream is sweet and rich but because only there is only 1.9% biscuit granules the cream overpowered any ameretto flavouring they may have had. They do really add to the bar in terms of texture though mixing well with the thick cream and smooth chocolate. 

I think the Mascarpone flavour might have meant to have been in the cream but I didn't notice any at all in the bar. The dark filling of the pod suggested that was where the coffee flavour would be but, considering in E.Wedels own words Tiramisu is supposed to be soaked in coffee, the flavour was very mild - more of an aftertaste. 

Overall the general taste of the bar was just a creamy sweetness. I wouldn't have guessed this was supposed to be Tiramisu but it was still very enjoyable, especially with the added biscuit pieces. I think this bar has suffered, whereas the others improved, from the dark chocolate. It has quite a strong flavour which overwhelmed any individual flavours in the centre. One bar which might have benefited from being a milk chocolate instead. 

I did really like this though, E.Wedel do make a good, semi sweet dark chocolate. 

7/10 

E. Wedel Créme Brûlée

Staying with Poland and back to E.Wedel, today's review is Créme Brûlée. It's a dark chocolate with a Créme Brûlée flavour filling but the chocolates not too dark at 50%. 

The bar was nice and dark to look at and while it did smell noticeably darker than milk chocolate it was still pretty sweet. 

It was portioned the same as the previous E.Wedel bar I'd tried with square blocks with a funny pod type thing on top of each. The bar didn't snap into very even squares, the pod things were quite flimsy and made it difficult to break the chocolate up - I wouldn't have been able to portion squares off without getting the centres everywhere so I had to eat it all at once.. 

There are two different parts to the filling, the first is the cream coloured that runs thoughout the bar. It had a slightly strange gritty texture, that looking at the ingredients seems to come from Caramel flakes. The flavour is lovely - sweet and creamy with a custard flavour. The texture while a bit weird is perfect for the bar, it really reminded me of slightly toasted caramelised sugar and mixed with the flavour is perfect for Créme Brûlée. 

The pods had the actual caramel flavouring though, made from caramel paste it was very thick, runny and gooey and despite looking it wasn't overly sweet. It went well with the creamier filling running through the the rest of the chocolate. 

I really enjoyed the chocolate itself too. It didn't have a very dark flavour and at times tasted more like a plain chocolate than dark but it was delicious and complimented the sweet Créme Brûlée middle well, a milk chocolate would probably work as the filling really is tasty but it would be bordering on sugar overload. 

I really liked this bar, individually the chocolate was good and the two different fillings were good but a mouthful with all three together was just delicious. 

My favourite so far of the E.Wedel bars. 

Rating 8/10 

Wawel Marcepan

Can you tell Tesco had a sale on Polish chocolate? 

For this weeks Wednesday world food review its another Wawel bar, a company I've had mixed experiences with previously, from Poland and this is Marcepan 'Marzipan coated chocolate product'. 

For a bar that weighs roughly the same size as a standard (for now anyway) chocolate at 35g, it was a little on the small side but for the size it felt pretty heavy. It was a little strange smelling, I couldn't work out what was the stronger scent; the darker chocolate coating with 43% minimum cocoa solids or the sweet marzipan centre. 

I couldn't get a clean cut as the marzipan is quite thick so I ended up snapping the chocolate before I got through. Although the filling is pretty solid it melts away in the mouth and turns into a pleasant sort of creamier, grittier texture. The filling thankfully didn't taste as sweet as it smelt but for a product that states quite a few times on the wrapper that it has 31% almonds, I expected the almond flavour to shine through a bit more. 

I didn't get much of a taste of the chocolate, the coating is very thin and the marzipan drowned out any darker flavours there might have been. I think a darker chocolate was the perfect choice though to balance against the sweet centre, milk would be too sweet. 

Rating 7/10 

E.Wedel Panna Cotta

Back to E.Wedel and Poland with this weeks world food review. It's a bar I've been eyeing up for a while but I'd only seen it in huge 200g bars, I managed to find a smaller single bar though so I grabbed it. 

This is a milk chocolate with Panna Cotta flavour filling. 

The Panna Cotta filling is a mixture of cream and raspberry and the raspberry is made with raspberry juice concentrate, it smelt very strong - as soon as I opened the wrapper all I could smell was the raspberry, no chocolate scent at all. The bars pretty cool looking and makes a change from a boring block of chocolate.

I snapped the first block off along the little indentations and all I could see was the cream, it had no noticable scent - I could still just smell the raspberry! 

Snapping that little block in half again revealed the source! Taking my first bite I felt the texture of the cream first, it was quite thick but I didn't notice too much flavour. Almost instantly the raspberry flavour kicked in and it was just as strong as the smell. I've found E.Wedel to be a bit hit and miss on fillings but the raspberry was pretty decent. It actually tastes fruity rather than an artificial chocolate bar filling - E.Wedel using real ingredients in their bars does pay off sometimes! It was very sweet but not too much and tasted summery and somewhat (for chocolate) refreshing. 

The chocolate was fine, same as with all the other bars but both the chocolate and cream were overwhelmed by the jam like, strong raspberry. 

Now if I'd left the review there it would be getting a 7/10 but the last two squares I ate had an awful acidic, sort of sour flavour in them. It was stronger than the raspberry which is saying something. I couldn't work out if it was the flavour of the cream appearing or something had gone a bit wrong with the jammy part but it was absoloutly disgusting. 

I'll give the bar the benefit of the doubt and assume something was wrong with the last two squares but it does knock the rating down a bit. 

Rating 6/10 

Ptasie Mleczko waniliow (Dark chocolate coated marshmallow)

This afternoons Wednesday World food review is another from Poland and E.Wedel. It's called Ptasie Mleczko waniliowe and is a dark chocolate covered vanilla marshmallow bar.

It's helpfully portioned into two individual fingers should you wish to share and the total weight of the pack is 50g - they're actually pretty heavy considering its marshmallow inside. 

They smelt good, not too dark though but it's only 47% so still quite sweet and milky and I could smell the sweetness. 

The chocolate coating is very thin and to be truthful some mouthfuls I didn't taste chocolate at all and some it was more of an aftertaste. As an overall bar I could taste the chocolate but the marshmallow is the dominant flavour. That said the marshmallow is vanilla apparently but I didn't really pick up on that. It was quite sweet, not overly so but had more of a general/generic marshmallow flavour. 

The marshmallow was quite thick and heavy but still soft and fluffy somehow. At first I had to chew it but it melted away to a smoother fluff like texture - like the spread. I'd actually refrigerated this and I'm glad I did as the chocolate coating had a lovely crisp bite to it. 

It was so so. Not bad, not great. It made for a change from what I've been eating recently which was nice but it really could have done with a thicker chocolate coating. 

Rating 6/10 

Wawel Maciek Adwokat

It's Wednesday so another foreign treat and another Wawel bar! This is Maciek Adwokat. I thought Maciek meant milk, as in milk chocolate but according to Google translate it means POTBELLY?!? So thanks Wawel, that's a bit offensive... This is a milk chocolate bar though with Advocaat filling, if you don't know what Advocaat is, here is the wiki on it "Advocaat or Advocaatenborrel is a traditional Dutch alcoholic beverage made from eggs, sugar and brandy.^[] The rich and creamy drink has a smooth, custard-like flavor and is similar to eggnog. The typical alcohol content is generally somewhere between 14% and 20% ABV. Its contents may be a blend of egg yolks, aromatic spirits, sugar or honey, brandy, vanilla and sometimes cream (or evaporated milk)" Advocaat is the alcoholic ingredient in a Snowball, which I know I've tried but it's been a while! 

If you've read my previous Wednesday posts you'll know Wawel don't muck about when it comes to the filling and Adwokat is no different, the filling takes up 45.5% of the bar and actually contains 2% alcohol and 1.8% egg yolks so quite authentic on ingredients. I purchased this on a Tesco self service till and even got I.D'd for it! 

Opening it up the chocolate was the main smell but there was a faint alcoholic-y scent to it, I haven't had Advocaat for years so I couldn't tell you if it was true to the drink but there was a hint of booze there. The filling was once again very thick and I actually managed to separate the centre from the chocolate with this bar and eating it alone it could be quite gritty. It has a creamy flavour to it, is quite sweet and rich and very enjoyable actually. I wouldn't compare the taste to a custard though but that is me going by the Wikipedia here, Advocaat itself might taste nothing like custard to me! 

I also got to taste the chocolate alone, it has 30% cocoa solids so isn't too sweet and is quite creamy. I found my favourite way to eat this bar was like a Creme egg - bite a bit off, eat the filling then the outside - but the 'normal' way was just as tasty too. 

Even though this only contains 2% alcohol it wasn't very evenly distributed in my bar, for the first few squares I found the centre very tasty but lacking any real alcohol flavours despite the scent. I then got to the last two squares which is where all the booze had settled apparently! Those last two little blocks were like eating a square of solidified pure alcohol!! Those parts weren't as nice as the rest of the bar but I wish some other alcoholic chocolates were as strong as them! 

Of the three Wawel bars I've previously reviewed this is my favourite, and I think they also sell it in a massive 200g bar too. 

Rating 7/10 

Wawel Krówkowy mleczny

It's a Wednesday! Also known as hump day to many, pizza night in our house and the day I'll hopefully be continuing my weekly review of a foreign food. Now it just needs a catchy name - suggestions welcome! 

Carrying on with the Wawel brand from Poland, I chose Krówkowy mleczny 'milk chocolate bar with caramel filling (50%)'. It's quite a big bar, weighing in at 48g and as you can see, taking up a fair part of a side plate. 

Unlike last weeks bar the chocolate shell of the bar felt quite thin and if you look carefully at the top right of the photo you can see where it had snapped before I'd even removed it from the wrapper. This can probably be explained by the fact the caramel and the chocolate unusually have an exactly equivalent percentage here, it's not often there is literally just as much filling as there is chocolate! 

I didn't get to try unadulterated chocolate as the caramel was so thick and sticky, try as I might I just couldn't get a piece without any on and as the chocolate was quite thin when I tried to scrape the caramel away it just crumbled! 

I was slightly worried looking at a cross section as it looked just like last weeks not so impressive Toffi bar. To taste, it was better though. Despite appearances it was a lot less gritty than the previous filling, a lot smoother and creamier yet just as thick. It was still super sweet and very rich - the Polish must have very sweet teeth!! The sweetness meant I'd liked to have eaten this slowly a square at a time but the fragile chocolate didn't allow for that and I ended up with shards of chocolate and blobs of caramel all over the plate. 

The caramel flavour is pretty overwhelming, I did get a touch of milky, creamy chocolate but not enough to review. I did enjoy this bar more than the Toffi and it is quite nice but again I found it exceedingly sweet and I couldn't have eaten a bigger sized bar than this. 

Rating 6/10 

Wawel Maciek Toffi

We went a bit mad in the Tesco foreign food aisle on the 3 for £1 chocolates so I've decided to do a weekly Wednesday mini review on these! 

Kicking off with what sounded the most appetising to me Wawel Maciek Toffi, a milk chocolate with 45% toffee filling. 

The way the weather in Londons been lately (34 degrees outside and a good 10 degrees warmer in my kitchen!) I kept this in the fridge and so it's developed a bit of a bloom, but it is best by August so it could be that too. 

Snapping a square off I realised the 45% toffee wasn't an estimation, it really does fill nearly half the bar. I could tell before I'd even bitten into it that it was a thick toffee and I had my suspicions it would be super sweet - I'm sure you can see the sugar granules! 

Surprisingly at first all I could taste was the chocolate, I've tried Wawel chocolate and reviewed it a few times before and enjoyed it but I wasn't too impressed. The bloom doesn't usually affect the taste of the chocolate so I don't think it was the case here but this tasted like cheap (to be fair it was) inferior chocolate. The toffee soon announced itself and good God it was sweet. I had a slab of English toffee last night and it was chewy, buttery and enjoyable - this was grainy, thick, gooey and overpowering. I think it would be suited to a more bitter, darker chocolate or even less of the toffee in the same bar but it was just not very nice here. I didn't enjoy the sickly aftertaste it left either so not a good start really, fingers crossed the others are nicer! 

Rating 5/10 

Wawel chocolates

I have two chocolate bars in this post, I'm not sure if they're new bars completely or just new to Asda when I bought them. They're both Wawel bars and judging by the company address and language it's all written in this is a Polish brand. 

Firstly I tried (I think) the Kaszstanki bar. It's a dark chocolate which went down well, it's not too dark so I didn't feel it was too much after one or two squares but it doesn't taste milky. 

The centre has a lovely texture, it was creamy yet still crunchy and had a delicious rich cocoa flavour. 

Despite being a darker bar it's very moreish and this didn't last long at all, I enjoyed the fact it was a filled bar whereas I find the flavoured fillings are usually paired with milk chocolate and the nut/whole pieces in the darks. 

Rating 7/10 

The other bar I had is, again, I think called Krówkokwa. It's milk chocolate with 36% caramel filling (I managed to hang on to the wrapper to get the translation here!) 

The chocolate isn't great to be honest, it seemed quite greasy and waxy - not that I'd have noticed the taste against the filling - but I ended up with smeared chocolate everywhere.

The filling I did not enjoy at all at the beginning of the bar. My first few bites I couldn't taste caramel, just pure sugar. Eventually the flavour did come through a bit, it's very buttery and still extremely sweet. I just couldn't get into it as it was too sweet even for me! I think this filling could be OK if they used it in a dark bar - at least over 70%. Maybe then the sugar and bitterness could balance each other out but with milk it's just too much. 

Rating 5/10 

White Lion

Bit of a random one today, I found this white Lion bar in Home Bargains, grabbed one for my fiancée and thought I'd get myself one while I was at it. 

It weighs in a bit smaller than a standard Lion bar at 42g and my wrapper is polish. Strangely some version of caramel (?) - karmelemis (PL), karamele (LT), Ar karameli (LV) etc is listed at 34.5% while the English is just white chocolate 41.9%. Weird! 

Anyway despite being smaller this is still a sturdy bar of chocolate. It looks quite impressive taking it out, big crispy pieces sticking out all over the place and a white finish that doesn't look like chocolate it's so thick! 

It's a creamy chocolate but let's be honest, it's white so it's very sweet! I do like Lion bars as they remind me of my pick and mix favourite Chocolate Fudge Crunch just on a much bigger scale, that chewy crispy gooeyness and that's still here in abundance. So much so it actually gave me a jaw ache! 

This made a nice change from milk chocolate and while it's not something I would crave and eat regularly I did enjoy it. I liked having something a bit different from the new trends like salted caramel and super dark organic bars. 

Rating 7/10 

World Foods Part 3

E Wedel Gorzka

This is another 100g block of chocolate from E  Wedel, this particular bar was purchased in Asda but I know for a fact I've seen it on sale in Tesco and lots of newsagents in my area.

When I bought this I thought Gorzka meant dark going by the picture on the front, but when according to google translate it actually means bitter.

I really enjoyed this, I wouldn't say it was bitter as such but it has a nice dark flavour.

It's quite thick which is definitely a quality I look for in chocolate, there's nothing better than that nice crunch when you take a bite and Gorzka ticks that box.

I would compare this bar to maybe a Bournville bar, in that some dark chocolates are too much and you can't eat more than a few squares but I had no problem working my way through this bar! Very nice.

Rating 7/10

Thai Glico Strawberry Flavour Pocky

I have a shameful confession to make in that I've never had Pocky or Mikado or anything like that before, maybe I should have chosen a plain chocolate version to compare this to but never mind.

Again this is from Asda a few weeks ago but I've only just got round to eating them. I was very surprised at how many came in a pack, especially as from what I could work out from the packaging a pack is one serving.

They're quite thin breadstick style biscuits, but from the parts without the strawberry flavouring on they seemed to have a nice flavour to themselves. At first I tried a single stick and was a bit disappointed, they were nice and crunchy but the strawberry was quite dull. I've learnt now though that these need to be eaten in at least multiples of two, and then I realised why it's just one serving, wow these are moreish!!

I really enjoyed these, there's a nice mix between the texture of the crunchy biscuits and the yoghurt(?) or chocolate (I'm not sure the box just says confectionary) strawberry flavour. I think before I buy these again I will try the chocolate versions first I can imagine they're delicious.

Rating 7/10

E Wedel Gorzka Wiśniowa

This is Gorzka Wiśniowa, which I think I've worked out from the other bar and the picture on the front, means bitter cherry. Once again this is a 100g bar and there is actually an English translation on the back - 50% Dark chocolate with cherry filling.  

This is a nice dark bar, for some reason when I opened mine it looks a bit busted - I've checked the date on the pack and it's still good until November but hey ho!

When I took it out I didn't break it apart,  it literally fell to pieces which was a bit worrying considering how it looked. It doesn't really come across in the photo and I was too worried to try and break it apart again in case it disintigrated but there's a white cream labelled as cherry filling inside each square as well as what's on the ingredients list as " 1.3% jelly puree".

Worrying that this was stale was a waste of time, I should have known from the strong cherry smell that it was still fresh and wow it tasted good! I've never had a bar with a purée in it before let alone one with a purée and a cream filling but I'll definitely keep my eyes peeled for another one. The cherry flavour was very intense  and really complimented the dark chocolate. It didn't taste artificial to me either, maybe that's because of the purée, and has a lovely fruity taste rather than sugary.

A really nice, moreish bar of chocolate.

Rating 8/10  

World Foods Part 2

Dairy milk tiffin (Ireland)

This is another Irish cadbury bar I got from Tesco. Its dairy milk chocolate with raisins and biscuits and as you can see mine had quite a lot of biscuit in it.

The bar itself is your usual dairy milk chocolate - which is delicious, I'm not sure if the Irish bars are a little different or my imagination is playing tricks on me because it's still square but this tastes better to me than our dairy milk.

Anyway I love raisins in chocolate, fruit and nut is probably my favourite of our standard, non limited edition cadbury range and the raisins in this bar are no exception, however I'm not sure if my bar was old or stale but I couldn't really taste the biscuit. I got the texture - which was fine I love chewy and crunchy together as I say over and over and over (woops) again but I really didn't get any biscuit flavour which was a shame as I really enjoyed the other Irish bar and had high hopes for this one. 

Rating 6/10 

Cadbury Caramello (Ireland)

I decided to look the ingredients up after wondering about them in the previous review and interestingly the English version Cadbury Caramel has Glucose syrup as the 3rd ingredient and no cocoa mass that I can see listed and the Irish Cadbury Caramello has no glucose syrup listed as far as I can tell and cocoa butter and cocoa mass as the third and fourth ingredient. So maybe I wasn't imagining the taste difference. Also English Cadbury Caramel has a 40% caramel filling and the Irish Caramello has 26% filling.

I actually prefer less caramel, it doesn't overpower the bar and you get the taste of

the actual chocolate aswell as the delicious caramel flavour and I didn't end up with melted caramel all over my fingers which is always a result.

I really enjoyed this bar and I would take this over our version of the caramel bar any day. Lovely. 

 Rating 8/10

E wedel mleczna toffi

This is a polish 50% milk chocolate with toffee flavoured filling bar according to thesmall part in English on the back. That's all I can really tell you about it as all the google results are in polish and the translate button seems to have disappeared.

This comes in a 100g bar, and I actually bought this as part of an offer in Asda but Ive seen it in all the big supermarkets and lots of newsagents.

I was quite surprised that for such a big bar it only had 10 squares ( there goes my willpower) -  it doesn't feel like you're  eating a bigger "sharing" bar when there's so few squares and so I ate the lot in one go.

The chocolate is nice and creamy, I'm in the chocolate in the fridge camp, especially as my only cupboard is above the fridge so everything put in it that can, will, melt and almost immediately this had started. I'm not too sure what that says about the quality of chocolate, if anyone knows but this is nice.

The filling disappointed me a bit, it was quite mild. I had expected quite a strong overpowering toffee flavour and while the toffee was there it didn't stand out to me very much.

I'm  not sure if I'd buy this bar again, for price value (75p as standard in tesco) it's good chocolate but for taste over all others, I think I'd probably choose something else.

Rating 6/10

Hershey's special dark mildly sweet chocolate (USA)

Before I start this review I'll say I looked at the ingredients for this bar after the dairy milk bars and even though this is a "dark" semi sweet bar the first and main ingredient is sugar! Actual chocolate came in second…

Anyway this bar is OK, a bit on the thin side but it had a nice snap to it once I took it out of the fridge. I couldn't taste any of the sick taste that lots of people outside of the US associate with Hershey's but this was far too sweet for me to consider as a dark bar - nowhere even near Bournville or any of the other low percentage dark bars. It was nice though, nicer than Hershey's plain milk chocolate.

Rating 6.5/10