As part of our Wellington Chocolate Tour we did, we visited Kapiti Chocolate factory. (Tour details is under the  'Travels' tab on this website).

Here is what our chocolate hoard tasted like.

MARSHMELLOW BRICK
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The marshmellow was nice and squidgy.  There was a nice covering of chocolate and the brick is quite a big size.  Like the size of a pack of cards.  The raspberry marshmellow flavour wasn't really there, but it was still an enjoyable munch.

IRISH CREAM FUDGE WITH CHOCOLATE COATING
This fudge was very buttery in flavour and had a nice texture.  We could barely taste any Irish Cream flavour though.

KAKO FAVOURITES SELECTION
These are 15 individually wrapped chocolates.

​CARAMEL MILK CHOCOLATE
The caramel was nice and there was a nice amount of milk chocolate shell.

MINT CREME DARK CHOCOLATE
These were pleasant.  The mint was not too strong.

ORANGE DARK CREME
These had an orange lollipop flavour.  They were nice, not a natural flavour, but still yum.

STRAWBERRY MILK CHOCOLATE
These had a yummy thick chocolate shell.  The Strawberry fondant was nice.  It reminded us of the Cadbury Roses strawberry flavour.

RASPBERRY DARK
This was our favourite.  The filling was a yummy raspberry jam taste.  It went really well with the dark chocolate.

KAPITI CHOCOLATE FACTORY EGGNOG FLAVOURED WHITE CHOCOLATE TABLET
This was a little bland.  We could barely make out any flavours apart from the white chocolate.  The white chocolate itself was very average.

KAPITI CHOCOLATE FACTORY LAVENDER INFUSED MILK CHOCOLATE 90g
This was so good!!  It is flavoured with Lavender oil and even though it has a good strong taste of lavender, it goes really well with the milk chocolate and is not overpowering.  It almost has a citrus peel tang to it, like eating a floral marmalade.

We have also previously tasted and reviewed the Kako artisan 12 range which were really nice.  If you were visiting the store we would recommend trying some of those artisan chocolates prepackaged or individually sold over the counter.   We also really loved the Lavender Infused Milk Chocolate.

For the odd snack on the run and surprisingly stops the hunger pangs, we quite like a pack of snack balls from time to time.  Usually comprising of dates, other dried fruits and other yummy bits, we decided to try some that featured Chocolate.

Joni's pet peeve is stale nuts, even if it is just a hint of rancidness so sometimes snack balls can be a bit hit and miss with this.

Frooze balls Fudgetastic ingredients are: Dates, raisins or sultanas, cashew nuts, almonds, sunflower seeds, raw cacao, coconut and himalayan salt.

The problem with stale nuts is  that the rancid flavour permeates the whole snack ball.  These nuts didn't taste fresh.  We didn't really enjoy this batch.

Tom & Lukes Original Dark Snack Balls Ingredients: Dates (58%), Cocoa Solids (25%), Almonds (10%), Desiccated Coconut (7.4%), Natural Vanilla Flavour, Sea Salt 

The nuts were fine, but the coconut wasn't fresh.  Now we are sounding fussy, but it's not as bad as stale nuts.  We still ate them.

Tom & Luke Choc Brownie Ingredients: Dark chocolate (28%) cashews, dates, cacao powder (6%), cacao butter, dark chocolate chips (5%), chicory root fibre, natural vanilla flavour, sea salt, desiccated coconut.

These were yum.  Maybe it is because they were the most chocolatey, but they tasted good to us.

Final thoughts.  Snack balls are yum when the are fresh, but Joni is super fussy when it comes to freshness in these.  Those triple brownies were yum.

While we were doing our Wellington Chocolate Tour, we found The Chocolate Story stocked Hogarth Chocolate.  They had the new bar we hadn't tried, Licorice Caramel.

Caramelised white chocolate and licorice 35% cacao
Ingredients:
Sugar
Cocoa Butter
Skim Milk Powder
Clarified Butter
Licorice Powder 3.5%
Sunflower Lecithin

This bar is very sweet as most caramilised white chocolate bars are.  The flavour of the caramilised white chocolate is really nice, golden syrupy and fudgey.  The licorice flavour is really balanced.  It's a compliment flavour to the caramilised white chocolate, and does not overpower it.  It adds like a spice note to the  chocolate and makes an enjoyable flavour combo. 

​Joni is a licorice fan and loved this bar.  Johanan is not a licorice fan and still thought this bar was okay.

I bunch of new choccie things have caught our eye, when travelling around the supermarket aisles.  We bought a stash to try.

NESTLE KITKAT DARK WITH RASPBERRY

The dark with the raspberry was nice.  Joni prefers the darker versions of Kitkats, because they seem less sweet.  

NESTLE KITKAT INSPIRED BY  TRIPLE CHOC  COOKIE

This really does taste like cookies.  KitKats are like wafer cookie fingers to us anyways, so this flavour went well with the KitKat concept.  Super sweet though!! More sweetness you would get from a cookie.

Speaking of Cookies....
GRIFFINS TOFFEE POPS CHOCOLATE BROWNIE

We like toffee pops.  These new toffee pops do have chocolate brownie flavours.  We like the caramel in the original toffee pops, so the original toffee pop is still our fave.

MALTESERS POPCORN FLAVOUR

The popcorn flavour is very fake.  Joni did not like these at all.  Johanan said they were ok.  Original Maltesers are much nicer.

NESTLE MILKY BAR WITH RASPBERRY INSPIRED BY ALLENS

We do like Milky Bar even though it technically it isn't a chocolate.  This was yummy too.  The raspberry are little hard jelly bits, the texture of raspberry licorice.  We liked this bar.

NESTLE CHOKITO BLOCK

Joni is a bit of a fan of the novelty Chokito bar.  This chocolate bar version is very sweet and lacked the malt, caramelly flavour the novelty bar has.  We prefer the novelty bar.

​A fun little chomp through some of the newbies available in a New Zealand supermarket.

We love Ocho chocolate, so always curious to try something of theirs we haven't tried before.  This  77% dark chocolate is sweetened by Stevia.
This bar has beans from Markham Valley, Papua New Guinea
The packaging notes say "you might taste dark berry and redcurrant notes, with an underlying cool creaminess."

The chocolate is very firm and has a nice snap that makes the mouth water.
We do get notes of berry and agree with the redcurrant note. We also picked up a slight burnt wood after note. 
Cane sugar to us, adds a caramel note to a chocolate.  Stevia is sweet, but different.  It doesn't have the same caramel note, more of a sweetness that is slightly astringent, maybe more acidy, tangy in flavor than cane sugar?
This 77% seems to have a good amount of stevia that adds not too much sweetness, and the chocolate flavors still shine.  This chocolate is not bitter and we didn't miss the cane sugar.  We liked it.

Two more bars to try from Raglan Chocolate!

NIBLICIOUS
Packaging notes:
​Caramelised white chocolate with crunchy roasted cacao nibbly bits.

INGREDIENTS:
Organic Cocoa Butter 30%
Waikato organic Milk Powder 20%
Organic Raw Sugar 
Organic Solomon Islands Cacao Nibs 10%
90g bar
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It is a gorgeous deep caramel colour.
​It tastes like golden syrup and russian fudge with raisins.  The chocolate is quite firm with a lovely crunch of nibs.  We enjoyed this one a lot.

SOLOMON ISLANDS 70%
Single Origin
Packaging notes: Light fruity notes, smoothing out the Darkness

INGREDIENTS:
Organic Solomon Islands Cacao Beans 70%
Organic Raw Sugar
90g bar

We could taste notes of black earthiness, and a slight smokey coffee.  It is a nice strong dark flavoured chocolate, without being bitter.  After the sweetness ride we have had from supermarket bought chocolate lately, we were almost craving something like this.  So good!