If you’re looking for a fantastic bit of raw chocolate then look no further than this new bar from Conscious Chocolate. This is pretty much as perfect a blend of mocha as you’re going to ever come across. The raw coffee beans work really well with the raw chocolate to give you a delicious coffee taste with a zing of chocolate in it. My flatmate and I gobbled this bar up. Highly recommended.

And, like other Conscious Chocolate bars this one consists of cacao butter, cacao powder, wild carob, agave as a sweetener, coconut butter, spices, and Himalayan salt.

Further information:
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate (Official site)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

A great bar with a lovely tang to it thanks to the grapefruit, orange, lemon and lime in it. However, gets a slightly lower rating than Conscious Chocolate’s Best Ever Essential Orange as the zests in the bar don’t blend as well as this citrusy essential oil does with the chocolate’s high cacao level content.

Nonetheless, like all of Conscious Chocolate bars, this is, as always glorious raw, organic chocolate, which is naturally sweetened with the plant sugar agave (cactus nectar), which is suitable for vegetarians due to its low glycaemic index .

Further information:
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate (official site)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

Travel review: Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh, Scotland
Rating: *** (out of 5)
Review by: Alexa Williamson

With parts of it dating from the 12th century, Holyrood Palace is everything that a royal residence should be – magnificent and wonderfully decorative.

Entry into the palace is enchanting as a “small but perfectly formed” building emerges in front of you. With its pointed towers, it sprawls over well manicured, dark green grounds with Arthur’s Seat in the backdrop.

Although it’s still used by the royals when they visit Edinburgh, Holyrood Palace’s most famous occupants were Mary, Queen of Scots and King James V (the originator of the King James Bible – the first bible to be Protestant and written in English instead of Latin).

About a dozen rooms are open for viewing with the dining room and its original George V silver, brightly polished and displayed proudly on the long table, being my favourite due to it still being a ‘usable’ dining room today. The king’s closet is also sumptuous with its 18th and 19^th century music ensemble of piano and harp, Delft tiles in the fireplace and Dutch carvings above it. Those who love historical lineages will enjoy a stroll through the king’s hall with all of the paintings of Scottish royals and Mary’s chambers, which are dimly lit and ornately decorated in deep red fabrics, are also intriguing. Her bedroom is a haunting corner of the palace’s attic which includes a dark, carved desk and amazingly detailed tapestries and a canopied bed, while her ante-chamber houses a stunning portrait of her donned in a deep red satin dress.

I gave Holyrood Palace a lower *s rating because it reminds me of several other stately homes I have been to (all of which have lots of darkly coloured paintings of their owners, many faded tapestries and busy-patterned red rugs).

However, what extremely impressed me though was the knowledge of the stewards in each room. They could answer any question thrown at them in great detail. For example, one fresh-faced uni student told me that the wall that separated the back garden from Holyrood Park was called a ‘haha’, it was eight feet high and was covered by grass intentionally so that it blended into the garden.

Holyrood Palace is easy to reach as it’s situated at the bottom of the Old Town’s High Street (also known as The Royal Mile) and makes a great time-out from the rest of one’s busy sight-seeing itinerary and has the added bonus of having a beautiful park behind it that can be visited right after walking the grounds and halls that has housed many a royal through the centuries.

Further information:
Holyrood Palace (official site)
Holyrood Palace history (Wikipedia)
]]> http://thelondonreviewer.com/2008/02/25/travel-review-holyrood-palace-edinburgh-scotland-3/feed/ 0 Alexa http://thelondonreviewer.com/2008/02/19/product-review-conscious-chocolates-love-your-heart-superfood/ http://thelondonreviewer.com/2008/02/19/product-review-conscious-chocolates-love-your-heart-superfood/#comments Tue, 19 Feb 2008 23:41:34 +0000 alexa http://thelondonreviewer.wordpress.com/2008/02/19/product-review-conscious-chocolates-love-your-heart-superfood/ ]]> Product review: Conscious Chocolate’s Love Your Heart Superfood chocolate
Rating: **** (out of 5)
RRP £3.95 for 40g
Review by: Alexa Williamson

Wasn’t sure what to expect from this raw, dark chocolate bar, as I wasn’t too keen on the combination of spices in their Love Potion No 9 (also raw, dark chocolate). However, this one was absolutely scrumptious!

This is a simple bar with a rich taste – and the combination of cacao butter and powder with the wild carob, coconut butter, vanilla and spices and Himalayan salt is perfect.

It delivered an excellent combination of anti-oxidants, clearer thinking and euphoria due to the cacao content and blue-green algae. Highly recommended and worth the price*.

*Also impressive is the fact that it’s handmade and the packaging includes recycled paper.

Further information:
Conscious Chocolate (official site)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

This raw, organic and (obviously vegan) dark chocolate sounded exciting with a list of ingredients that includes essential oil of Otto Rose and spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and cayenne. However, it failed to be as good as expected and merely had a bitter, unenticing taste. The cacao content also failed to deliver the wonderful and clear state of mind (due to anti-oxidants) or serotonin-derived joyful mood that the similar Raw Intent organic chocolate, that I tried recently, did.

Still a meritable product for being handmade, sugarfree and using recycled paper in their packaging.

Good news though: their Love Your Heart Superfood bar is excellent (read the review)!

Further information:
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate (official site)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

Trying to keep my sugar consumption low in 2008, I thought I’d give this bar a try as the 70% cacoa content appealed. However, the artificial sweetener (which carries health risks) in this bar, aspartame, and malitol (a natural plant-based sugar alcohol, which still has minuses) – were so overwhelming they gave me diarrhea and just generally made me feel sick. Although I thought the cacao content was good, I wouldn’t touch this bar again with a ten-foot poll – unless I want to jeopardise my health!

NB: I can’t comment on the quality of their other chocolates and they may be very good – ie the ones without these sweeteners.

Further information:
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

For chocolate lovers – especially those who are into dark chocolate – this is a heavenly experience as it’s all natural with the main ingredient being raw cacao, mixed with coconut butter, brazil nuts, macadamia, almonds, agave (a natural plant sweetener instead of sucrose), fructooligosaccharides (which help to promote gut flora growth), carob, lucuma and vanilla. With so few, it’s easy to list them out.

I loved this chocolate as shortly after eating it, the anti-oxidants in the cacao and the essential fatty acids and proteins in the nuts gave me a real intelligence burst. Plus, I also noticed a fantastic serotonin rush and instant happy mood, which one gets from pure cocoa, for about six hours after consuming this. The results were better than a regular chocolate bar, such as Cadbury’s, because the ingredients were 100% natural and not diluted with milk.

And, finally, the chocolate, is according to Raw Intent, suitable for people who need to be on a “sugar free*, dairy free, gluten free, heat free, additive free, chemical free” diet, but still want to eat treats.

* Agave and lacuma are natural sugars but have a low GI content, which Raw Intent say, “are suitable for people with blood sugar disorders”.

Further information:
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
Raw Intent’s Raw Chocolate Pie Bites (official site)

and also scrummy…
Raw Intent’s Luxury Chocolate Pie (official site), RRP £4.99

Healthy chocolate. Isn’t the product description itself a contradiction in terms?

Chocolate should be a decadent treat, an indulgence to be paid off through penance in the gym. Can there really be chocolate that is good for you? Improbably enough, Raw Intent has created a range of such products.

Apropos to Valentine’s Day, I recently sampled a variety of their Raw Chocolate Delights candies, created from raw cacao, coconut butter, low GI natural sweeteners such as agave and lacuna, and vanilla. These bonbons are organic, vegan and suitable for diabetics. What’s not to love?

Delight Bars

First up were Delight Bars, cubes of dark chocolate filled with a creamy centre. Not for the sweet-toothed are these. The bitter dark shell has a complex flavour that lingers on the tongue, but is tempered by the rich sweetness of the fudgy centre.

Bitter Bites

Similar to these were the more aptly named Bitter Bites, which are dusted with powdered cacao. Unfortunately for my palate, the dark bitterness of the outer shell tended to overpower the sweetness of the creamy centre, particularly with the Delight Bars. But those who like their chocolate not just dark, but black as the jungle night, should find these a real treat.

Raw Chocolate Heart Minis

Closer to conventional confectionary were their new, and best-selling, Raw Chocolate Heart Minis. No baking chocolate here, just melt-in-your-mouth squidginess.

Proving these sweets’ healthy credentials was the graininess and tell-tale aftertaste of the raw chocolate, which conspired to tempt me into further bites. If your Valentine’s on a health kick, then these would be the perfect treat.

Further information:
Raw Intent (official site)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

Considering all of the excellent, healthy, antioxidant-rich ingredients that this bar has in it, it will always be a good pick-me-up for someone needing an energy or mental concentration boost*. However, I found it, sadly too peppery a taste that diluted the fine chocolate flavour underneath it.

* Besides the cacao powder in the bar, the essential fatty acids/protein in the hazelnuts and the cayenne pepper are also both excellent for providing helping energy levels and mental clarity.

Further information:
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate (official site)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)

Just the right blend of chilli and chocolate. The combo is mouthwatering for anyone who loves spicey chocolate – a very Mexican thing. (Read The Discovery of Chocolate and you’ll know what I mean!)

Cayenne is also a great stimulant for cleaning the blood, helping it flow well throughout the body and enhancing mental function and energy levels.

Further information:
Conscious Chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Raw Intent chocolate reviews (The London Reviewer)
Conscious Chocolate (official site)
What makes for good chocolate? (The London Reviewer)
What’s in raw chocolate? (The London Reviewer)