Musings - Making The Chocolate Change

Both Cat Deeley and the Archbishop of Canterbury (Rowan Williams) have been featured in the news recently encouraging us all to choose Fairtrade chocolate over the many brands that parade our supermarket shelves - some of them tasty but none of them holding a guarantee that a child didn’t suffer somewhere in the production from bean to product and that workers were fairly paid for their hard labour.

The great thing is, it’s really easy to make a difference, make a change and make it now. You simply stop buying the products that don’t carry the Fairtrade symbol or say they are organic. Consumers have been led down the garden path for many years with clever and creative advertising, being enticed to eat what is really a tiny bit of cocoa and masses of sugar and milk! But we can choose as individuals to be well-informed customers who don’t settle for second best and who don’t put up with the fact that people around the world are suffering because we continue to support the companies that employ their cheap labour. The Fairtrade/Organic products may sometimes be more expensive and may also take a bit of getting used to as they are often richer in cocoa content and even the milkier varieties are stronger tasting. But surely the more people who buy them, the more other brands will be forced into getting back to the drawing board and offering us items (chocolate in this case!) that are not tainted with the suffering of our fellow humans and that taste more like chocolate is supposed to taste like - heaven!

So here is some more good news. Me and a panel of three other expert chocolate lovers decided to carry out a taste-testing session of the loveliest chocs in the world, made by companies who care about people: their workers and the people who bring them the chocolate in the first place. Here’s what we think of three of the tastiest.

WOW! We all loved this company’s chocolate wares. All their products are ethically-produced and not only are their chocolates beautifully presented and wrapped, they taste incredible! We sampled hand-made cookies (rich and buttery in taste, melt-in-the-mouth and very satisfying) chocolate brownies (light and fluffy - gone within seconds and delicious), hand-made dark chocolate truffles (these were truly scrumptious, exquisite creations that again were fought over and gone all too soon!) and a favourite amongst us all - a rose and geranium white chocolate bar adorned with real rose petals. Sublime tasting all round and we will all definitely be buying from them in the future.

Simple yet elegant packaging and a wide range of flavours meant that all the taste-testers were happy! Our top favourites were the vanilla (really smooth and creamy), milk chocolate (a stronger taste than usual milk chocolate - much tastier and so very velvety), cherry (bittersweet and really flavoursome) and ginger (packs a real spicy punch!) The great thing about this company is that their products are very well priced but you also feel you are eating a bar fit for a king or queen because of the quality of the ingredients. All chocolate in moderation but these are bars that we’d happily eat for a sweet treat any time of the week!

They must have a team of brilliant designers for the packaging - that’s when we were hooked! This company have gone from strength-to-strength over the past few years and little wonder as they have great ethics, great chocolates and a great team of dedicated people working in their various stores. We tried their small speciality range of bars that included Bean Machine (with organic coffee - this was a clear favourite), Gourmet Gorilla (with almonds and hazelnuts), Whoopee (white chocolate with tiny freeze-dried raspberries - another favourite!) and Culture Shock that was covered in the mighty tasty and zingy Dragon Ginger. We also chomped our way through a most decadent White Chocolate with Cranberry and Almond Block (that speaks for itself - we drooled over this one for days then finally broke it up and shared it as evenly as possible! VERY tasty and made us feel festive even though it wasn’t Christmas) and a selection from their plain bars - phew!! What we loved about Montezuma is that their range is just so extensive and fun, fresh and funky without compromising at all on taste.

Other companies who also stock good quality, organic or fairly-traded chocolate are:

So you see, there are no more excuses! These are just some of the companies who make fine and fair chocolate - so if you are a true chocolate lover, do consider making the change and making the change for good! Of course, once you make the change to organic and fairtrade there is always raw chocolate to sample too!