Chocolate Cream Eggs

Ah - the cream egg in all its variations! We have to start with the most beloved, classic Cadbury Egg - first in its standard size:

And then in the mini size:

I swear I thought the "yolks" used to be more yellow, but that might just be a childhood memory/delusion:

What can I say?  These are awesome - the chocolate is that delicious, creamy Cadbury chocolate.  The filling is a little bit rich for me, but they are good.  I find the little ones are a lot easier to eat - the big one is just too much.  But, hey - they rule the creme egg category rule and I don't think Cadbury should change a thing!

Russell Stover continues to suck.  The chocolate can't even come close to Cadbury's and this strawberry cream has little strawberry taste - just sweet and fluffy rather than creamy (like Cadbury).  Kinda gross:

The raspberry - in dark chocolate rather than milk, but still in that thin, crummy RS chocolate was better:

Better because the dark chocolate offsets the super sweetness of the "whip" and the raspberry taste was stronger than the strawberry.  But not something very good.

This was the worst of the three - just way too sweet (and the chocolate is not so good):

Of course, RS is better than Palmer because while their chocolate can't hold a candle to Cadbury's, it's way better than Palmer's.  I didn't even try these - the chocolate is so thick and so bad, no filling can save it:

But the flower is cute!

Sorry, Palmer.

These Kisses are special for Easter/spring and are buttercreme:

You all know I tend to really like Hershey's Kisses. But these I do not like. I do not like them, when I dream, I do not like the buttercreme. They have a kind of weird flavor to me - I guess I don't like buttercreme. The chocolate overpowers the weird taste after a minute, but why go there at all? I wouldn't waste my time with these if I were you. Sooooo many better options.

See's has a ton of eggs at Easter (last year they sent me some to review).  I wanted to try some I hadn't so I got this little egg assortment:

This one is chocolate butter:

I thought it was kind of dry.  Basically this is chocolate fudge covered in chocolate.  It really didn't do much for me.

This one is vanilla chip:

I thought this one was kind of dry too.  The filling was like vanilla fudge with some chocolate chips (which I thought would be good) but it wasn't.  Think dried out fudge - not so good.

This is Bordeaux:

This was the best of the three and Bordeaux is kind of like a brown sugar fudge coated in chocolate. 

See's has tons of larger eggs - these are sightly less than twice the size of a real egg.  The chocolate butter in the larger egg has walnuts:

And while I MUCH prefer this egg with the walnuts, it just doesn't blow me away.  For some reason all these eggs were kind of dry - dried out fudge is just no good.  The Bordeaux eggs were not dry, though.  Another mystery.

This is the big version of Bordeaux:

I like the addition of the sprinkles:

But, at the end of the day, this just doesn't do it for me.  Butter cream and brown sugar is too rich and sweet, I'd rather have peanut butter or caramel.

I haven't had great luck with Sanders in the past, but this egg surprised me:

I like maple and this had a great maple flavor with little bits of pecan coated in dark chocolate.  It's VERY rich though - like maple pecan fudge. 

As usual, this sucked:

Fluffy, sugary, vaguely mapley stuff inside a thin layer of crappy chocolate.  Glack!

Sanders also had a dark chocolate cherry egg:

But it wasn't very good - not much cherry taste.  The dark chocolate overpowered what little cherry flavor there was.  Not so good.

This is my favorite of all the creme eggs - See's Mayfair:

Hunks of cherry and pecans and wrapped in dark chocolate - I love this egg!  For me, all these flavors and textures work wonderfully together.  It is really delicious!!

I have to confess, after this, I'm just not buying anymore butter cream eggs.  They are too rich and kind of creep me out.  I do not like them in a box, I do not like them in my socks, I do not like them in a jar, I do not like them in my car, I'd rather have a chocolate bar.

Milk Chocolate Eggs (and a Carrot)

These are the most beautifully packaged chocolates I've yet to see:

Each of the eggs is slightly larger than life size and the color Mylar wrapping is tied with a golden cord:

I found them at Williams-Sonoma and they are Florentine Chocolate Eggs. They even have their own little plastic pedestal!

They were hollow and I find it hard to compare hollow chocolate to solid chocolate. I know - it shouldn't matter, but the thinner pieces let so much air get in and the smooth surface changes the texture. This is a wonderful silky milk chocolate - I'd place it between Lindt and Neuhaus (see below). Not quite as earthy as Neuhaus, but wonderful and delicious.

I found these Madelaine chocolates in Kohl's of all places (chocolate is everywhere - life is good!):

I really like these springy, tropical foil wrappers - they just scream aloha!

This is a solid milk chocolate. Good.

They also made these large solid milk chocolate eggs:

Very pretty, very good.

Isn't chocolate a beautiful thing?

These Hershey's Bliss eggs (in the stolen Cadbury packaging) are pretty good:

Mostly because of the "meltaway center":

It gives them a smooth, creamy richness. I really liked these.

Palmer has an egg assortment (we already reviewed caramel and peanut butter). This one is fudge:

Because it's more like a truffle with the fudge filling than their solid egg (below) it's better, but it's still got the outer waxy mockolate shell. These are just too sugary sweet and not chocolately enough. But the assortment was fun overall.

Palmer's regular solid mockolate eggs are just plain bad:

So waxy and just awful. Not worth the calories. Not even close.

I got this carrot which was originally $4.95 for 47 cents. I couldn't say no to it.

I'm showing you the back because I thought it was interesting to see all the drizzle marks:

This carrot was made by Seattle Gourmet Foods and was richer and creamier than both the Madelaine and the Harry and David Milk Chocolate Easter Eggs (I see why it was originally $4.95 - it was very good. I think they didn't sell because it was a carrot. No one wants to think about carrots when they are indulging in chocolate). The H & D Milk Chocolate Eggs:

In fact, I couldn't tell this one and the Madelaine eggs apart. They tasted exactly the same to me.

These are sooooo cute! They are a little bit smaller than all the other eggs:

Lindt has some great packaging - this is a little tin box:

These blew all the others out of the water. You just can't beat that super smooth and creamy Lindt chocolate. And this smaller size is great! Very poppable! (And thus very dangerous. Thank God they have the foil wrappers to slow you down.)

These are mini Lindor truffle eggs in the Lindt trademark golden bunny (I reviewed the little bunny that was in the middle in an earlier post - yep, he's gone):

But not forgotten!

Of course, they are fabulously creamy and delicious:

And the larger eggs? Need I even say anything?

So rich, so creamy, so decadent - I don't see how Godiva can stay in business with Lindt out there. There is just no comparison! These truffles are transcendent!

Speaking of Godiva:

I hate to say it, but these milk chocolate eggs are pretty good. They are not as good as Lindt, but they are better than H & D and Madeline.

But yet again, the ultimate winner is Neuhaus - at least in the solid milk chocolate category:

What makes these so good is they really taste like chocolate - that wonderful earthy, complex, rich taste. They aren't overly sweet or cloying. They are just about the chocolate.

You know, I'm really starting to get the hang of this chocolate thing. I see why Palmer is so bad and Neuhaus so good. But I had to pare it down to the essentials - i.e. no peanut butter or caramel confusing things. You really do have to try a lot of different things to figure out what works best for you. And you have to be brave enough to say - I've tried them all and I still like the Snickers bar! If you don't try different things though, you really can't know. That's what the journey is all about - trying things, exploring and figuring how who you really are.

Thanks for taking this chocolate journey with me! And let me know what you think or what you'd like me to review. Kris - coconut is still coming, I promise!!!!!