In 1689, Sir Hans Sloane's Milk Drinking Chocolate launched in London. Fast forward a few hundred years and Sir Hans Sloane Chocolates of Byfleet, Surrey, are keeping his discovery alive with their range of 'posh hot chocolates'.
I bought a selection of the Sloane's Hot Chocolate to review here and the first I'm testing is the 44% luxury blend of posh hot chocolate (since rebranded as the Luscious Luxury Blend).
Packaging
The 400g of hot chocolate beads arrived in a reusable plastic clip-lid jar, resembling a traditional mason jar but in a lightweight format.
I can see myself reusing the jar to conveniently store other hot chocolate blends, or for decanting the 250g bags into. A glass jar would have been more versatile in its afterlife though.
A simple tag on the neck, affixed to a loop of elastic string, contained a brief set of recipe instructions, the ingredients list, and allergen information.
Sloane's Luxury Blend 44% Posh Hot Chocolate ingredients:
Sugar, cocoa mass, cocoa butter, whole milk powder, emulsifier (soy lecithin), natural vanilla flavouring. Contains cocoa solids 44% minimum.
No nutritional information was available on the packaging or on the website as far as I could see. The Great Taste award-winning hot chocolate is suitable for vegetarians and is gluten free.
Sloane's Luxury Blend 44% Posh Hot Chocolate Review
Peering through the jar, it was clear that there was a mix of milk and dark chocolate pebbles forming the luxury blend. Beads of varying shapes and sizes filled the jar, with the largest around 1cm in width and the smallest at the bottom spanning a mere 1mm.
Popping open the lid, I smelled a variety of aromas, with the creaminess at the forefront. Hints of vanilla, butter, and caramel all came through in this sweetly scented chocolate mix.
Tasting the beads individually, I started with the dark chocolate. The sweetness landed first, with a rich, ever-so-slight bitterness that peeked through towards the end. It was especially mild on flavour so while it has a district chocolatey flavour, it didn't exhibit much in the way of complex flavours.
The sugars rushed to the foreground in the milk chocolate too, but it was by far more vibrant in flavour, with hints of vanilla, honey, and caramel colouring the creamy flavour.
It was time to make hot chocolate! Sloane's Hot Chocolate recommends 25g of beads to 200ml of hot semi-skimmed milk or water. I made one hot chocolate using milk in a saucepan, adding the chocolate right at the end and stirring vigorously once the heat was turned off. For my second test, I cracked open my Hot Chocolate Shaker, filled it with chocolate, and replaced the milk with hot water.
The hot chocolate aroma was very much like a dense, gooey chocolate brownie - rich and sweet, with a dark side.
The flavour was rounded, with a mildly bitter edge. When made with water, it relied solely on the milk chocolate beads for its creaminess, leading to a purer, more intense beverage. The sugars made for a rich, sweet cup of hot chocolate and something that tasted extremely indulgent.
The dark chocolate tries to steer the flavour down a bitter road but the milk chocolate sprang into life to centre it again. For me, it tasted like a mug of strong, punchy milk chocolate, despite the inclusion of dark chocolate. If you are worried by the inclusion of dark chocolate beads in this blend, then fear not as it simply adds a robust depth to the overall flavour, leaving the milk chocolate flavour to sing away in the foreground.
Overall, these beads produced a rich, creamy, and delicious cup of hot chocolate regardless of base liquid. The balance between the flavours of milk and dark chocolate made for a very rounded chocolatey flavour. It was certainly an indulgent experience, befitting of a product that describes itself as a luxury blend.
Sloane's Luxury Blend 44% Posh Hot Chocolate Review
RRP: £10.00 | Sir Hans Sloane | Shop now°
A simple blend of milk and dark chocolate that is rich yet balanced, boasting creaminess and depth of flavour without being too heavy or bitter. The reusable plastic clip-top jar is a great way to present this product but it's not as convenient to reuse as a glass jar.
You can buy Sir Hans Sloane's 44% Luxury Blend Hot Chocolate direct from their website (£4 for 250g, or £10 for 400g). It's also available on Amazon here°.
Have you tried Sloane's Hot Chocolate and do you have a favourite blend? Let me know in the comments below.
