Hotel Chocolat Luxury Chocolate Advent calendar

Every year, usually about now, my 6yo starts dropping hints about chocolate advent calendars.

Every year, I dutifully dig out our fabric advent calendar and try *not* to fill it with chocolate, but fill it with boxes of raisins and nuts and and and ...ok, a few chocolate sneak in there if we run out of homemade gingerbread stars & angels.

Every year, the 6yo laments the lack of a fully branded chocolate advent calendar. But what does Ben 10 have to do with Christmas I ask him? But Soandso has one comes the reply. I don't care. You're not Soandso (this is where I realise I've turned into my father).

So you can imagine the 6yo delight when this little beauty landed in our postbox:

I'm pretty sure the squeals of delight were audible some miles away...


I have to admit, I'm pretty taken with it myself.

It's beautifully illustrated with snowflakes and partridges in (pear?) trees.

There's even the essential Rhudolf, with his shiny red nose.

And as for the chocolates inside...well, i couldn't possibly comment seeing as we haven't opened door number 1 yet (ahem..slight fabrication). Ok, I admit it. I tasted one. In the name of research of course, you understand?

It was everything I have come to expect from Hotel Chocolat. Decent chocolate. Grown-up chocolate. In a lovely bite size festive shape too (but shhh, don't tell the children). And not a Ben 10 in sight.

Disclosure: We were kindly sent this Hotel Chocolate Advent Calendar to review, free of charge, but all views are my own.

Review: Cocoa Boutique. Luxury, artisan chocolate tasting experience.

So, a few weeks ago a lovely email popped into my inbox. I must confess, I practically squealed with excitement. I never rarely get approached by PR companies, which I try not to take as a personal reflection on my writing ;-) This isn't the type of blog that attracts lots of attention from PR circles, but that's fine. Eggdipdip is a rambling, ramshackle kinda place, but it suits me fine. I get to write what I want, when I want and not bother too much about offending or pleasing anyone in particular.

Anyway, back to this email. Would I like to be sent a box of luxury, artisan chocolates to review (aided by my two glamourous assistants as well of course)? it asked. Just a bit! Free chocolates to scoff  enjoy - what's not to like?

So, a couple of days later, this arrived:

I couldn't wait to open the box. I loved the simple, elegant look although I was surprised that the box wasn't more glossy looking given the luxury label. But I was impressed by the look nonetheless. Slightly reminiscent of Jo Malone packaging. Understated but elegant.

Inside, it all looked very special and enticing. Giant chocolate buttons, truffles and dark chocolate coffee beans all looked very inviting.

Each chocolats was beautifully finished and even had a 'menu card' with a detailed description of each one. We started off with the giant chocolate buttons (guess whose choice that was?). The milk chocolate ones got a huge thumbs up from both boys, but the white chocolate ones proved to be a bit disappointing. None of us were keen.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately for the sake of our teeth and waistlines), the box arrived at the start of a rather humid couple of days. So chocolate wasn't really our treat of choice for a good couple of days.

But in the name of research, we struggled on. Tasting each chocolate in turn and giving it our undivided attention.

But to be honest, we weren't blown away by them. I've had Hotel Chocolat tasting boxes in the past and they never fail to impress. But these chocolate just weren't...as special. The packaging was lovely, the chocolates themselves looked delightful, but in terms of taste, they just didn't suit us. There was nothing wrong with them (apart from the white chocolate ones - they left an aftertaste that wasn't pleasant). But these chocolates just tasted a bit...normal. Nothing spectacular. Maybe we've been spoilt too long by Hotel Chocolat. Luxury chocolates have to be pretty amazing in this house. And while Cocoa Boutique scored high in terms of looks, it fell short on taste for us.

They would make a lovely present for someone you knew was a chocolate connoisseur I'm sure. In fact, you can win a box to try for yourself (or stash away for Christmas) here.

I think we'll be sticking with Hotel Chocolat though. Sorry Cocoa Boutique. We wanted to love you, but you're just not the chocolates for us.

Disclosure: We were sent a complimentary box of Cocoa Boutique chocolates to review but no other incentives were received. 

Some crafty distractions

Today started off pretty normal. The boys woke up too early, porridge was thrown around the kitchen and we wondered aloud when we'd ever get a lie in again.

But then, the day improved dramatically with a package of Fimo from the lovely Merrily at CraftMerrily. In fact, Bigger was so excited at the prospect of modelling his very own monsters that he promptly collided with the sofa, knocking his wobbly tooth so that it protruded at rather an alarming angle. A trip to the emergency dentist ensued, but Bigger is now happily tucked up in bed clutching his first tooth for the tooth fairy.

But back to the Fimo. After all that excitement, some Fimo modelling was just the sort of calm activity we needed this afternoon.

Fimo fun

At first we did find the Fimo quite difficult to work with, but as it (and we) warmed up, we got a feel for how best to mould it into shape. The kit we tried had some ideas of what you could make as well as some step-by-step instructions, which were quite handy. 

Toothless (the dragon or the boy?)

Bigger made a dragon and I (cough. well yeah, of course I had a go!) made the Loch Ness Monster. What do you think?

Nessie in a fetching stripe ensemble

We've also got some Soft Fimo to try out, so I'll be interested to see if our modelling skills improve. I do lov doing this sort of thing, but so often end up taking over and poor Bigger ends up spectating. But I was very restrained today and limited myself to my Loch Ness Monster, leaving Bigger to model his Fimo the way he wanted to and not the way I wanted to. This sort of activity is great for fine motor skills and concentration and it's just a fun way to spend time with my boy. Winners all round.

I might just have to order some Fimo for my own personal use though. Can't have Bigger having all the fun ;-)

I don't think I'll ever be able to make this sort of thing though. I'll stick to Nessie and her mate Sammy the snake. But this site here, which is Merrily's family blog has some great Fimo ideas. We'll definitely read more of her blog before we get stuck into the 2nd pack of Fimo! Practice makes...well, maybe not perfect but hopefully I can graduate from sausage-body based animals.

Disclosure: We were sent 1 Fimo Soft Create Your Own Monsters & Dinosaurs Set and 1 Fimo Soft Basic Starter Kit  from Craft Merrily to review but did not receive any other financial incentive and the words are all my own.

Learning respect, back to basics

WARNING: Boring weight loss blog post ahead...turn around now if it doesn't interest you!

So, I blogged earlier about using a slimpod from Thinking Slimmer and how I wasn't really seeing any huge change on the weight front. This puzzled me somewhat and I re-read my blog post a number of times, looking at my list of changes I'd noticed and wondering why they weren't translating into weight loss. For a couple of days I made excuses. It's because I'm breastfeeding. It's because I have some weird metabolic condition that has yet to be discovered. It's hormonal.

Then I thought, hang on a minute. If I'm not losing weight I'm OBVIOUSLY eating too many calories. Well duh! It's not rocket science is it? Yes, losing weight can be hard work. But I really felt my slimpods had sorted out my cravings and emotional eating. So if I still wasn't losing weight it had to be down to calories.

So I decided to go back to basics and count calories. Now, I've never actually counted calories before. I've done weight watchers, juice diets, exercising my butt off and various permutations of low carb. But I've never actually counted calories.

But I decided I needing something I couldn't 'cheat' at. I wanted something with nowhere to hide and I knew I needed to learn the true value of food. I didn't want to calorie count so I could eat lots of so-called diet foods. I just wanted to re-educate myself of the true calorific value of foods. I hate diet foods, I really do. But if I want to eat cake, I want to know if that cake is the equivalent (calorie wise) to a healthy chicken salad or a big plate of lasagne. I've spent too long cheating/lying to myself about food. Now it's time to face facts.

I'm relieved to say that I didn't need too much of an education. The only real shocks I got were around frappuccinos and lattes. But I have regained my respect for food. If I want a biscuit/cake/pastry, I'll eat it. But I have to enter it into my food diary and note the calories (using an app on my iphone - it's fab). If I'm heading towards going over my daily calorie target or I want more cake, then it's a great incentive to go for a run or do a fitness dvd.

But respect is definitely the key here. I have a greater respect for calories and I have a greater respect for my body. I want to nourish my body first, then if I have calories left over, then we can go to town on the pastries.

And the bonus is, the weight is starting to fall off! Hurrah!