Original Beans Edel Weiss 40%

Made with cocoa butter from beans grown in Yuna River Valley, Dominican Republic; this is an organic white chocolate that is without vanilla. Original Beans suggest a flavour profile of banana milk 

The aroma was creamy. It had a soft bite. The mould of this bar was different to Original Beans usual, it had smaller chunks and was more 'ordinary'. The taste was malted milk, golden sugar, Milky Bar yogurt

The Edel Weiss is a nice white chocolate, very creamy and not too sweet (as the raw cane sugar isn't the first ingredient)

Original Beans Esmeraldas Milk 42%

Arriba cocoa beans from the Esmeraldas rainforests in Ecuador, more specifically the Pacific Cloudforest

The flavour was cocoa rich, milky, fudge, delicious. It had a berry brightness to it, and later online I read "red summer fruit", so that was real

The ingredients are good, and always good with Original Beans: direct-trade cacao beans*, cacao butter*, raw cane sugar*, milk*, fleur de sel - *organic

This 42% milk chocolate is a really good, a really, really, really good milk chocolate. I have had 2 bars of it in a week

Original Beans Beni Wild Harvest 66%

The Beni Wild Harvest is a chocolate greatly admired, and very popular with Cocoa Runners (£4.45). The wild Beniano cacao that makes this chocolate grows on cacao forest islands in the Bolivian Amazon. And when it comes to the chocolate, Original Beans says it is delicate, yet expressive. Original Beans supports the preservation of Beni's forest islands. The ingredients are: fair-wild cacao, cacao butter and raw cane sugar (all organic) 

An aroma of earth, lapsang souchong (smoked tea), honey, apricot and figs. The taste was toasty, dark dark chocolate, it felt darker than 66%, there was slight bitterness, followed by subtle fruitiness, which opened up to essential orange oil, and now the chocolate was rather sweet. There was vanilla, leather, and pure richness. The finish was cocoa-rich dark chocolate

Introducing air into the mouth (aeration, achieved by taking an imaginary sip), I found a distinct liquorice. The texture was smooth, like the Swiss chocolate it is. The snap was crisp

Firstly I was underwhelmed with this Beni Wild Harvest, in my memory I had it down as being more "wild" in flavour, as I have tried the Beni many times before. Although admittedly I don't know if I just made that "wildness" up now, due to its name. The chocolate certainly grew on me. It wasn't so complex, I just enjoyed it's rich chocolatiness. If you love the pure chocolate flavour you will love this bar. I particularly love the ethics behind Original Beans, which you can find out more here

Original Beans Piura Porcelana

The Porcelana, considered the Holy Grail of cacao, is a pure Criollo variety, possibly the purest, and is prized for its delicacy. It is amongst the rarest and most expensive of all beans around the world. The Porcelana pods are unique due to their white/light colouring (they lack the flavonoid anthocyanin which contributes to the purple colouring)

In Peru, this "forgotten" cacao was discovered and, after near extinction, was brought back into production by Original Beans who worked with the local farmers. Original Beans' sustainable proposition of "one bar plants one tree" has meant they've planted over 1 million trees in the rainforest. Porcelana cocoa has not been found anywhere else in Peru other than La Quemazón (a village in the Piura Region). The cocoa farmers of La Quemazón are proud of their white cacao and ensure quality control to maintain their cacao in the fine chocolate market

Original Beans Piura Porcelana was of 75% cocoa solids made with direct trade Porcelana beans (from La Quemazón), organic and Fairtrade cocoa butter and organic cane sugar. The chocolate had outsourced its manufacture by chocolate maker Felchlin (Swiss company). My 70g bar had broken up in the packaging and was a little scuffed. It was of the lighter brown spectrum and had a medium snap

I breathed in a perfume of potent vanilla, yellow plum, leather and cream. The flavour opened with a bitter cocoa and sweetened up with a low acidity. There was such an authentic raspberry note, it was really quite unbelievable. The raspberry flavour wasn't always there, and when it wasn't I would [unsuccessfully] try to find it. It did always make itself present in the finish though. The chocolate overall was soft in flavours with a creaminess. There were hints of lightly toasted pecan, and along with the raspberry, a marscapone and cacao flavour it created a dessert-like finish. The texture in the mouth was exceptionally smooth

This delicate Porcelana cacao truly is white gold, and La Quemazón is the goldmine that domesticates it. I did enjoy and appreciate this chocolate and I really did love the authenticity of that raspberry: it was tart, creamy and quite sensational. That trait alone made this Piura Porcelana the James Dean of chocolate. Initially shy, gives an unpredictable yet talented and inspirational performance (the raspberry = "you're tearing me apart")