I'm a sucker for fruity chocolates, always have been, especially fruit cremes. I used to adore the ones in Quality Street until they became sweeter over the years (either that or my tastebuds changed), but I've always liked the Thorntons bags of fruit cremes too. I hadn't bought one in years until I spotted these new bags in WH Smiths recently...as well as a Fruit Colleciton they've also launched a Nuts & Pralines Collection, Mint Collection and Toffee, Fudge & Caramel Collection. They're all £1 a bag or two bags for £1.60, which is significantly cheaper than in Thorntons stores. All are suitable for vegetarians.
The new additions to this Collection are "Raspberry Caramel" dark chocolates and "Blueberry Cheesecake" white chocolates, and as well as those it contains the classic "Strawberry Dream" cremes, and "Orange Crisps". I felt a bit put out that it didn't have an Orange Creme, but hey ho!
I arranged the chocolates into a fancy pattern (I'm not just a pretty hand you know!), there were two of each chocolate except for the Raspberry Caramel. I dunno if that's because it's meant to be the most special one, or if each bag contains different amounts of each chocolate.
Blueberry Cheesecake
I first bit into the Blueberry Cheesecake chocolate...this was the one I was anticipating the most. It tasted very nice, the white chocolate is creamy and comforting and the blueberry filling works very well with it. It could have been a bit sharper, but overall it was good.Raspberry Caramel
Next I tried the Raspberry Caramel, which was the only dark chocolate in the bag. It was good...a nice gooey caramel (the best sort!) with a pleasant raspberry tang. The dark chocolate had a good balance of sweeteness and richer cocoa flavor (60% cocoa solids).The Orange Crisp was the dark horse of the bag...it was actually very very nommy and addictive, at first I was sad there were no orange cremes, but this is a worthy alternative, and head and shoulders above the crunchy orange chocolates in Quality Street! It contained crispy wafer pieces mixed into an orange truffle, which are made with maize flour and so are gluten free (yay!)
The Strawberry Dreams were as lovely as always...again, head and shoulders above the ones in Quality Street, with a nice comforting creamy strawberry flavor.
Overall, this new Thorntons Fruit Collection is a pretty great collection of fruity chocolates for those who love such things...personally I would have included some orange cremes to make it even better, but as it stands it's a lovely mixture of flavours and textures.
8.5 out of 10.