As we polish off some of the tasty treats we got from Mexgrocer, we come to Carlos V milk chocolate bars. It is a straight up chocolate candy bar by all appearances, but listed as a “milk chocolate style bar” – is that like “fruit drink” instead of “fruit juice”?

I’m always aware that foreign chocolate will taste unmistakably different to the palette than the chocolates from the Hershey’s or Nestles that I’m used to and Carlos V didn’t let me down. The small, flat bar had a very silky smooth consistency and a hint of something more sweet mixed into it, almost like honey. A little bit of research shows that this is in fact powdered milk – a bit of it is mixed in with the rest of the ingredients. This made it a slightly more tangy sweet taste than the smooth milk chocolates I am more used to on a daily basis. It would go well with raisins or nuts in the bar.

It might be my personal preference, but it was almost a little too sweet. I am quite a candy fan and yet my sweetness tolerance is a little lower than most peoples when it comes to chocolates. Maybe I can try the dark chocolate version of this in the future. I was also surprised since I usually hear that Mexican chocolate is often less sweet and has an additional spiciness to it. Other blogs have reported that this bar is not “real Mexican chocolate” but considering it was made in Mexico, I can’t help but chuckle.

It might not have the spice, but it definitely has an exotic tang from the powdered milk. Maybe that makes it “milk-style” and not the real deal?

Either way, Carlos V is definitely a king of chocolate bars, maybe just not in my kingdom! I’m still hoping that Alex will see fit to include more royal chocolately goodness in our blog!

Alex and I decided to look online for new and exciting snacks and foods to try to help get the blog going and one of the places we looked was Mexgrocer.com. I had tried a lot of Mexican food while living in the city, but on the site we found an amazing selection of candies and treats I had never heard before.

The main one I have tried so far is called De La Rosa Mazapan.  Alex swears by these candies as his stepfather used to pick them up at the market sometimes. I didn’t know what to expect other than that it was made from peanuts. I like peanuts though, so it couldn’t be bad. I also hoped I’d enjoy it, as we’d gotten a 30 piece box. Oy!

De La Rosa mazapan is a peanut confection (dulce de cacahuate) made similarly to marzipan (made from almonds). It is simple and only contains three ingredients – peanuts, sugar and artificial flavors.

This candy is fairly simple looking – a small silver-dollar-sized tan disk wrapped in cellophane and has a giant rose logo on the top. Upon opening the plastic wrapper, I noticed that it was not as paste-like as I had expected and actually more like a compressed powder. It broke off in crumbly chunks and then smoothed into a paste on my tongue. It was very sweet but not too sweet and the nuttiness of the peanuts was a swift change to American confection peanut butters. Most nutty things in our candy culture are usually either a filling or whole nuts. The texture is definitely the unique and surprising part and wasn’t like anything else I’d encountered in a candy before. I can’t say that I’m going to be eating a ton of these, but a once in a while snack after I get used to it might be good enough for me.

If you are a peanut candy fan or into nut paste type sweets, you will definitely enjoy this. It might also be a good idea for people who are allergic to chocolate. (But not nuts!) Just beware of the dustiness.

Look forward to more Mexican treat entries soon!