For the love of chocolate

I am a lover of chocolate. There was a time where I would have described myself as a complete chocaholic but sadly chocolate does not return my feelings. I have found after giving chocolate many chances to redeem itself that it keeps doing me wrong. Now part of the problem is I have Candida. I wont bore you with the details of what this is except to tell you that refined sugar, gluten and dairy play havoc with my digestive system and this can have a knock on effect on the rest of my life. The other thing is I have noticed when I eat refined sugar I see an immediate spike in my anxiety levels and worst of all I cant seem to eat refined sugar in moderation. I either eat no refined sugar or I go into a complete sugar eating frenzy in which there are no survivors.

 As you can imagine I have had some pretty sad times. Loving chocolate but not being able to eat it is like a true unrequited love story. I remember eating carob chocolate as a child and it not being so bad and once in desperation buying a bar in my local health food store. I had first read the labels of every other bar in the shop but found them all to contain refined sugar so I was delighted when I saw carob did not until I tasted it.  Not an experience I'd care to ever repeat. I have also tried many types of diabetic friendly chocolate. Only two major problems with that. One being that it never tastes anything like chocolate and the other being that the sweeteners they use to replace sugar are actually toxic based purely on the reaction my body has to them.

Now I'm sorry if my story thus far has you feeling very sorry for me. It does actually have a happy ending. So its possible you might have come across the Irish brand Nobo. They have been around for a while now making dairy free, refined sugar free delicious ice cream in a variety of flavours. Well I had gotten word via the interweb some months back that they were launching a chocolate. A chocolate that was going to refined sugar and dairy free and if the ice cream was anything to go by , delicious. To say I was excited by this news would be an understatement.

To make things even better I was raving about the possibility of nobo choc to the two very lovely ladies who run my favourite shop in Kilkenny, 'The Little Green Grocer', they said not only were they aware of the chocolate but they had ordered it in for the shop. I was the first in line once they unpacked the delivery. Initially they only managed to get the buttons in the salted flavour. I did rigourous taste tests on it or you know I bought one and really enjoyed it and returned a number of times to buy it again just to be sure. I liked the brightly coloured packaging. Always good to have it look visually appealing. I Loved the fact that the chocolate itself is in the shape of a giant button. There is something quite appealing about eating it. It must be my inner child coming out. Then theres the taste of the chocolate itself. Delicious, sweet and oh so creamy. Now I dont know how they get it to taste so good without refined sugar or dairy but my top guesses include alchemy or witchcraft (the good kind). They go delicious with a good coffee and I'm perfectly happy eating just one plus my stomach is not complaining after.

Now if you only eat cadburys and the like you might wince at the price but I have been buying healthier snacks for a long time now so I know you pay more to eat healthier and you pay more for really good quality and honestly if you had tasted what else is out there you would know its worth every cent.

Now in the interests of research I have tasted every flavour they make. Okay that bit was a lie. I did it for the love of chocolate but also having tasted the salted, I had to know what the other flavours are like. In case you are curious you can also get them in creamy, mint and orange. Weirdly I'm finding myself quite partial to the orange flavour. This is weird because as a rule Im not gone on Orange flavoured chocolate but there you go, I guess Nobo choc really is a game changer.

In Kilkenny you get them in The Little Green Grocer with the nicest coffee  ( Badger and Dodo) or they are also available in the health food store 'The Good Earth'. If you live further afield then I happen to know Nobo deliver and also have a full list of stockists on their website. So go on give Nobo choc a go. If you are vegan, dairy intolerant, not eating refined sugar or just love the idea of eating a giant button. Trust me, you wont regret it

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