Seattle Chocolate – Vanilla Orange Cream Truffle Bar

Look, I’m not the biggest fan of white chocolate, but that has never stopped me from buying it if there’s something interesting that goes along with it. I feel like this bar qualifies. The packaging alone has me thinking of a hot summer day and beating it back with a nice, refreshing ice cream. The combination of a sweet citrus flavour just makes it even more refreshing.

The appearance and smell is really bang on for what they are going for. If it wasn’t yet clear by now, the inspiration is the Creamsicle bar. More specifically, an orange Creamisicle, which is a combination of an orange Popsicle on the outside with vanilla ice cream on the inside. I don’t know whether it made it’s way across the world, but it was a huge part of my childhood here in the western hemisphere, and I imagine for a lot of people my age they too have partaken in this classic ice cream treat. It was so ubiquitous that it became a staple flavour, where the combination of orange and vanilla would typically be called orange Creamsicle.

The texture is quite soft, and while the whole thing is essentially a solid block, it’s very soft, and if you hold it too long it will melt in your hands. There’s not much in the way of tempering here, as it’s mostly just barely holding itself together. As you try to chew it, it melts around which is honestly kind of pleasant because it is another way that it emulates the experience of eating an actual Creamsicle. There is a little bit of what seem to be candied orange pieces inside to add a bit of texture, but they are so soft it doesn’t really add much contrast in texture.

The flavour is the perfect combination of orange and vanilla. Similar to the OG Creamsicle, it’s mostly sweet, not much tart but distinct orange and citrus flavour and has a smooth quality, largely thanks to the vanilla flavour. With such classic flavours like orange Creamsicle, I wonder if it was something that someone would inevitability stumble upon, or it really was pure chance that someone in ancient times discovered the winning combo. Either way this gives big nostalgia to me, and for me I must begrudgingly admit worked.

As I said, I don’t generally opt for white chocolate due to it being too sweet, but maybe the nostalgia really did offset that for me because it is exactly as I remember orange Creamsicle to be, and I think anyone else who enjoyed them as I did, will feel similarly about this. This is a great summer flavour and I would definitely get this again. Although I wonder if I should be getting an actual Creamsicle instead…