Mauna Loa Macadamia Nut Off

Macadamia nuts, equated with Hawaii and known for their buttery, rich goodness are made better with chocolate. Just like anything, right? Mauna Loa, a Hilo, HI based company is a huge exporter, whether they be salted in cans or enrobed in chocolate like they are today. The question is, when all the Mauna Loa chocolate candy bars are pitted up against each other, which one comes out on top?

We bring you today- the Macadamia Nut Off!

Packaging
The three bars are nearly identical with a gold background and Hawaiian print. The difference only being the colors on the edge of the bars. Macadamia Milk Chocolate Bar has the classic blue of the Mauna Loa logo, Macadamia Kona Coffee in brown and Macadamia Crisp in a bright orange.

Winner: No one. I like blue, the orange pops and the brown reminds me of chocolate, but NO ONE WINS.

Appearance
Each bar is made up of 4 squares and each square is imprinted with a bird of paradise or leaf. The tops are all rounded very nicely, the reverse is where you see the bumps of macadamia nuts. Dark chocolate is well, dark and milk chocolate ones from the top are indistinguishable from each other.

Winner: This is all coming down to taste!

Taste

Milk Chocolate with Macadamias

The chocolate smells very sugary and creamy. It’s better than I expected, quality wise. It’s a soft milk chocolate and complimented by the roasted macadamia nuts well. The chocolate coats the inside of my mouth in a way where I only want the one square.

Kona Coffee Dark Chocolate with Macadamias

I can really smell the Kona Coffee notes over the dark chocolate. It reminds me a lot of chocolate covered espresso beans. The taste reflects this almost exactly! There’s more chocolate, but the coffee flavor is very powerful. The macadamia nuts are almost completely lost.

Milk Chocolate Macadamia Crisp

The crisp bar smells a lot like the milk chocolate bar, crisp doesn’t make much of a smell does it? It makes a taste though, a crunchy taste. The macadamias seem to be in smaller chunks in this bar than the others to stay in line with the size of the crisps, in fact, I’m having a hard time telling the crisp from the nut because the milk chocolate is heavier is flavor than either of them.

Winner: Milk Chocolate with Macadamias!
The classic is classic. Kona coffee was too strong for me and the Crisp version was just too weak at offering anything unique.