As hyped up and popular the Chocolate Bar palette is ever since its launch, I never considered actually buying it and that's purely because of the price. After I got TheBalm's Nude'Tude I didn't plan on buying another eyeshadow palette for a really long time, but I needed a proper treat for my birthday and one night I just decided to order it. And boy, am I glad I did. The raves are so justified and I can easily see why so many people put this palette into their last year's annual favourites. The shade selection is fantastic and the quality of the shades is brilliant as well. It may be expensive, but I don't regret buying it for a second.
Texture: All the shimmer/satin shades apart from the Candied Violet are buttery, incredibly pigmented and blend so well. The mattes are great too, more buttery than Urban Decay's, but they perform equally well. Candied Violet feels drier to the touch and it performed poorly from the start, however, now that I've swatched it properly, so gone through the top layer, it performs great. A similar thing happened with Strawberry Bon Bon, which swatched chalky from the start, but is now working just fine. In general the eyeshadows are more buttery than Urban Decay's and TheBalm's.
Colours: There are 16 colours in the palette, ranging from mattes to satins and shimmer shades. The shade selection ranges from chocolate browns, gold, greenish old gold, burgundies and purples. Black is missing and I would also add an even darker matte brown, like Sleek in theBalm's Nude'Tude, but otherwise, I love the shade selection. I love every colour and all are very wearable, I've even worn Candied Violet, which not a shade I typical wear. I have very little dupes for these in my collection, which is a bit sad considering I've been a beauty blogger for over five years and a beauty enthusiast for well over a decade.
Gilded Ganache - a shimmery green old gold shade. It's similar to Bronze Goddess by L'Oreal in the discontinued Infallible range, but less gold and green. It looks stunning on its own and I also I love combining it with Creme Brulee for an antiqued gold look.
White Chocolate - a matte skin tone shade. The perfect base and blending colour.
Milk Chocolate - a matte medium cool brown. Great crease colour, but quite a brown choice for something that fakes a shadow.
Black Forest Truffle - a shimmery brown burgundy. Finally a company that made such a shade right, all the rest I've tried weren't pigmented enough. I combine it mostly with Amaretto.
Triple Fudge - a matte deep cool brown with some green tones. Great for deepening the outer corners, but I would make this shade darker.
Salted Caramel - a matte medium peachy brown. Very smooth and looks great on the lids in combination with blue eyes.
Marzipan - a shimmery light beige-peachy shade. Darker than Sin from UD's Naked or theBalm's Stand-offish, but with a similar effect on the lids. Great as a lid colour and as an intense inner corner highlight.
Semi-Sweet - a matte medium chocolate brown. A lovely darker shade for the crease and outer corners.
Strawberry Bon Bon - a matte pastel pink. Soft, but quite sheer, so it works as a blending out colour.
Candied Violet - a medium violet shade with purple shimmer. This one was very deceiving from the start because it swatched sheer, but then I did a test with one eye bare and the other with a cream eyeshadow base. To my surprise I managed to build up a fully opaque layer of colour on both sides with no problems. It's a very pretty purple that looks even more interesting because of the red shimmer.
Amaretto - a gorgeous satin reddish brown shade. One of my absolute favourites and crazy pigmented. Looks great with green and blue eyes.
Hazelnut - a satin medium brown shade. Very similar in terms of quality to Amaretto, so amazing and one of my favourites. Love wearing this on the lids.
Creme Brulee - the perfect gold shade that doesn't look orange on me, instead it's much more old gold/bronze like. Undoubtedly my favourite gold shade so far so my colouring. Quality is like at Amaretto and Hazelnut.
Haute Chocolate - a darker version of Hazelnut shade. Another great quality one and one of my favourites. It use it mostly in the outer corners.
Cherry Cordial - a satin burgundy shade. Similar to Sexy in TheBalm's Nude'Tude, which I slightly prefer to this one, though both are great.
Champagne Truffle - a satin light gold shade which is an excellent highlighter. It looks more pink in the pan, but the shimmer is gold.
White Chocolate as a base, Hazelnut on the lid and under the lower lashline, Haute Chocolate in the outer corner and in the outer third of the lower lashline, Champagne truffle in the inner corners. The eyeliner is Stila Stay All Day Waterproof and mascara Maybelline The Sensational Waterproof. On the cheeks Max Factor Creme Puff blush in Lavish Mauve and on the lips Sleek Matte Me Birthday Suit.
Staying power: They last all day on the lids, but they do sometimes crease if I don't use a primer because some shades are so buttery. In that respect I actually find TheBalms' are better. With a primer they work great. I use theBalm's Put a Lid on it eyeshadow primer, but mostly I use a cream eyeshadow as a base to intensify them and make them last all day.
White Chocolate as a base, Amaretto on the lid, Black Cherry Truffle in the outer corners, Champagne Truffle in the inner corners. Eyeliner again Stila, blush Max Factor Creme Puff in Lavish Mauve and on the lips Golden Rose Velvet Matte 12.
Scent: The first couple of days I could not smell any chocolate, but now I do. It really does smell faintly like chocolate and cocoa. So far everyone has noticed the scent, even though I haven't told them that its scented.
Packaging: The packaging is metal with a magnetic closing system. It has a decently sized mirror inside. It's bulkier than my other palettes, but it's the only one made from metal.
Price and availability: Mine is from Beauty Bay for 54.70 € (41.75 GBP). I hear Beauty Bay will now stop selling Too Faced, which is just the stupidest move ever. French and Polish Sephora ship Too Faced to Slovenia or you can go to Italy's Sephora. I'm not sure where else you can get this brand.
I just adore this palette. I has a wonderful selection of shades that are so completely up my alley. Maybe I'm missing a taupe shade or two, but I have them in other palettes anyway. I love how pigmented these are, since I have zero patience when it comes to application and they blend so well. This may well be one of the best purchases I have made in this year.
Have a great day!
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