Galler: Biscuit

My dear cousin bought this bar for me at The Chocolate Library on St. Marks near Avenue A. The store just opened less than a month ago, and it's largely disappointing -- there's a much bigger variety at the Food Emporium chocolate shop on the Upper East Side, and even at most big upscale grocery stores. But this was a nice little find:

Galler: Biscuit
Cocoa content: 60%
Notable ingredients: biscuit
Origin: n/a

This will be a brief entry because this was a brief bar -- and because on this, the first day of 2011, I am dead tired and just want to watch re-runs of the Jersey Shore. The bar was divided into four thick segments -- inside, there was one layer of "biscuit," which in American candy bars is usually called wafer, and one layer of a sort of hazelnut paste. It was nutty and had a nice roasted taste -- a little coffee-ish, and not at all too sweet. My only complaint would be that I was hoping to encounter a more buttery, flaky biscuit within.

Hopefully the new year will be buttery and flaky enough to make up for my disappointment. This bar gets a B.

Berkshire Bark: Jumpin' Java

Here's another Berkshire Bark bar from Dave's Fresh Pasta in Somerville, MA -- if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right? But there's actually a ton of great specialty food shopping in that little city, and many interesting little shopping districts that I never knew about in high school because they weren't on the Red Line. Behold: Jumpin' Java.

Berkshire Bark: Jumpin' Java
Cocoa content: unlisted (guess: 60%)
Notable ingredients: Brace yourself -- roasted almonds; espresso toffee; crushed coffee beans; caramelized nibs
Origin: n/a

Now, I'll forgive Berkshire Bark for the corny name "Jumpin' Java," which is perhaps even cornier than the last Berkshire Bark product I had -- "Pretzelogical" -- but, hey, at least this time I was prepared! And, to be honest, this bar was jumpin'. This was a monstrous hunk of chocolate filled to the brim with whole almonds, amazingly delicious homemade toffee, and lots of roasted coffee flavor. I'm not crazy about coffee-flavored things in general, but there was so much sugar happening here that the acidity I usually object to was neutralized.

The only thing that was decidedly unpleasant about this bar was that it's impossible to break off pieces of it. For those of us who eat chocolate in a civilized manner, bit by bit, night after night, with attention to the subtlest of details, the unsegmented design of the bar was kind of difficult to deal with. It's basically just a hunk of thick, densely packed chocolate, with nary an easy-breaking line in sight. Berkshire Bark should sell these snacks in little bite-sized pieces, all contained in a bag, but then -- alas -- I might never have Known it.

All in all, a delectable bar from a delectable state. B+.

Dolfin: Au Lait Au Masala

Michael brought this bar home from Boston for me -- undoubtedly from the liquor store on Broadway in Somerville, because they stock all of these plastic sleeve Dolfin bars -- two birds, one stone, right? Just kidding. Here we have another milk chocolate bar made with masala. I know I pegged masala chai as corny a couple of posts ago, but I just want to clarify that masala itself is not corny. Hello, have you ever had chicken tikka masala? We all have -- it's dead serious. It's chai that I take issue with, and this bar earns automatic points for abandoning that nasty four-letter word and maintaining the sweet, addictive flavor.

Dolfin: Au Lait Au Hot Masala
Cocoa content: 32%
Notable ingredients: hot masala
Origin: n/a

Ok, first. Masala, what is it? Usually, it's cloves, black pepper, cinnamon, ginger, and cardamom. It's just a name for a mix of spices commonly used to brew tea. But of course, the spices themselves do not add up to tea unless you steep them in water, which is kind of why I object to the concept behind that Le Pain Quotidien bar from two weeks ago.

Aside from having different names for the same thing, this bar and the Le Pain Quotidien bar are very similar. The LPQ bar had a cocoa content of 38%, and this bar is 32%. A 6 point difference in cocoa solids isn't hugely noticeable in this range, but I did feel like the LPQ chocolate was slightly higher quality. However, the spices were blended better in this Dolfin bar: it was less grainy, a little subtler (with a more surprising finish toward the end,) and sweet without being cloyingly so.

Both bars have beautiful packaging, a good snap, and good flavor. I didn't give the LPQ post a grade but this grade can serve for both of them: B+.

Dolfin: Noir au Poivre Rose

"Zartbitterschokolade Mit Rosa Pfeffer"

I know I kind of already reviewed this bar; I wrote a little blurb about Dolfin's Dark Pink Peppercorns a few weeks back. That bar was 59% though, and this bar is 52%. Also that bar tasted completely different and was wrapped completely differently. Also the other bar was totally normal and this bar is not. More on that later. Stats follow:

Dolfin: Noir au Poivre Rose

Cocoa content: 52%

Notable ingredients: pink peppercorns

Origin: none (Dolfin practices "the art of blending,") made in Belgium

This is a really beautiful bar that Michael bought at Cardullo's in Cambridge, MA. It is wrapped in plastic, which is nestled in a plastic-encased paper pouch. The sensibility of its perforations are unmatched: it has about seven or eight perforated bars cut widthwise, each about the same dimensions as a domino, or a stick of Wrigley's gum. 

But this bar is a freak. I always thought peppercorns were more or less the same thing as chili when chocolate was concerned, but now I know that peppercorns are a whole nother animal. There is nothing sharp, or sweet, or hot about peppercorns. They are the fullest, most savory, earthiest things I know. This is the same thing I grind over pasta or soup, except the dark pink variety is a little more floral. This spice wants not for chocolate, and I think the fact that Dolfin has used 52% here exacerbates the situation. It would make more sense with a much darker, fuller cocoa. I give this bar a C+.

Nirvana: 72% w/ Sea Salt & Caramel

I started this bar last night. I have never tried this maker -- Nirvana -- before. I bought it at Whole Foods in West Orange, NJ. Here are the stats:

Nirvana: 72% w/ Sea Salt & Caramel

Cocoa content: 72%

Notable ingredients: sea salt; caramel

Origin: Belgium

My interest in this bar was entirely based on the inclusion of sea salt. Caramel is a vulgar, low-brow confection. It doesn't move me. But sea salt goes wonderfully with chocolate, as the Chicago-based chocolate maker Vosges knows.

Luckily this bar doesn't taste much like caramel; it is, however, remarkably salty. I would say it's almost too salty, insofar as the intense edge interferes with the pleasure of the melt. It had a great snap to it, though. I got the sense that Nirvana actually makes wonderful chocolate, and just added too much salt to this recipe. The packaging was not special. B-.

A note about the tags on this post: I am creating a new tag for Salt, and another called "Sugars" which will include the caramel in this bar as well as other added sugars. 

Avant le Blog pt. 2

Here are some more bars from the last few weeks, with notes below.

Le Pain Quotidien: Noir Extra. LPQ is a Belgian chain of cafes -- they have a dozen locations in NYC. I got this at the one on 63rd and Lexington. If you go there for lunch, get the black bean hummus tartine. Their chocolate is nice but not as nice as their pastry. B.

Amattler: Extrafino Con 70% Cacao. My boyfriend got this for me -- I think it is from Cardullo's in Cambridge, MA. This bar was ridiculously good and far sweeter than your average 70%. It spoke to me. The list of ingredients lists "vanillin," which I don't usually see and which may explain the sweetness. This was out of control. A.

NewTree: SEXY. This is also from Michael, from Cardullo's. NewTree has names for all of its bars: SEXY is the ginger one. I mean to say that it is infused with ginger, not that it has red hair. I am almost as obsessed with ginger as I am with chocolate, so this is a special combo, but it is by no means rare. I've had a lot of ginger chocolate bars and I think Green & Blacks does it best, with the chewy chunks of crystallized ginger. This was still tasty, but not incredibly so. B.