After my recent review of the Camaya Dark Slab I had an email from Anita (Queen Camaya) offering me the chance to try a few more of her products. As I was sent a brace of milk chocolate slabs I thought I’d it best to review them as a pair.
Both slabs use the same blend of 33.5% Belgian chocolate with the ‘other ingredient’ sitting in the topside of the slab. The milk chocolate used is a good, rich, creamy blend with a well rounded flavour and a soft mouthfeel. It offers a very pleasing combination of sweetness, creamy milk flavours and quite deep cocoa notes.
The first slab I tried was this one.
It’s still somewhat unusual to come across coconut in chocolate (Bounty Bars excepted), and the ‘Coconut’ label was a little deceptive, for on the back of the bar one learns that this is in fact caramelized coconut, making it another first for me. Slivers of dark brown, glossy coconut sit atop the slab, waiting to add their flavours to the chocolate. There’s no hint of any coconut flavour in the chocolate, but as soon as your teeth find a shard, the combination of burnt sugars and coconut lifts the whole taste experience to a quite sublime level. I really liked the idea of caramelizing the coconut. It adds a surprising depth of flavour to the chocolate, lifting it far beyond ordinary and into the realm of rather special. There’s enough coconut sitting on the slab to ensure that every chunky mouthful delivers the intended flavour combination. A definite winner, and something I would buy for myself as a treat.
Slab number two is a Cherry & Kirsch offering, and unlike the previous slab this one definitely carries the flavours in the chocolate.
Camaya have used a Kirsch flavoured syrup and freeze dried cherries in this one, and there’s a delightful counterpoint between the slightly heavy sweetness of the chocolate and the sharp citrus tang of the cherries.
Whether or not you’d enjoy this slab very much hangs on how you feel about cherries. There’s no escaping the cherry/kirsch combination, as it’s part of the chocolate. Personally I found it a bit much after a couple of mouthfuls, whereas I could have cheerfully munched my way through the coconut slab (well, actually I more or less did just that – very hard to resist ‘just one more bit’)
If you’re after experiencing the subtle cocoa flavours of the Belgian chocolate, forget the Cherry & Kirsch slab. Go for the coconut bar and savour the opportunity to separate out the elements a little more. There’s more chocolate flavour in the coconut slab, but the cherry delivers bucketloads of fruitiness.
If, on the other hand you’re a fiend for cherries and chocolate and relish every fruity little nibble then by all means get your hands on the cherry slab.
Returning to French chocolatier Michel Cluizel, we have this 85% bar with origins in South America, Africa, and Java, its black box accented with red instead of green.
The chocolate has a good and thick cocoa flavor. I know some would call it “bitter” instead of “thick,” but it actually just has a twinge on the edges, as opposed to the Patric Chocolates, where that was a part of the flavor. A soft sweetness works in halfway, its influence joining casual with intense.
I don’t know what it is about all these very dark chocolates that makes me want to have more than usual. After each piece (or piece of a piece), it melds to you more and more. Sitting in your mouth and mind, it tastes like the dark sky of a new moon when the blackness is all around you, but the air feels beautiful against your skin as you lift your head up to the sky, feeling both high and low on the earth. . .
It’s one of those chocolates that, if you can connect with it, you’ll never want to disconnect. Remember that it’s an 85%, but if that works for you, don’t pass it by.
Valrhona has been spoken of so lovingly by so many world famous chefs in recent years, I thought it was time to give my wallet a hammering and buy some. First, I had to find it as it wasn’t exactly at the front counter of my petrol station or fish and chip shop and eventually I went to David Jones to buy this compact 90 gram tin of Jivara for $26.95.
Oh dear, that is a lot of money. Translated, that is around Three Hundred Aussie Bucks or £140 per kilogram. Upon opening the tiny treasure trove, the delicate gold lettering told me that in order to enjoy this as much as possible…
“…take the time to awaken your senses. Observe the color, listen to the characteristic ‘snap’, appreciate the texture on your tongue and enjoy it until all of the aromas are released.”
At $1.50 for each five gram square, I intended on doing just that, if only to make them last a bit longer!
The tasting wheel informed me that my Jivara Lait 40% was rated a 4 for Force Intensity with 7 as the highest score; one bean each for Roasted Nuts, Acidity and Bitterness with four beans the highest out of the other varieties included on the wheel. Being a milk chocolate, it was understandable that Fruity scored a big fat zero. Essentially, Jivara Lait is Valrhona’s second mildest chocolate, with Tanariva Lait 33% being the mildest and Abinao 85% the strongest.
Despite being encouraged to observe the aroma, there was pretty well nothing to sniff as each tiny square was unwrapped. When placed on the tongue, it melted quickly and gently revealed its generous proportions of milk and cocoa butter. The wrapper spoke of a ‘vanilla finish’ but my taste buds were revealing a honey caramel which didn’t seem so surprising when brown sugar was found on the ingredients list.
My verdict? Jivara is very, very nice. But then again, so is Lindt’s milk chocolate which is much cheaper and more easily available. Even the Valrhona website is posh. So posh that it has the classic Gallic arrogance of inviting you to visit via the US-English tab, but provides all the details and information in French. So whilst I’m glad to tick this off the list and be able to say that I’ve tried some, for flavour equivalency, top-notch quality and value for money, I’d reach for Lindt instead.
This is the first in a regular series on Chocablog, where we discretely follow interesting people (from a safe distance) before sending our agents in to apprehend and question them on their chocolate eating habits.
We start with actor and presenter Robert Llewellyn (Red Dwarf, Scrapheap Challenge). Suggestions for future subjects (and questions to put to them) in the comments please:
Chocophile:
Robert Llewellyn
- Occupation:
- Actor, TV presenter
- Web Site:
- www.llewtube.com
Interrogation Begins:
- Milk, dark or white:
- White
- Favourite childhood chocolate:
- Milky Bars
- Fruit or nut:
- Nut
- Crunchy or chewy:
- Neither!
- Your guilty chocolate secret:
- That I don’t really like chocolate that much
- Average chocolate consumption:
- Minescule
- Give or receive:
- Give
- Least favourite chocolate:
- Cheap easter egg chocolate
Clearly this subject needs to be trained in the fine art of chocolate appreciation, although this distaste of cheap easter egg chocolate shows that there may be hope. Don’t worry, we have an operative on the case right now!
