Some things shouldn’t be messed with. Take chocolate, for example. Does it really need to be enhanced? Does it need to have something infused into it besides its naturally delicious flavor? Why have we gotten so trendy with everything, why must we mess with the classics? Don’t touch Jane Austen, and don’t touch chocolate.
Robert thinks I’m funny, and he’s decided to make me try something I am against in principle. So, right now we are going to try Vosges’ Black Salt Caramel Bar, and Vosges’ Black Pearl Bar.
The caramel bar with “Hawaiian sea salt, burnt sugar caramel and 70% cacao” tastes like a dark chocolate bar with runny caramel. It’s not bad, actually. The bar is scored into one inch squares and the caramel is leaking everywhere – no sign of the salt. I think I like the caramel the best – it’s better than the chocolate. The 70% makes the bar taste bitter in comparison. I don’t like how messy this is, and I don’t like it that Robert paid $8 for each of these ‘designer’ chocolates.
On to the ‘Black Pearl Bar’ with its “ginger, wasabi, black sesame seeds and 55% cacao.”
In a word: yuck.
This is seriously bad – like dark chocolate infused with window cleaner.
I know, I know. Ginger and wasabi and tea and lavendar and all of that natural homeopathic stuff is good and trendy. But chocolate should never be infused with sushi, and this is what this ‘haute chocolate’ bar tastes like.
If I want to impress my friends, I pull out the very best, freshly made, high fat chocolate I can find. Usually that means something Belgian, but there are some wonderful chocolatiers around here who make chocolate well, and when they mix it with something, they do it right.
Don’t make a margarita with cinnamon, don’t put frisee on my pizza, and don’t ever, EVER, put wasabi in my chocolate.
Vosges, show me your best chocolate that is infused with chocolate. In other words, make it taste like chocolate.