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Taste. Better. Chocolate.
Discover the world of craft chocolates through my personal tasting reviews, learn about how chocolate is made, learn to mindfully taste chocolate and find out what's going on in the worldwide craft chocolate scene.

I'm Lilla, chocolatier and certified chocolate taster, chocolate educator and I eat chocolate Every. Single. Day.

I started this blog to share my passion for craft chocolates with others and to celebrate the amazing diversity of flavours and styles in chocolate making, the makers and of course the cacao farmers.

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Lilla - Chocolate Educator
๐Ÿ’™ Blue week is here ๐Ÿ’™ And I'm starting with ๐Ÿ’™ Blue week is here ๐Ÿ’™ And I'm starting with a beautiful @dormousechocs bar. Look at this wonderful wrapper! The chocolate is special too, it was a new release last year, and I must admit that I forgot about it in my pile. But how convenient now for blue week. Using beans from Indonesia, Gaura, West Sumba. I had to turn to Google Maps to check this out of course. It's one of the Southern islands of Indonesia, East of Bali. The 75% dark bar still has a lovely glossy surface and a fruity-spicy aroma. It melts with a slight sharpness of fruity acidity, and reminds me of barrel-aged bars I've had before. The warmth of spices surrounds the whole flavour, making this an intense, rich and flavourful chocolate. It's been a while for me to taste chocolates from Dormouse. I will keep an eye out for their seasonal bars. ๐Ÿ’™ Do you have a favourite Dormouse bar?
So there's another green bar, and again a lovely c So there's another green bar, and again a lovely creation from @zotterschokolade. While I have to admit that I bought this firstly because of the green wrapper ๐Ÿ˜… but then I'm also intrigued by Zotter's approach to milk chocolates with a very high cacao content and minimal or no sugar added. This Peruvian bar has 8% raw cane sugar, 22% milk powder and 70% cacao and some vanilla. Vanilla aroma is dominant, the chocolate is glossy and has a medium snap. It is very creamy and starts off with a strong, rich chocolate note along with fresh unroasted hazelnuts and lots of whipped cream. It has a touch of sweetness to it, just enough to make the flavour a bit more rounded. Compared to the 70/30 no added sugar milk chocolate they also have, this is less sticky/viscous in the mouth, actually it has a really nice mouthfeel. What's the highest cacao content milk chocolate that you've tried so far?
I have another @javachocolates bar in my Chocoa st I have another @javachocolates bar in my Chocoa stash, so let's see this 63% dark chocolate made in Brazil from the Minas Gerais region (right above Sao Paolo and Rio de Janeiro). Tasting Brazilian chocolate always makes me think of my lovely friend Isliana @sweet_isli. She was a wonderful colleague of mine during my time in Cambridge and we laughed a lot while making chocolate together. Sending you a virtual hug dear Isli โ™ฅ๏ธ The bar is quite thick and hard to break into smaller pieces, it has a hard snap, slightly earthy aroma. Melts quite quickly, the texture is a stone-ground style, slightly grainy. It starts on a sweet flavour note, then as it melts it has an intense coffee note at its peak that ends with some acidity, it leaves a clean palate and a gentle coffee aftertaste. I will definitely melt down a few squares into a hot chocolate as this bar seems like a very good base for a frothy cup.
Let's start off #tttt_green week as green as it ca Let's start off #tttt_green week as green as it can get! I have seen green chocolate before, most of the time flavoured and coloured by matcha tea powder. But I'm not a big fun of its flavour. Pumpkin seeds are much more my thing. They are a quite popular ingredient in Austria and even in Hungary we call it green gold, it's kind of special. This bar is a vegan delight from @zotterschokolade in their new nougat bar range which are various nut-based pralines. The colour of the bar is a lovely shade of light green (I tried to edit the photos so they are as much realistic as possible). Look at this beautifully intricate pattern on the bar mould design! It is thick and soft, don't expect a snap here. Pumpkin seed praline is the main player but the bar also contains rice milk and coconut, lemon powder, salt and vanilla. So the overall flavour is not as green and earthy as plain pumpkin seeds. It tastes quite sweet, the salt comes out nicely and balances out the sweetness here. You can definitely taste the coconut, too. Have you ever had green chocolate?
Gold to green with @herufekchocolate 70% Madagasca Gold to green with @herufekchocolate 70% Madagascar from Akesson's Bejofo Estate 2018 harvest. Deep fruity chocolate aroma, great snap and creamy melt. Intense redcurrant and sweet raspberry note throughout, almost incredible that it's not a flavoured bar. Not as acidic as I expected, really well-balanced and rich dark chocolate. Really wish I could visit Herufek's factory as it's only a couple of hours away from me, but unfortunately I don't know when we will be able to travel again.. at least I can travel through their chocolate. โ™ฅ๏ธ Where does your chocolate take you today?
I feel quite lucky to have found more @castronovoc I feel quite lucky to have found more @castronovochocolate partial bars in my stash from my friends @_chococard_ . So much so that I could organize this little comparative tasting of Colombian chocolates from Sierra Nevada, cacao grown by the Arhuacos Nation. It is not surprising, because ChocoCard is also working with these beans. They have a 76% dark version. If you swipe left you can see which bar was their favourite from Castronovo ๐Ÿ˜Š. So on the tasting plate today we have: ๐Ÿซ 63% dark-milk: beautiful warm brown colour, sweet caramel aromas. Lovely creamy melt that starts with a very sweet and strong salted caramel note that then opens up to a bright nuttiness and clotted cream undertone. (I'm seriously addicted to dark-milk bars โ™ฅ๏ธ) ๐Ÿซ 72% dark: deep brown colour, gentle sweet aroma, clean and creamy melt. Intense richness and a bright and light fruity acidity with hints of caramel. ๐Ÿซ 80% dark: dark brown colour, floral, wine-like aromas. Creamy melt with a slight drying sensation. Very intense bright floral and honey notes at the beginning, with a deep earthy background, hints of a light summer wine. All three are such beautiful representation of the diversity of even the same cacao origin. It is also fascinating to learn more about the life of the Arhuacos and their vision of the world. Truly special cacao โ™ฅ๏ธ Have you tried chocolate from this origin?
Started Bronze week with @dandelionchocolate and n Started Bronze week with @dandelionchocolate and now starting #tttt_gold week with Dandelion as well! Grabbed this bar from lovely @gdalesandre at Chocoa back in February together with the 100% Ecuador I showed you two weeks ago. This one is a 70% dark from the Gola Rainforest in Sierra Leone from the 2017 harvest, which was the first official cacao harvest exported to the US. Twinning with Shay @choccoffeewine on this bar, but make sure to check out her post as she did a comparative tasting of the same bar made in San Francisco and in Japan (the other factory location of Dandelion). Super interesting! I'm not sure I've tasted chocolate from Sierra Leone before (honestly, who can keep track) but it's definitely a more rare origin than others. So I was really excited to taste it. The beautiful deep dark brown bar releases sweet, warming spicy aromas. Decadently rich chocolate, with a seasonally appropriate roasted chestnut taste, with maybe a splash of rum, also some sweet caramel and gentle warm spicy notes. A really satisfying bar and I'm happy to see craft chocolate makers explore small, rare cacao growing regions. Have you already tasted chocolate made from beans from Sierra Leone? Do you know other makers using beans from this origin?
๐Ÿ‹ When life gives you lemons, put them into whi ๐Ÿ‹ When life gives you lemons, put them into white chocolate ๐Ÿ˜… Two bars to finish off #tttt_yellow ๐Ÿ‹ @castronovochocolate white chocolate with lemon and salt has been on my wishlist ever since I saw @37chocolates Estelle raving about it and use it at nearly all of her tastings. So I was so excited when I got a partial bar from my friends from @_chococard_ (the other partial bar is from them as well). It has such an intense lemon drizzle cake aroma, and it's wonderfully creamy. The sweetness is perfectly balanced by the fresh lemon and the touch of salt. It's like eating a delicious "tarte au citron", it definitely brings back some summer memories. The other bar is from @chequessettchocolate that I was able to try at Chocoa, but by the time I got back to buy it it was sold out. So again, thanks to my friends for sharing their bar with me. Here, we have another white chocolate bar. This one is flavoured with thyme, lemon oil and turmeric (hence the more intense colour). The aroma is more dominated by turmeric with a citrusy hint in the background. It's slightly slower to melt. It has a herbal-vegetal flavour, that reminds me of golden milk. The aftertaste brings in more of the sharp and fragrant citrus flavour. Have you already tried lemon in white chocolate? I think it's quite a winning combo. ๐Ÿ‹
Second yellow piece for #tttt_rainbow #tttt_yellow Second yellow piece for #tttt_rainbow #tttt_yellow week is this sweet and fragrant dark chocolate from @kakauworship in Greece. They used a Peruvian Chuncho blend for this 70% dark chocolate, sweetened (as all of their bars) with coconut blossom sugar and flavoured with fragrant vanilla powder. Vanilla is kind of a debated ingredient in craft chocolates but not in the case of bars where vanilla is used purposefully as an ingredient, and not just an additive to mask off-flavours. I think, in this case its use is perfectly fine and can create a nice flavour profile and adds some extra sweetness without any extra sugar. Vanilla and coconut sugar create a really intense and unique sweet, floral and molasses-like aroma. The bar is smooth, creamy, melting with a slight cooling sensation on the tongue. The flavour is also dominated by these two ingredients, but you can also taste a rich chocolate base that reminds me of a nice cup of hot chocolate. What's your opinion about vanilla in craft chocolate?
"Look at the stars, look how they shine for you, a "Look at the stars, look how they shine for you, and everything you do, yeah they were all YELLOW" /Coldplay Can't get this song out of my head since I started taking photos for this weeks theme which is the lovely and bright yellow. One of my favourite colours. First up, I have a double bar from @zotterschokolade called a flower bouquet. The first one is an almond praline with white chocolate sprinkled with rose petals. The flavour is enhanced with vanilla, salt, cinnamon and ginger. The roasted almond aroma goes perfectly with the fragrant rose and the hints of spices. Very creamy bar with an oriental flavour profile. The other bar is even more colourful. It's a cashew praline with lemon sprinkled generously with wild flower petals. Very fragrant and flavourful. The cashew gives a more gentle base so the flowers can really shine through. Creamy but it has a bite, from added crunchy sugar crystals and the petals. So now we can gift each other a bouquet of flowers in the form of chocolate. 2-in-1 solution, what a great idea. It doesn't wilt, smells and tastes great ๐Ÿ˜‹ Or would you prefer real flowers instead?
๐ŸŒธ You know what I sometimes asked myself when I ๐ŸŒธ You know what I sometimes asked myself when I was younger? Where do the people living in Hawaii go on their honeymoon? Because all I could think of as a little girl was that Hawaii is a honeymoon destination ๐Ÿ˜… ๐ŸŒธ Now I know, that it's also a place where they grow cacao and make chocolate! What a magical place, wish I'd be able to visit one day. ๐ŸŒธ Until then, let's dive in and taste it. But first of all happy 10th birthday @manoachocolate! I love your Craft Chocolate TV, such a fun and cool way to educate people about craft chocolate and go behind the scenes, it's a real gem! ๐ŸŒธ And the bar? Such a treat! Gentle, slightly earthy. There's a very light vegetal note in the background, but also sweetness, like fresh sweet peas (I know it might sound weird but it's actually really nice). Easygoing, creamy, gentle but not boring at all. It leaves you with a clean palate and some lingering rich chocolate flavour. ๐ŸŒธ Have you tried chocolate made from Hawaiian cocoa?
A fragile beauty comes next in my #TTTT_Bronze row A fragile beauty comes next in my #TTTT_Bronze row. Special in many ways. It's made in my home country Hungary by a family-owned craft chocolate business. They work with many different origins from within Venezuela including this rare Porcelana. The wrapper and the bar mould are unique, recognizable, familiar. Subtle and elegant. The bar is the same. The aroma is gentle, light cocoa notes. Beautifully creamy melt. Such a fragile piece, it is so light, like the softest chocolate mousse in the world. No intense fruity or earthy notes, no fireworks. This is a cozy feeling of being safe, loved, cared for. Slightly nutty, with some even lighter coffee undertones. But really, you can barely notice. It's all about the cocoa here. This humble little Porcelana bean. @rozsavolgyi_csokolade did a brilliant job with this bar. Careful roasting and conching to ensure these delicate notes are preserved in the chocolate. Have you already tried chocolate made with Porcelana beans?
As someone who struggles with describing aroma/sme As someone who struggles with describing aroma/smell of chocolate when tasting, I sometime have bars that are super nice to me in this regard. I was in the middle of taking photos of this @dandelionchocolate 100% Camino Verde, Ecuador, and a cool wind swept across from the side window bringing this amazing aroma to my nose. I stopped and had to look up from the screen. Is this smell coming from the chocolate? I was about 40-50 centimeters away from it. I leaned forward and took a slow and long breath through my nose. Just WOW. Seriously. This cozy, heartwarming hot chocolate smell with some hazelnuts and freshly brewed espresso.. I'll let you picture me sniffing at this bar for the next 5 minutes ๐Ÿ˜…. Ok, then I also tasted it. 100%, so I was taking it slowly, maybe 1/4 of a square at once, letting it melt. The aroma is sweeter than the flavour (obviously, as there's no sugar), so I need to be patient. The chocolate is creamy, not dry, it's intense and rich but not bitter. Low acidity, and it brings out the unsweetened espresso and nutty notes beautifully. Perfect start for my ever so late participation in #tttt_rainbow of #tttt_bronze week. Added a photo of the back swirls for Trish @myic2016 because she loves them. Stay tuned for two more bars for this week. Do you like to try 100% bars?
My first time trying the first Chilean craft choco My first time trying the first Chilean craft chocolate brand @obolochocolate thanks to my friends @_chococard_ who bought it in SF back in March. Already an exciting thing to discover a new maker, but this time it's also the discovery of a new flavour, a wild herb called 'rica rica' that grows in the dryest desert of the world, the Atacama desert in Chile. The makers paired it with cocoa from Pangoa in Peru. The bar is a 53% dark-milk, so already starting with good characteristics (I looove dark milks). The chocolate melts into a deliciously creaminess with sweet caramel notes merging with a herbal, vegetal note and a slight cooling sensation. The packaging says that the herb itself has a mildly minty flavour. I think it's a very interesting idea to pair herbal/vegetal flavours with dark milk chocolate as the lightness and creaminess of the milk gives a nice background to the herb and it doesn't get overpowering. Yet you can still taste that it's something different. If you like unusual ingredients in chocolate, look out for this bar and let me know how you liked it. This is part 3 of my #tttt_orange row. Next week, we are onto 'bronze', so stay tuned for the next row in our #tttt_rainbow.
Still working my way through my chocolate haul fro Still working my way through my chocolate haul from Chocoa 2020 ๐Ÿ™ˆ It was nice to meet @chequessettchocolate and try their fantastic range of bars! I chose this 72% Dominican Republic dark chocolate studded with crystallized ginger and dried blueberries. Love how the orange colour pops out of the dark blue packaging. The smell is a mixture of sweet fruity and citrusy spicy. Depending on what inclusion you get on the piece that you are tasting, the experience can vary. It's also possible to taste the chocolate on its own. Of course the chocolate takes on the ginger flavour even if you don't actually get a piece of ginger on top, but it's much more toned down and lets the chocolate shine through. Really nice and creamy bar that gives me a christmas-y feeling (like gingerbread cookies). (After all, xmas is only 3 months away ๐Ÿ˜…) The blueberries are soft and juicy, very flavourful and a great accompaniment to the fiery ginger pieces. Have you tried Chequessett Chocolate yet? Do you have a favourite?
๐Ÿ If you haven't got the autumn feeling yet, th ๐Ÿ If you haven't got the autumn feeling yet, this week will definitely bring those cozy vibes ๐Ÿ For TTTT Orange week, first I bring you a bright dark chocolate made by @firetreechocolate using beans from the Mindanao Island in the Philippines. ๐Ÿ The 25g mini bar came with the tasting pack for @readcacao's Online Tasting Course, but I will probably use some of the other bars as well during the Rainbow theme because these beautiful swirls on the packaging are just gorgeous. ๐Ÿ No picture of the bar unfortunately, as they got melted in transit in the Vienna summery September weather. The crumbly bloomed texture helps the bar melt even more quickly and once all the cocoa butter crystals are melted again, the flavours open up deliver the same lovely notes as you'd get from a tempered bar. The only thing you miss with a bloomed bar is the glossy surface and the snap. Everything else is still there. ๐Ÿ This 73% dark has a bright citrusy aroma. Upon melting, it keeps on bringing sweet orange notes (how accurate!), it finishes with floral honey and caramel notes. ๐Ÿ Paired perfectly with an afternoon read of Cacao Magazine Issue 2 ๐Ÿ Have you got the autumn vibes yet?
๐Ÿ”ด Third time RED for TTTT and this time I have ๐Ÿ”ด Third time RED for TTTT and this time I have a flavoured bar. @endorfinfoods 60% cocoa content coconut dark-mylk chocolate flavoured with coffee and cardamom called Turkish Coffee. If you know Endorfin Foods chocolate bars you know that they are focusing on using ethically traded cocoa beans, and all of their bars are sweetened with coconut blossom sugar. They don't use dairy either but creamy coconut to create silky smooth dark-mylk bars. I really like the art nouveau style wrapper. The aroma of the bar is dominated by the special, molasses-like aroma of coconut blossom sugar. It melts easily and with a cooling sensation on the tongue. Coconut sugar has a strong flavour too, this hits the tongue first and then slowly and gently, you get a nice coffee note and an even more gentle floral and herbal cardamom note. Do you ever put spices in your cup of coffee? Cardamom works really well with both coffee and hot chocolate.
๐Ÿ”ด You say red, let it be red through and throug ๐Ÿ”ด You say red, let it be red through and through. Now watch out. This is no Ruby, not even strawberry or raspberry. No, it's not cherry, nor cranberry. Don't you worry, it's not tomato, but you're getting close: it's the sweet and earthy BEETROOT! ๐Ÿ”ด Say hello to another fun creation of @karl.harrer of @harrerchocolat. After purple sweet potatoes, he is on a roll to add other fun veggies to chocolate. They cook and dehydrate the beetroot themselves in the pastry kitchen and add the powdered beetroot to white chocolate. ๐Ÿ”ด The colour is a kind of pale red, and the aroma is predominantly sweet. The creamy melt releases sweetness and a fruit candy-like flavour. I'm not sure I would be able to guess beetroot. I have a weird relation to beetroot, sometimes I love it, sometimes I rather skip it. So I was a bit worried this would taste in a way that falls into the second category. Luckily it didn't happen. I know there has been another version for this bar with added horseradish, that probably pushes it towards a much more spicy and vegetal, savoury way than as it is without it. You know what? If my son would eat beetroots this way ๐Ÿ˜… I'll put it to the test tomorrow! What if the veggie revolution would succeed through chocolate?! ๐Ÿ”ด Have you already tasted vegetables in chocolate?
Are you RED-y? ๐Ÿ˜… Sorry, I'm probably not the fi Are you RED-y? ๐Ÿ˜… Sorry, I'm probably not the first one to start with this pun for the weekly TTTT round of RED week. I'm starting my red trio with this Brazilian bar by @luisaabram and this is the first time for me to have an entire bar from her (I vaguely remember tasting some samples from chocswaps). I love that there are two individually wrapped bars inside, so you don't expose the whole bar as you open it and can keep it for a later tasting or share it with someone. The packaging is mainly bilingual (Portuguese and English) except for the inner part (swipe to read) that is only in Portuguese. This 70% dark bar has a nice acidity, not citrusy but closer to tropical fruits like slightly unripe pineapples or passionfruit. There are also some underlying notes of nuts and rich chocolate, but this fruitiness is dominating the game. Happy to twin the lovely Shay @choccoffeewine with this bar, she paired it with Brazilian coffee, make sure to check out her post as well as all the other #tttt_red posts in the #tttt_rainbow series. I'll bring you two more red bars this week, so stay tuned!
Final piece of my PINK row for TTTT Rainbow series Final piece of my PINK row for TTTT Rainbow series is this beauty from @karunachoc. I have already tasted two of their bars (slow dried vs fast dried Belize) that I got at Chocoa, and the I received this partial bar from my friends @_chococard_ who kindly shared with me lots of bars they gathered at Chocoa and at the SF chocolate festival in March. I also did a comparative tasting of 3 bars made with Indian cacao a while back, and it's interesting to see how well this fourth bar matches to those ones. The packaging here also reflects the intense fruitiness of the bar. 70% dark, 3-ingredient bar with a lovely sweet fruity aroma. It melts gently with such an intense cherry note that it's almost unbelievable. The mouthfeel is clean, fresh and so bright. What an amazing interpretation of these Kerala beans! ๐Ÿ’ Do you like fruity notes in chocolate?
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