Charm School - Coconut Milk Chocolate bar - Mar. 3, 2015

Chocolate of the Day: 

Charm School Chocolate
Coconut Milk Chocolate 49% bar
Good + - Very Good
Weight: 2.1 oz. (60 g.) in 1 bar
Calories: 315 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $10.00 for 1 bar
Purchased from: The Chocolate Garage, Palo Alto, CA

Today was Day #3 for Chocolate and Coconut Theme Week.

The number of good non-dairy and vegan "milk" chocolate bars has grown in recent years. These bars are made with milk alternatives, such as coconut "milk" instead of cow's milk.

Today's Coconut Milk Chocolate 49% cacao bar from Charm School Chocolate (Reisterstown, MD) was definitely one of the best ones I've tasted to date.

Charm School Chocolate specializes in non-dairy, vegan chocolate offerings, incorporating organic and fair trade ingredients where possible.

The chocolate was made from scratch, stoneground and crafted using cacao beans from Maya Mountain Cacao (farmers co-op in Southern Belize). The finished bar had a rich, almost creamy melt and tasted like great chocolate all the way through -- an experience made possible by great beans and careful chocolate-making technique. The bar also had faint caramel latte, coconut, spice (cinnamon, vanilla, lemongrass) flavor notes.

This Coconut Milk Chocolate bar earned a 2015 gold seal of approval from The Good Food Awards. 

Divine - 70% Mango and Coconut bar - March 2, 2015

Chocolate of the Day: 

Divine Chocolate Inc.
70% Dark Chocolate with Mango and Coconut bar
Good
Weight: 1.17 oz. (33.3 g.) / 3.5 oz. (100 g.) in total bar
Calories:  188 calories in 1/3 bar (per label)
Cost: $3.99 in 1 bar
Purchased from: Michaels, Mountain View, CA

Today was Day #2 of Chocolate and Coconut Theme Week.

One of my favorite desserts from Thailand and southeast Asia is Mango with Sticky (Coconut) Rice. Today's 70% Dark Chocolate with Mango and Coconut bar  from Divine Chocolate Inc. (Wash., D.C.) was the closest chocolate bar I could find that incorporated these two flavors. (I should add -- that I haven't already tried before.)

Chocolate tends to overpower delicate or less assertive flavor additions, so I didn't expect this dark chocolate bar to be the same as the fresh sliced mango and sweet coconut rice dessert.

It was, however, a nice rendition of these two flavors, with subtle mango fruit and even subtler coconut flavor.

Divine Chocolate offers a line of Fairtrade certified chocolate bars -- that are imported from Germany and distributed here in the U.S. (The story of a cacao farmer from Africa (Ghana) was printed on the inside of the label.)