Sunday, July 21, 2019

Goodio Craft Chocolate - Sea Salt 77% Cacao bar - July 21, 2019

Chocolate of the Day: 

Goodio Craft Chocolate
Sea Salt 77% Cacao bar
Good - Good +
Weight: .85 oz. (24 g.) / 1.7 oz. (48 g.) in total bar
Calories: 112.5 calories in 1/2 bar
Cost: $8.50 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered, San Francisco, CA

Welcome to Day #7 of Chocolate and (Sea) Salt Theme Week.

Today's four-ingredient* Sea Salt 70% Cacao bar was made from stoneground cacao (from the Congo in Africa) and sea salt (hand harvested from Icelandic fjords) by Goodio Craft Chocolate (Helsinki, Finland).

See image (right) to see this bar, and the three men behind Goodio in the background. (Picture/background shown in photo is from Goodio Craft Chocolate website.) Chief Creative Officer, Jukka Peltola, pictured at far right, founded the company in 2015.

This chocolate had a bold, earthy, slightly acidic chocolate and savory (sea salt) aroma, which in some bars might signal a very strong flavor. However, because this chocolate was made with raw cacao, it did not get roasted, or processed over a certain temperature. It did not have the heavy, acidic or slight smoky "charcoal" flavor that the aroma caused us to brace for.  (Think espresso vs. a mild coffee.)

Instead the chocolate had relatively robust cocoa flavor with a lower acidic and sharpness level than expected. It had light floral,** cocoa, fruit and coconut sugar notes, and a faint sparkle of sea salt.

The chocolate was smooth yet slightly granular in texture because it was stoneground, likely for a relatively shorter period. Larger particle size and less grinding time means more intact flavors. However, the "creamiest" mouthfeel often comes from long grinding/conching time, which, you guessed it, leads to loss in certain flavors. It's a chocolate making trade-off.

The coconut sugar—and less sugar in general with a darker, 77% cacao bar—allows one enjoy flavorful cacao, but with a gentler tasting experience in other aspects. That is, coconut palm sugar has been shown to be lower on the glycemic index than refined cane sugar. So you may experience less of a sugar buzz. (Fine by us.)

Today's bar was raw, vegan and organic.

*Ingredients: Organic Cacao beans (Congo), organic coconut sugar, organic cacao butter and sea salt
** More delicate floral notes are often the first to go when cacao is roasted or heated, so you're more likely to taste these in raw chocolate and in origins where floral flavor is commonly found, but then lost in cacao processing.




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