Tuesday, September 20, 2022

Spinnaker Chocolate - 70% Madagascar with Sea Salt (bar) - Sept. 20, 2022

Chocolate of the Day

Spinnaker Chocolate
70% Madagascar with Sea Salt (bar)
Good +-Good++
Weight: 1 oz. (28.3 g.) / 2 oz. (57 g.) in total bar
Calories: 120 calories (per label) in 1/2 bar
Cost: $11.00 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Spinnaker Chocolate, online order 

Welcome to Day #8 of Chocolate and Madagascar Theme Week.

Today's 70% Madagascar with Sea Salt (bar) was made from bean-to-bar by Spinnaker Chocolate (Seattle, WA).

Aroma notes for this bar included: faint fruit (mango, tropical fruit, fruitcake), chocolate (dark chocolate ganache); sweet, subtle, honey-ed floral; and diffuse light fruit (dried melon, jackfruit, mild tangerine, dried cacao fruit/pulp). In a re-tasting (several hours later), I experienced peach-mango fruit aroma notes.

This well-tempered chocolate had a smooth, relatively slow melt (at room temperature), allowing bright fruit flavors to unfold. Tiny flakes of sea salt added a bit of texture, and an additional dimension of flavor.

Flavor notes included rich cocoa, followed by a rapid blooming of a bouquet of tart-sweet fruits (sour cherry, jackfruit (pineapple, mango), sweet citrus, tart-sweet red and dark berry, other), and sparkles of sea salt. Fruit flavors played the starring role, and these bright notes leveled off after about 10 seconds and lingered into the finish. 

After about a minute (after swallowing this chocolate) there were two fleeting, barely-there chocolate notes (very faint, balanced earth and warm spice)--revealed after the fruit flavors had receded. (After the bar had been opened for several hours, the tart-sweet fruit notes mellowed a little.)

This well-executed, 70% Madagascar dark chocolate bar--like the Spinnaker 70% Dark Madagascar and 58% Dark Milk Madagascar bars reviewed earlier this week--offered a bright and fruit-forward rocket ride with no off notes. 

The addition of sea salt was interesting. I love trying umami adds and salt(s) with chocolates, especially if there are nuts or nutty notes involved. And this was high-quality sea salt.

However, in today's case, adding salt felt like salting an exotic fruit salad or fruit juice. The delicate sea salt flakes helped balance the naturally tart-sweetness; but I also wanted to taste all the very unique and prominent Madagascar cacao fruit notes in this bar without other elements competing for my attention.

Maker's tasting notes: "The always delicious Madagascar beans paired with Jacobsen Salt Co.'s Pure Flake Finishing Salt. My oh my."

Ingredients: Cacao, Organic cane sugar, sea salt flakes

Allergen-related information: "Processed in a facility that uses milk powder and nuts."

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