Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate - Dark Chocolate Strawberry Champagne Truffle 54% (bar) - Oct. 22, 2025

Chocolate of the Day

Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company
Dark Chocolate Strawberry Champagne Truffle 54% Cocoa (bar)
Good + - Good ++ 
Weight: 1.16 oz. (33 g.) / 3.5 oz. (99 g.) in total bar
Calories: 150 calories in 1/3 bar
Cost: $6.99 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Andronico's Community Market, Los Altos, CA

Welcome to Day #9 of Chocolate and France Theme Week, and Day #1 of Chocolate and Fruits Theme Week. This is the second of two bars featured today. (See previous post for a short write-up on Valrhona's 70% Guanaja dark chocolate.)

Today's Dark Chocolate Strawberry Champagne Truffle 54% Cocoa (bar) was from Chocolate Chocolate Chocolate Company (St. Louis, MO).  

Strawberries may not have been native to France; but, like chocolate, strawberries were taken to a new level there. The French and Swiss helped perfect milk chocolate, and the modern strawberry was cultivated in Brittany France (a hybrid two "New World" strawberries from the Americas) in the 1750s. Champagne was the third element in this bar. This sparkling wine is unique to a growing region in northeastern France.

Put chocolate, strawberries and Champagne together and you have the makings of a romantic and/or a special occasion.

Aroma and flavor notes for today's filled bar included: sweet, dark chocolate; slightly fermented red berry (strawberry) and white wine grapes/white raisins.

Texture: soft, almost creamy, smooth dark chocolate, that surrounded a thin layer of sweet, slightly jammy, red strawberry fruit. 

I enjoyed trying this celebratory, upbeat chocolate.

Ingredients: Dark Chocolate (Cane Sugar, Chocolate Liquor - Processed with Alkali, Cocoa Butter, Milk Fat, Soy Lecithin - an Emulsifier, Vanilla Extract), Cane Sugar, Corn Syrup, White Chocolate (Sugar, Cocoa Butter, Whole Milk, Non-Fat Dry Milk, Milk Fat, Soy Lecithin (am Emulsifier) and Natural Vanilla Flavor), Heavy Cream (Cream (milk) and Carageenan), Whey Powder, Natural Flavor, Marc De Champagne, Strawberry Puree, Fruit Juice, Natural Colors from Fruits and Vegetables, Invertase

Allergen-related information: "Contains: Milk, Soy" "Products have been manufactured on shared equipment that processes Peanuts, Tree Nuts, Egg, Soy, Dairy and Wheat products. Contains bioengineered ingredients."

Valrhona - Guanaja Valrhona Chocolate (piece) - Oct. 22, 2025

Chocolate of the Day

Valrhona 
Guanaja Valrhona Chocolate (piece)
Good +++
Weight: 1.41 oz. (40 g.) / 2.82 oz. (80 g.) in total piece
Calories: 219 calories (estimate) in 1/2 piece
Cost: $5.60 for 1 wrapped piece (sold by the pound)
Purchased from: The Market at Edgewood, Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to Day #9 of Chocolate and France Theme Week. This week would not be complete without at least one Valrhona chocolate offering; and Day #1 of Chocolate and Fruits Theme Week.

Today's Guanaja Valrhona chocolate made by Valrhona SAS (Tain L'Heritage, France) was an individually wrapped piece, sold by the pound at a high-end market.

Guanaja is a Valrhona 70% dark blend that was first announced in the 1980s.* This very well-balanced, sophisticated blend contained (according to online sources) cacao beans from six different origins including: Trinidad, Dominican Republic, Jamaica, Ghana, Ivory Coast and Madagascar.

I really appreciated this chocolate. It was chocolate-y with a balanced, gentle fruit and very balanced subtle roasted and bittersweet notes. It was "just right" on many levels. Perfect for a baking or dessert; and it was great all by itself.

Note: See also the next post for a second (never featured before) chocolate (a strawberry champagne chocolate) today--because I tasted what was likely the same 6-nation Guanaja blend back in 2009.

Company's product description: "Bittersweet and Elegant"

Ingredients: (No ingredients were listed on this one piece.) (Online information suggested ingredients have included: cacao(s), sugar, cocoa butter, vanilla, and soy lecithin.)

Allergen-related information: (No allergen-related information printed on this label.) 

*Valrhona was founded in the 1920s. When the company introduced Guanaja dark chocolate decades later, it was considered almost revolutionary -- a "bitter" but balanced/darker chocolate. The name Guanaja is a "nod to Christopher Columbus when he washed up on" the island of Guanaja (Honduras) in the Caribbean more than 500 years ago, on the voyage when they were (the first Europeans to be) exposed to cacao. 

Chocolat Bonnat - Les Recettes de Jean Sulpice - Sarrasin Caramelise 55% Milk Chocolate (bar) - Oct. 21, 2025

Chocolate of the Day

Chocolat Bonnat
Les Recettes de Jean Sulpice - Sarrasin Caramelise 55% Cacao Chocolat Au Lait
(The Recipes of Jean Sulpice - Caramelized Buckwheat 55% Cacao Milk Chocolate) 
Good ++ 
Weight: 1.76 oz. (50 g.) / 3.5 oz. (100 g.) in total bar
Calories: 297.5 calories in 1/2 bar (50 g.)
Cost: $15.00 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Jemome's C.V. Market, Carmel Valley, CA

Bonjour, and welcome to Day #8 of Chocolate & France Theme Week.

Today's Les Recettes de Jean Sulpice - Sarrasin Caramelise 55% Cacao Chocolat Au Lait (bar) made by Bonnat Chocolatier (Voiron, France). It was a collaboration between chocolate maker Stephane Bonnat and French chef, Jean Sulpice.*

The cacao(s) used to make the chocolate was from Indonesia and Mexico.

Aroma and flavor notes for this bar included: complex milky, mild chocolate with light cocoa and very slight earthy grain with barely detectable roasted green tea notes.

Texture: smooth, milky chocolate with slightly crunchy, pyramid-shaped (presumably toasted/browned) caramelized buckwheat. (Caramelized in this case did not mean sweet caramelized sugar.) Each bite of chocolate had a slow then rapid melt (in a cool room).

Buckwheat (a seed from a plant) is believed to originate in Asia (Yunnan province in southwestern China). It spread to Europe, and eventually the United States. Many of us remember eating buckwheat pancakes with maple syrup and butter when young. I wondered what caramelized buckwheat would taste like in chocolate.

Maker's comments/notes (rough translation): Indonesian and Mexican milk chocolate for rare cacaos with casse-claire and a pinch of caramelized buckwheat to spice it up and enhance the floral aromas of these rare cacaos.

I enjoyed the opportunity to try this chocolate with buckwheat. I appreciated being able to taste the nuanced flavors present in this flavor inclusion, as well as the list of short, quality list of ingredients.

Ingredients: "Cocoa, cocoa butter, sugar, powdered milk, buckwheat."

Allergen-related information: Contains Milk, and buckwheat.

*Jean Sulpice is perhaps best known in France as the youngest French chef to receive a Michelin star. (He was 26 years old at the time and earned a second star in 2010 -- becoming the youngest chef to win two stars.)