Markham & Fitz Chocolate Makers - Southern Pecan - 52% Dark Milk Chocolate with Caramelized Pecans & Black Salt (bar) - Aug. 25, 2025

Chocolate of the Day

Markham & Fitz Chocolate Makers
Southern Pecan - 52% Dark Milk Chocolate with Caramelized Pecans & Black Salt (bar)
Good ++
Weight: 2 oz. (57 g.) in total bar
Calories: 260 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $11.99 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Caputo's, online order 

Welcome to Day #2 of Chocolate, Beer & Hops Series--featuring chocolates with beer, beer yeast, hops as well as chocolates (like today's bar*) that pair with beer(s).

Today's Southern Pecan - 52% Dark Milk Chocolate with Caramelized Pecans & Black Salt (Batch #468) (bar) was from Markham & Fitz Chocolate Makers (Bentonville, Arkansas). It was made using cacao from Nicaragua.

Aroma notes included: sweet milk chocolate, sweet cream caramel and nut.

Texture: Soft, creamy whole milk chocolate with small, softly crunchy pecan pieces.

Flavor notes included: Sweet milk chocolate, with caramel (with faint brown sugar and maple) overtones, accented with salt. (I liked the salt.)

This flavorful milk chocolate was quite sweet, but it was a great mid-afternoon blood sugar booster; and the milk, nutty (pecan) caramel notes and black salt balanced the sugar. 

I enjoyed the blend of creamy, nutty (and very faintly fruity) caramel flavor notes in this satisfying milk chocolate. While I did not have a "biscuity beer"* to pair with this bar, I could imagine that it working nicely.

Maker's tasting notes: "Brightly aromatic cacao blends with cream and a salted subtle crunch of our Louisiana lady's heritage, the pecan."

*"Pairs well with a biscuity beer, your next Netflix binge, or storytelling with family around the campfire." 

Ingredients: "Cacao, Organic Cane Sugar, Organic Cocoa Butter, Whole Milk Powder, Caramelized Pecans (Pecans, Brown Sugar, Butter), Black Salt."

Allergen-related information: "Contains dairy & nuts."

Fossa Chocolate - Honey Orchid Dancong Oolong 52% dark milk chocolate (bar) - June 20, 2025

Chocolate of the Day

Fossa Chocolate
Honey Orchid Dancong Oolong 52% dark milk chocolate (bar) 
Good +++ - Very Good
Weight: 1.76 oz. (50 g.) in total bar
Calories: 273 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $15.00 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Bar & Cocoa, online order

Welcome to Day #7 of Chocolate and Tanzania Week, and Day #1 of Chocolate and Floral Theme Week. 

Happy Summer Solstice. I couldn't imagine a better bar to celebrate this spring-to-summer transition. 

Today's Honey Orchid Dancong Oolong 52% dark milk chocolate (bar) was made by Fossa Chocolate (Singapore). This collaboration with Pekoe & Imp (Singapore company specializing in single origin teas) was part of the Fossa's "Tea Chocolate" series.

Aroma notes for this tea-infused bar included: dark milk chocolate with subtle honey, orchid, faint stone fruit (peach, nectarine), and ripe guava. (It was a perfect sensory match with the bar's name.)

Texture: luxurious and creamy mouthfeel and melt

Flavor notes included: dark milk chocolate with blooming honey, floral, cream, oolong tea and fruit (peach, guava) notes.

I loved the aroma, creamy texture and complex, elegant, botanically authentic flavors that unfolded like a beautifully painted fan. This thoughtfully sourced and well-executed chocolate was fit for royalty.

Tasting Notes: "Floral fragrance layered with notes of guava and cream"

Ingredients: "Organic cacao, cane sugar, cocoa butter, milk powder, tea leaves"

Allergen-related information: "Contains dairy. Produced in a facility that processes nuts."

Heinde and Verre - Dutch Vegan Mylk 52% Chocolate (Indonesia, DR, Peru) - Nov. 26, 2023

Chocolate of the Day 

Heinde and Verre
Dutch Vegan Mylk 52% Chocolate (bar)
Good ++ 
Weight: 1.25 oz. (35 g.) / 2.5 oz. (70 g.) in package of 2 bars
Calories: 199 calories in 1 bar (1/2 of a 2-bar package) 
Cost: $9.50 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Bar and Cocoa, online order 

Welcome to Day #1 of Chocolate and Indonesia Theme Week, featuring chocolates made with cacao grown across the Republic of Indonesia--that includes 17,000+ islands--and origins such as Java and Bali.

Today's Dutch Vegan Mylk Chocolate (bar) was from Heinde and Verre B.V. (Rotterdam, The Netherlands). Like the company's name (rough translation: near and far), high-quality ingredients were selected from at least three different continents.

The cacao used to make this 52% cacao bar was from Indonesia, the Dominican Republic, and Peru.

Aroma notes for this vegan bar included: complex dark chocolate, dried fruit (banana), sweet green and subtle rice/oat cereal. 

The texture was thick and creamy, with no unpleasant graininess (from oats, rice). All the flavor inclusions were fully incorporated into the mylk chocolate. 

The sealed packaging helped keep this bar smooth, in-temper,* and fresh-tasting. (And it also made it easy to share a bar with someone else.)

Flavor notes included chocolate, fruit - (fully incorporated), authentic banana, and pleasant, very subtle oat and rice "milk" and very faint coconut.

This was one of the most well-crafted and tasty vegan "milk" bars I've tasted. Alternative milk bars often taste/feel a bit starchy; or the oats or rice can muddle the taste of the cacao with duller flavors.

Today's bar was very nicely balanced, not too sweet, with a pleasing complexity. 

Ingredients: "Cacao beans and cacao butter (52%), sugar, oat, cocos, banana, rice, calcium, sunflower lecithin, salt." 

Allergen-related information: (None listed. See ingredients list above.)

*Chocolate is tempered (using precise cycles of heating and cooling). The perfect temper results in chocolate bars that break with a hard snap at room temperature, and well-tempered chocolates have a longer shelf life as well. If chocolate sits in the sun, or is subjected to other extremes, it can lose its firm texture and desirable appearance and become out of temper.

Lir Chocolates - Guinness Dark Chocolate (bar) - Sept. 18, 2023

Chocolate of the Day

Lir Chocolates
Guinness Dark Chocolate (bar)
Good +
Weight: 1.06 oz. (30 g.) / 3.18 g. (90 g.) in total bar
Calories: 175.5 calories in 1/3 bar
Cost: 3.00 Euros ($3.00 (estim.) USD) for 1 bar
Purchased from: Guinness Storehouse, St. James's Gate, Dublin, Ireland

Welcome to Day #2 of Chocolate and Ireland Theme Week. 

Today's Guinness Dark Chocolate (bar) was made by Lir Chocolates (Johnstown, Navan, County Meath, Ireland)--"with chocolate from multiple countries." In addition to producing their own chocolates, Lir partners with famous Irish product brands like Guinness to produce novelty chocolate offerings. (Lir also makes a box of small Guinness chocolate ("glasses"), and a Guinness Chocolate Rugby Ball.)

Aroma notes for today's Irish stout-forward chocolate included sweet dark chocolate and sharp, sweet malted barley--just like the aroma in the Guinness facility where I bought these.

The bar's texture was silky smooth, buttery and slightly oily (butter oil).

Flavor notes included: smooth dark (52%) chocolate and bold brew notes (roasted, malted barley, hops, stout, dark beer).

Tasting notes: "Intense dark chocolate flavoured with the complex notes of Guinness (TM)."

Ingredients: Cocoa Mass, Sugar, Cocoa Butter, Butter Oil (Milk), Flavourings, Emulsifier: Lecithins (Soya), Guinness (TM) Beer (contains Barley and Gluten). Dark Chocolate contains Cocoa Solids 52% minimum. 

Allergen-related information: Contains: Milk, Soya, Barley, Gluten. May contain traces of Nuts and Peanuts. This product contains alcohol (0.2%). Not suitable for children. 

Taitau - 52% Dark Chocolate (bar) - Aug. 30, 2023

Chocolate of the Day

Taitau (Tai Tau)
52% Dark Chocolate (bar)
Good +
Weight: .706 oz. (20 g.) / 3.5 oz. (100 g.) in total bar
Calories: 110 calories in 1 serving of bar
Cost: $3.39 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Crossroads Specialty Market, Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to Day #5 of Chocolate and Lithuania Theme Week.

Today's 52% Dark Chocolate (bar) from Taitau (Tai Tau) Exclusive Selection (Lietuva, Lithuania) was imported into the U.S. by B&I Overseas Trading Inc. (Van Nuys, CA).

This bar was "made from premium quality Ghanian cocoa beans." Ghana, in recent years, has been the number two exporter of cocoa beans in the world (right behind Ivory Coast). The top three export markets (in 2020-2021) for Ghana cacaco were: 1.) Netherlands, 2.) Malaysia, and 3.) United States. 

Most of the world's chocolate from Northern Europe (and the Western world) is made using West African cacao--and most cacao trees are Forastero (variety). Forastero cacao beans typically have a deep, dense, chocolate-y flavor.

Aroma notes for today's (Ghana) bar included: sweet dark chocolate; faint, warm nutty spice; subtle caramel macchiato (light coffee).  

The texture was uniformly smooth, with a creamy melt.

Flavor notes were similar to the aroma notes, and included: rich, very sweet dark chocolate. Sugar was the number one ingredient, and it dominated the tasting experience. This 52% chocolate was too sweet for me; but otherwise it had a pleasing aroma, well-executed texture and rich, underlying chocolate-y flavor.

Ingredients: "Sugar, cocoa mass (made from premium quality Ghanian cocoa beans), cocoa butter,  emulsifier - rape (canola) lecithin." 

Allergen-related information: "This product may contain traces of peanuts, hazelnuts, gluten and milk." 

 

Mirzam Chocolate - 52% Dark Milk Chocolate with Coconut (bar) - Feb. 4, 2021

Chocolate of the Day

Mirzam Chocolate 
52% Dark Milk Chocolate with Coconut (bar)
Good +
Weight: 2.47 oz. (70 g.) in total bar
Calories: 352.8 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $11.25 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Bar and Cocoa, online order

Welcome to Day #6 of Chocolate and Coconut Theme Week.

Today's Mirzam Chocolate Makers* 52% Dark Milk Chocolate with Coconut (bar) was made in Dubai (United Arab Emirates), produced by Kakaw Manufacturing, LLC.

The aroma of this chocolate was redolent with cocoa and coconut. The texture was uniformly laced with a tiny, quiet riot of coconut bits, providing a satisfying chewy, crunchy texture--in the same way that certain sesame and coconut candies satisfy a craving for something sweet and crunchy.

Many of the artisan chocolate and coconut bars featured this week were a very finely ground mind meld of these two flavors, resulting in bars with silken, creamy coconut milk texture, often using coconut milk as a vegan replacement for dairy milk. 

Today's 52% cacao bar differed in at least two significant ways: 1.) the "milk" in the "dark milk" name was dairy milk powder; and 2.) the more intact coconut bits yielded a stone-ground-like melt, with layers of flavor and texture. 

This week's line-up has shown that multiple approaches to blending cacao and coconut can, and do, result in successful, high-end, flavorful chocolate bars. 

While I initially felt that today's bar might be too sweet (it was a bit harder to detect any subtle flavor nuances in the cacao), I managed to consume the entire bar with no trouble whatsoever.

Ingredients: Cocoa beans, skim milk powder, sugar, cocoa butter, coconut, organic coconut extract.

*Mirzam is the name of a bright star (in the southern constellation of Canis Major) that helped Arab traders navigate to far-away lands as they searched for/traded in exotic spices and other goods. Mirzam Chocolate Makers honors this history, and specializes in high-end bean-to-bar chocolates, confections and desserts that feature dates, coffee, cardamom, sesame seeds and other flavor blends from the Arab world.

NibMor - Dark Chocolate Bites with Tart Cherries - May 4, 2019

Chocolate of the Day: 

NibMor Inc.
Dark Chocolate Bites with Tart Cherries
Good
Weight: 1.8 oz. (51 g.) / 5.4 oz. (153 g.) in total package
Calories: 240 calories in 1 serving (6 pieces)
Cost: $ missing information
Purchased from: missing information

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

Today's Dark Chocolate Bites with real Tart Cherries were manufactured for NibMor Inc. (Kennebunk, ME). NibMor, short for Nibble More, had its start in a New York City kitchen. Eventually the company moved to Maine.

These NibMor small rectangular bites (think mini bars but without the extra packaging of individually-wrapped chocolates), were an easily consumable and shareable size.

They had a fairly strong cherry/cherry almond aroma* and bits of authentic tart, sweetened cherries complemented the sweet 52% cocoa dark chocolate.

Sugar was the first ingredient listed*. We would love to see a 70% cacao dark version to take down the sweetness a bit. But, we understand many people do like sugar.

*Ingredients: Sugar, chocolate liquor, cocoa butter, natural cherries, natural cherry flavor*, soy lecithin (an emulsifier), vanilla.

NibMor - Dark Chocolate bites with real wild Maine blueberries - Jan. 26, 2018

Chocolate of the Day:

NibMor Inc.
Dark Chocolate bites with real wild Maine blueberries
Good +
Weight: 1.8 oz. (51 g.) / 5.4 oz. (153 g.) in total package
Calories: 240 calories in 1 serving
Cost: $5.69 for 1 package
Purchased from: Piazza's Fine Foods, Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to Day #4 of Chocolate and Fruit Theme Week.

Today's Dark Chocolate bites with real wild Maine blueberries were from NibMor Inc. (Kennebunk, ME).

These two-bite sized rectangles were dark (52% cocoa) and sweet, and full of natural blueberry flavor.

Tiny, whole, dried wild blueberries were visible on the underside, and were well balanced with a medium % dark chocolate.

These NibMor chocolate bites were gluten free, vegan, non-GMO project verified, and made with
Rainforest Alliance Certified Cacao.

Chocolino - Dark Chocolate Almond & Sea Salt bar - July 31, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Chocolino
Dark Chocolate Almond and Sea Salt 52% Cacao bar
Good - Good +
Weight: 1.07 oz. (30 g.) / 2.14 oz. (60 g.) in total bar
Calories: 165 calories in 1/2 bar
Cost: $2.15 for 1 bar
Purchased from: CVS/Pharmacy, Palo Alto, CA

Welcome to Day #3 of Chocolate and Almond Theme Week.

The Chocolino Dark Chocolate Almond and Sea Salt bar was "Artfully Crafted for Chocolino" in Fresno, CA.

This relatively smooth 52% Cacao dark chocolate bar contained sparkles of sea salt and bits of almonds.

GourmetNut - Dark Chocolate Covered Cashews - June 17, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

GourmetNut
Dark Chocolate Covered Cashews
Good - Good +
Weight: 1.4 oz. (40 g.) / 7 oz. (198 g.) in total package
Calories: 210 calories in 1 serving (6 pieces)
Cost: $5.99 for 1 package
Purchased from: Kohl's, Mountain View, CA

Welcome to Day #3 of Chocolate and Cashew Theme Week.

Today's Dark Chocolate Covered Cashews were produced by GourmetNut (Brooklyn, NY).

These glossy, comma-shaped confections with a cashew inside were chocolatey, crunchy and satisfying.

Like most chocolate-covered cashew treats, the mild, sweet nut flavor of this nut got overshadowed a bit. The relatively thick 52% cacao chocolate covering had a pleasing, rich brownie flavor and dominated the mix.