ChocolateBet: September 25, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:

1 small bar
Kshocolat
Honeycomb and Vanilla - Milk Chocolate
Good
Weight: .35 oz. (10 grams)
Calories: 52.5 calories (estimate) for 1 bar
Cost: $5.00 for a package of six small bars
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered, in San Francisco, CA

This little milk chocolate bar from Kshocolat (Scotland) certainly tasted sweet, but it was hard to pick out the honey flavor amongst all the sugar molecules.

Three of these Honeycomb and Vanilla bars were packaged together with three Kshocolat's Orange and Cardamom dark chocolate bars. Both were good, but the latter also had wonderful citrus and cardamom notes.

ChocolateBet: September 24, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:

1 small bar
Kshocolat
Orange and Cardamom - 72% dark chocolate bar
Very Good +
Weight: .35 oz. (10 grams)
Calories: 52.5 calories (estimate)
Cost: $5.00 for a package of 6 bars
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered in San Francisco, CA

If you like fragrant spice items, like gingerbread and chai tea, you should try this Orange and Cardamom dark chocolate bar from Kschocolat (Scotland). I enjoyed it very much, and started fantasizing about melting a few of these dark chocolate bars into a gingerbread cake recipe. This small bar is a perfect size: large enough to satisfy, and small enough to prevent chocolate overload. (These bars were packaged with Kshocolat's Honeycomb and Vanilla Milk Chocolate bars, featured earlier.)

ChocolateBet: September 23, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:
1 Tablespoon
Fudge is My Life
Ginger Chocolate Sauce
Weight: ~.7 oz. (20 g.)/10 oz. (284 g.) in total jar
Calories: 80 calories in 1 Tablespoon
Cost: $8.00 for 1 jar
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered, in San Francisco, CA

I tried this ginger chocolate sauce with a wheat-free lemon cheesecake I bought from IKEA. In the future, I'd like to try this fudge sauce heated, over vanilla ice cream, or cherry vanilla ice cream.

ChocolateBet: September 22, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:
1 square
Z. Cioccolato
Black Panther Fudge
Very Good
Weight: ~2.12 oz. (60 grams)/~4.48 oz. (128 g.) total bought
Calories: ~250 calories (estimate)
Cost: $4.48 for total mini-slab I bought
Purchased from: Z. Cioccolato, in North Beach, San Francisco, CA

Z. Cioccolato, a store in San Francisco, is a great place to find good fudge and novelty chocolate items. Last night, I bought a 1/4-pound mini-slab of Black Panther* fudge, to try today; and I found some other fun chocolates to sample later. (I did not buy the bacon wallet, or the toast wallet, or the Hostess (King) Ding Dong lunchbox, but I did find a straw that turns ordinary milk into chocolate milk. More on that later.)

My apologies to Z. Cioccolato for the unflattering image of the fudge above; it looks more like a slab of meat than fudge. It looked much nicer in the shop.

*Black Panther is the name of a Marvel comic book character. Also, The Black Panthers name refers to an African-American revolutionary group and political party that was active in the San Francisco Bay Area. Both the character and the group came into being in 1966.

ChocolateBet: September 21, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:

NewTree
"Thym Alpha" - Dark Chocolate with Thyme
(aka Chocolat Noir Au Thym) with Omega 3
Very Good +
Weight: 2.35 oz. (66.67 g.) (estimate) for 5/6 bar /~2.82 oz. (80 g.) in total bar
Calories: 300 calories (estimate) in 5/6 bar
Cost: $6.00 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered, in San Francisco, CA

It's thyme for college students to return to classes this week; and, sadly, it's thyme for summer to end today and for fall to begin tomorrow.

Brightening up the mood a bit was today's chocolate bar from NewTree with, you guessed it, thyme. Crunchy bits of rice and roasted flax seeds mixed with the herbal taste of the thyme in this "Alpha" dark chocolate bar made for a great combination of textures and flavors.

ChocolateBet: September 20, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:

1 bar
B.T. McElrath Chocolatier, Inc.
Salty Dog Chocolate Bar
Very Good
Weight: 3.0 oz. (85 grams) in 1 bar
Calories: ~420 calories in 1 bar
Cost: $5.50
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered, in San Francisco, CA

Arghh. I missed the opportunity to eat this yesterday, September 19, which was Talk Like A Pirate Day. It's hard to keep track of all the interesting holidays (that provide creative fodder for eating different chocolates). This was good. However, as much as I enjoy good dark chocolate, a version of this bar with 60% cacao (vs. 70%) would probably make it easier to taste the nice, embedded toffee bits and sea salt.

ChocolateBet: September 19, 2009

Chocolate of the Day:

1 bar
Al Nassma
"Dates" (camel milk chocolate) bar
Good + - Very Good
Weight: 70 grams (2.46 oz.) in 1 bar
Calories: 369 calories (estimate) in 1 bar
Cost: $12.00 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Chocolate Covered, in San Francisco, CA

Last week, one little fresh, yellow date (four cents worth) rolled down the black grocery check-out strip, along with my other groceries/chocolates. I wanted to try one date, before buying a large cluster of them. It was very good.

When I lived in Santa Barbara years ago, a friend from Indio (known as the date capital of the U.S. at one time) got me hooked on date milkshakes with a dash of nutmeg. Heavenly. So, it was with these fond date-related memories in mind that I bit into this unique Al Nassma camel milk chocolate bar, from halfway around the world (Dubai, United Arab Emirates). It was well-made and quite tasty. I imagined sitting in the shade in my own little oasis, eating this Dates bar with toasted walnuts and fresh orange slices. It probably wouldn't be half bad in a date milkshake either.

Change of subject...

Happy Talk Like a Pirate Day (Sept. 19).

Tomorrow's chocolate will be B.T. McElrath's Salty Dog Chocolate Bar, in honor of this day. Also, this weekend is the Austin Chocolate Festival in Texas, with Fat Turkey Chocolates and others, and proceeds going to Susan G. Komen organization. (O.K. I have to try a Fat Turkey chocolate; the name is too good.)