Coconut Mango Bites - May 29, 2013

Chocolate of the Day: 

Trader Joe's
Dark Chocolate Covered Coconut Mango Bites
Good
Weight: 1.4 oz. (40 g.) in 3 pieces / 7 oz. (198 g.) total package
Calories: 200 calories in 1 serving (3 pieces)
Cost: $3.99 for 1 package
Purchased from: Trader Joe's, Menlo Park, CA

These soft and chewy, sweet coconut candy and mango flavored bites from Trader Joe's (Monrovia, CA) were coated with dark chocolate that helped balance out the sweetness. The small rectangular pieces that came packaged in a resealable bag were just the right size for a snack.

Today was Day #5 of Chocolate and Mango Theme Week.

Coco Keeno - Organic mango - May 28, 2013

Chocolate of the Day: 

Wonder Food Co.
Coco Keeno - Organic dried mango covered in dark chocolate
Good
Weight: 1 oz. (28.3 g.) / 2 oz. (57 g.) in 1 box
Calories: 140 calories for 1/2 box
Cost: $3.75 for 1 package/box
Purchased from: SweetE Organic, Mill Valley, CA

Today was Day #4 of Chocolate and Mango Theme Week.

Today's "Coco Mango" flavor, from a line of Coco Keeno chocolate products, was made with dried, organic mango from Wonder Food Co. (Palm Desert, CA). Small mango pieces were drenched in organic dark chocolate. The 70% cacao coating was rich enough to make a small serving satisfying.

And, who doesn't like a nice monkey mascot when it comes to chocolate? (Previously on Chocolate Banquet I featured a Chocolate and Monkey Theme Week, with a lot of bananas and peanut butter and monkeys of all types.) This particular, almost mango-colored, golden tamarin monkey (pictured on today's chocolate package) lives in trees in Central/South America, and is a Coco Keeno mascot. Wonder Food Co. donates part of the proceeds from this product line to preserving rainforest/monkey habitat.

Thank you to Elana at SweetE Organic, for continuing to carry great organic, gluten free, preservative-free options, so that everyone can enjoy a sweet item now and then.

Coco Polo - Milk with Mango bar - May 27, 2013

Chocolate of the Day: 

Coco Polo
Milk with Mango (sample) bar
Good - Good +
Weight: .49 oz. (13.8 g.) (estimate) in 1 small sample packet
Calories: 69 calories (estimate) for 1 small sample packet
Cost: N/A - sample
Purchased from: N/A - sample, Coco Polo booth at San Francisco Fancy Food Show, San Francisco, CA

Today was Day #3 of Chocolate and Mango Theme Week.

Today's chocolate came in the form of a small sample packet that I'd picked up at a Fancy Food Show in San Francisco a few months ago. I'd been saving it, hoping I'd have enough mango + chocolate items for this theme week. And, at last, here we are.

Coco Polo (Highland Park, NJ) makes a line of stevia-sweetened chocolate bars in a variety of flavors, with no detectable "off" taste that can accompany a chocolate made with an alternative sweetener. This Milk (39% cacao) bar had just the right level of sweetness for my taste and a hint of sweet mango flavor.

Compartes bar with mango - May 26, 2013

Chocolate of the Day:

Compartes Chocolatier
Okavango Delta
Good
Weight: 1 oz. (28.3 g.) in 1/3 bar / 3 oz. (85 g.) in 1 bar
Calories: 148 calories (estimate) for 1/3 bar
Cost: $9.99 for 1 bar
Purchased from: Compartes Chocolatier, Los Angeles, CA (online order)

Compartes Chocolatier (Los Angeles, CA) offers a colorfully packaged line of bars and chocolates, many with exotic flavor combinations. Today's "World Series" (Vol. 1, Bar 12) Okavango Delta, contained bits of mango and grains of paradise in a dark base of 73% cacao.

I had to work to find hidden sweet bits of fruit and flavor in this very earthy, dark, gluten free bar, much like a trek through the jungle I imagined. In fact, the packaging (complete with zebra art) offered a similar description:

"Trekking through fields of mango and grains of paradise, the African Zebra's celebrate(d) triumphant journey end(s) at the Okavango Delta*."

Today was Day #2 of Chocolate and Mango Theme Week.

*The Okavango Delta is located in Botswana (a land-locked country in Southern Africa). The Delta is a large inland delta that supports many types of wildlife (including zebra) with water levels that fluctuate with seasonal flooding. Unlike other deltas that empty into a sea or ocean, the waters end at the Kalahari, with most water evaporating or being absorbed. The Delta has been called one of the seven wonders of Africa.

Tamarind Mango Caramel - May 25, 2013

Chocolate of the Day: 

The Oakland Chocolate Company
Tamarind Mango Caramel
Very Good
Weight: .4 oz. (11.32 g.) (estimate) for 1 piece
Calories: 60 calories (estimate)
Cost: $2.00 for 1 piece
Purchased from: The Oakland Chocolate Company (Oakland, CA)

Nancy Nadel of The Oakland Chocolate Company (Oakland, CA) has done it again -- another great flavor combination.

Today's Tamarind Mango Caramel had just the right amount of tamarind and mango flavors infused into a beautiful caramel center, that was wrapped in 70% cacao dark chocolate from the parish of St. Mary in Jamaica, and topped with a thin mango tile. Very flavorful, without being too overpowering.

Today was the first day of Chocolate and Mango Theme Week.

Agouti Cacao Drinking Chocolate - May 24, 2013

Chocolate of the Day:

Agouti Cacao Farm
Drinking chocolate (stoneground)
Good +
Weight: 3 oz. (85 g.) (estimate) for 1 bag
Calories: 300 calories (estimate) for 2 cups (added honey)
Cost: $4.00 (estimate) BZ dollars for 1 bag
Purchased from: Agouti Cacao Farm, San Pedro Colombia Village, Belize

Today I savored the last bit of chocolate that I'd brought back from a trip to Belize last month, following a visit to Agouti Cacao Farm (in San Pedro Colombia Village) in Southern Belize.

I added boiling water to the contents of this small bag of organic, unsweetened, stoneground cacao paste, and stirred it up thoroughly with some orange blossom honey. The smell, slightly smokey from roasted cacao beans and allspice berries over a comal (hot plate over a fire), brought me back to Agouti Cacao Farm, run by Eladio Pop and family, where I'd enjoyed a cacao farm tour and tasting. (Eladio and his family were featured in a documentary, called "The Chocolate Farmer" a few years ago.*)

I poured some of this deliciously rich drinking chocolate into a traditional cup (from Belize), and a drinking gourd from Agouti Cacao Farm. On the gourd were carved a woodpecker, a squirrel and an agouti -- all three have been known to nibble on fruit and seeds found in cacao pods.

The only unfortunate thing about today's cacao is that you may have to travel to Southern Belize to enjoy this. I hope that some of you will have the chance to do so. There is a lot to see and experience in the Toledo District of Belize, an area where some Mayan farmers, like Eladio are still growing cacao, using traditional methods going back thousands of years.

*Note: I highly recommend the documentary about Eladio Pop and his farm and family, called "The Chocolate Farmer" directed by Rohan Fernando (2011) (available on Amazon, and other sources). 

Mackenzies - Airplanes - May 23, 2013

Chocolate of the Day:

Mackenzies Chocolates
Airplanes (Milk and Dark Chocolate)
Good
Weight: .5 oz. (14.1 g.) x 2 / 2 Airplanes
Calories: 150 calories (estimate) in 1 oz. worth of airplanes
Cost: $2.50 (for 2 small airplanes)
Purchased from: Mackenzies Chocolates, Santa Cruz, CA

Today was the last day (Day #7) of Chocolate and Transportation Theme Week.

Planes, trains and automobiles. We are blessed with multiple modes of travel in the U.S.; and Mackenzies Chocolates (Santa Cruz, CA) has made chocsimiles (chocolate facsimiles) of just about every mode possible, including today's milk chocolate and dark chocolate airplanes -- not to mention trucks, flying saucers and jet rockets (not pictured here).

And, speaking of (chocolate) trains, congratulations to the master chocolatier from Malta, Andrew Farrugia, who constructed the world's longest structure/train (recognized by Guinness World Book of Records), made of 2,755 pounds of Belgian chocolate, this past year. Impressive.