For the Flavour Seekers
I remember the first time I tried craft chocolate—it was back in 2011, a Mast Brothers bar that I’d picked up from the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in San Francisco. Having just graduated with a Visual Communications design degree, of course, I was seduced by the beautiful patterned packaging, printed onto textured paper. Prior to visiting, my friend had sent me a video about Rick and Michael, the chocolate makers at Mast.
In my viewing of it, at the time, I paid more attention to the production value of the video than I did the actual content. However…this was the first time the notion of making chocolate entered my brain space. Stumbling across their chocolate at the market was a fortunate coincidence.
I took one bite of this 74% Pecan and Maple bar, and I HATED it. This was not a reflection at all on the quality of the chocolate that the Mast Brothers produced—but a truer indication of where my palate sat at the time. I had the same experience again and again with “high-end” chocolate that I knew I was "supposed" to enjoy.
It wasn’t until someone gifted me a bar of Fortunato No 4 68%, that I found a chocolate whose flavour I could understand. Whether it was due to the recipe of the chocolate or the origin, I won’t ever know…but it opened a door for me to keep exploring.
From there, I discovered Marou at my local deli and bought a whole array of Vietnamese origin bars—each block knocking my socks further off my feet. I had found my jam…
As chocolate consumers from a young age, our palates are trained to expect a certain flavour when it comes to one of our favourite comfort foods. Sweet, sugary and milky…with cocoa forward notes whose flavours have been subdued by additional ingredients or bulk processing.
I feel like for such a long time, we have been missing out on the world of flavour that cocoa can provide. Like all seasonal produce, the flavour of chocolate is impacted by how it’s grown, the terroir in which is cultivated and how it is processed by the maker. It should vary from harvest to harvest, with no batch being identical to the next.
If you’ve had the same experience as me with your entry to craft chocolate, please don’t give up! There are a plethora of amazing chocolate makers out there—each with their own different styles and expressions of flavour. There is bound to be one out there for you—your “gateway drug” as I call it.
I promise you, you’ll never look back.
Image © Kokoa Kamili 2022