Dark Chocolate Redefined

When introducing people to the flavour experience of craft chocolate, I feel it's quite unfair to compare it to a dark confectionery bar like Bournville. Yet in the new Cadbury campaign — “Unpretentious, uncomplicated, made to be enjoyed (not endured)” they deliberately contrast their simple and crucially sweet Bournville bar with the complexities of craft chocolate. 

Clearly, it’s time to go back to basics and redefine chocolate.

The team behind the Bournville campaign are working on the assumption that for most of us, chocolate means one of two things: the sweet, familiar kind, comforting, nostalgic, and easy to love, usually found in the confectionery aisles – or the serious dark stuff - intense, bitter, ethical and a little pretentious in its claims.    

But craft chocolate is a third category entirely.

It's a new tier of chocolate: generally absent from supermarkets, less visible, and as the Cadbury campaign illustrates, often mistakenly confused with the intense, “pretentious” premium dark variety.

So here’s Chocolate, Redefined using the criteria of Taste, Transparency and Craftsmanship.

1. Confectionery: Basic, Sweet and Simple

Let’s start with what we know best - confectionery, here in the classic form of Cadbury Bournville, first launched in 1908 and named after Bournville town, - once a model of corporate responsibility.

Taste: Simple, sweet and nostalgic. But I challenge you to really taste it and decide for yourself how delicious it really is. For me there’s a strong aroma of desiccated coconut with a taste that appeals to your sweet tooth but it's fatty and dominated by that lingering coconut and something resembling old oil.

Transparency: A Mondelez “Cocoa Life” badge and a promise of "sustainably" sourced cocoa. The basics and arguably more a reassurance device than an act of social reform.
Craftsmanship: Industrially manufactured from 36% cocoa solids. Sugar is the first ingredient, palm oil is the third and milk powder is the last!

Chocolate in dark form but made for sweet cravings.

Price: 180g bar £3.00 for (£1.66 per 100g)

2. Premium: A Step up, Intense and Ethical

Next, a step up - Green & Black’s, also owned by Mondelez. The first UK Fairtrade chocolate bar, once celebrated for introducing dark chocolate with principles, it now markets intensity levels, with its organic and Fairtrade status quietly relegated.

Taste: So now we can taste the cocoa beans but mainly their bitterness, tamed by the vanilla extract making it dark yet approachable.  
Transparency: Once sourced from a cooperative of small holders in Belize, it is a blend from that premium pool of organic and Fairtrade beans with no mention of origin.
Craftsmanship: Made with beans “dried in the scorching sun” indicating more marketing gloss than skilled post-harvest practices - where scorched beans would be most unwelcome! Still industrial, though with fewer ingredients and vanilla to soften the bitter edges.

Chocolate made to appeal to our better nature. 

Price: 90g £3.00 from Co-op, (£3.33 per 100g)

3. Craft Chocolate: Defined by its Taste, Transparency and Craftsmanship

Then there’s chocolate that changes everything.
Bars like Bare Bones Madagascar have a new story to tell. Not a story of corporate take-overs, generic sourcing and low impact sustainability but one of beans grown and crafted with respect for both the producer and the consumer.

Taste: Not bitter but fruity and vibrant, with flavour notes that evolve, the bright fruits mellowing and deepening into brownie and dark sugar tones. The taste of the beans themselves.
Transparency: Cocoa beans sourced from a specific cooperative of 47 shareholder farmers with the bean to bar process done in a small-scale chocolate factory in Glasgow.
Craftsmanship: Wooden box fermentation and sun-drying on patios at origin and a true bean-to-bar process, expressing the natural flavour of the beans with only three ingredients.

Chocolate made to be tested, and appreciated by those of us with a real interest in flavour and provenance.  

Price: 70g bar £7.50 from bareboneschocolate.co.uk (£10.71 per 100g)

So, if you are looking for the best, top-tier, dark chocolate or buying for someone who cares – ask three simple questions:

Taste: Am I tasting sugar, vanilla or an intense cocoa bitterness or the natural flavours of fine cocoa beans?

Transparency: Do I know where the cocoa beans are from, how they've been handled and where the chocolate was made?

Craftsmanship: Was it industrially made to reflect the brand or crafted to express the natural flavours of the beans?

Knowing about the three types of chocolate helps you cut through the marketing spin to find dark chocolate that you really can enjoy rather than endure.

Curious to learn more?

Visit my listings on the Cademy online education site to explore the on-demand courses and discover how to taste, understand, and enjoy chocolate like never before. Link to Cocoa Encounters Cademy Site for Bookings and Vouchers