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dorchadas
Apparently I'm starting some kind of sea salt-themed section in Darker than Black. We got a Raaka Pink Sea Salt in our latest chocolate shipment, but we already did that a year ago. There's another sea salt-themed bar waiting as well, but as I was looking through the pile of dark chocolate to see what there was to do, I decided on this one since it was a present. Thanks to ![[facebook.com profile]](https://www.facebook.com/favicon.ico)
topher.elderkin for providing it!
This is reinforcing what I already know--namely, that salt is delicious. Fortunately, almost all the popular nutritional advice we grew up with was based on lies, and much like saturated fat is good for you, salt doesn't raise blood pressure. Well, maybe--studies are confused, and people with higher blood pressure do tend to eat more salt. But unlike fat, which, at least in America, had its consumption drop as a result of nutritional guidelines (mostly being replaced with sugar. Oops!), salt consumption has stayed pretty much constant for decades despite all the nutritional advice about it. Huh. As the quote goes:
Delicious salt.
So, it turns out that this is caramel chocolate, not just dark chocolate with salt, and the salt wasn't really the star of the show. Perhaps I should read the packaging more carefully before I pick a bar next time!
That said, this wasn't just a vehicle to convey caramel to someone's mouth. Each square of the chocolate had a core of fluid caramel, but it was small, and it was perfectly possible to take multiple bites without getting any caramel at all. That's actually what happened when I first bit into it, and then when I got caramel a couple bites later it caught me completely by surprise. Well, not completely. Once I had it in front of me I knew what kind of chocolate it was, after all. But the taste was much different than I was expecting, a kind of smoky flavor through most of the chocolate and then sudden bursts of liquid sweetness when I hit some caramel. It was delicious.
More caramel chocolate should be like this, actually. This was chocolate caramel that was focused on the chocolate, and the smoky taste of the black salt set it up as a strong counterpoint to the caramel when it did appear. Excellent.
Its weak point was hit for massive damage.
schoolpsychnerd's Opinion
This is reinforcing what I already know--namely, that salt is delicious. Fortunately, almost all the popular nutritional advice we grew up with was based on lies, and much like saturated fat is good for you, salt doesn't raise blood pressure. Well, maybe--studies are confused, and people with higher blood pressure do tend to eat more salt. But unlike fat, which, at least in America, had its consumption drop as a result of nutritional guidelines (mostly being replaced with sugar. Oops!), salt consumption has stayed pretty much constant for decades despite all the nutritional advice about it. Huh. As the quote goes:
Dr. Melik: "You mean there was no deep fat? No steak or cream pies or... hot fudge?"Anyway, enough talk about not chocolate!
Dr. Aragon: "Those were thought to be unhealthy, precisely the opposite of what we now know to be true."
Dr. Melik: "Incredible."
-Sleeper
So, it turns out that this is caramel chocolate, not just dark chocolate with salt, and the salt wasn't really the star of the show. Perhaps I should read the packaging more carefully before I pick a bar next time!
That said, this wasn't just a vehicle to convey caramel to someone's mouth. Each square of the chocolate had a core of fluid caramel, but it was small, and it was perfectly possible to take multiple bites without getting any caramel at all. That's actually what happened when I first bit into it, and then when I got caramel a couple bites later it caught me completely by surprise. Well, not completely. Once I had it in front of me I knew what kind of chocolate it was, after all. But the taste was much different than I was expecting, a kind of smoky flavor through most of the chocolate and then sudden bursts of liquid sweetness when I hit some caramel. It was delicious.
More caramel chocolate should be like this, actually. This was chocolate caramel that was focused on the chocolate, and the smoky taste of the black salt set it up as a strong counterpoint to the caramel when it did appear. Excellent.
schoolpsychnerd's OpinionIt's been a bit since Vosges made an appearance on this blog [almost six months -I would eat it often too if we had more money to buy our chocolate with!
