Dark Chocolate…

[aaronatthedoublef]

Hello,

What is your definition of "dark chocolate". I understand the US has no formal standard for what constitutes it (never mind that the FDA took years to determine that ruby chocolate is, indeed, chocolate).

"Dark chocolate" appears to be all over the map here in Hartford - as low as 45% and up to about 80. There are people who sell and people who eat cocoa nibs. I've tried them and they are not for me. I've also tried unsweetened chocolate. Not to my taste...

Now, should you say to me "silly Aaron it's chocolate without milk," Trader Joe's sells dark chocolate that lists milk as an ingredient and not just in the warning that the product has been made in a facility that also has dairy and tree nuts. There is also at least one chocolatier who sells "dark milk chocolate" (I need to find them again).

So, as I started this topic - what do you consider dark chocolate?

Spread the word

      

  

  

[Mike Nolan]

50% (by weight) cocoa solids is sort of the border between light and dark chocolates, but there's no official standard.

That's why I tend to stick to brands I know and trust for coverture chocolate, like Callebaut/Cacao Barry or Valrhona. They'll tell you how much cocoa butter and how much cocoa solids is in each type. Scharfen Berger always seems to be higher priced than I'm willing to pay.

In Chocolate School, we tended to divide chocolates into 3 groups, mainly for handling and temperature sensitivity.

Dark chocolate, which has no milk products in it. Unsweetened chocolate is a subset of this category.
Milk chocolate
White chocolate, which has no cocoa solids

Of course, the school is run by the Callebaut folks, so their nomenclature and recipes tend to favor their products.

For allergy purposes, advisories about tree nuts, eggs, dairy products, etc tend to be on the extremely cautionary side, if there are nuts anywhere in the building they're listed.

I've also seen stuff labeled 'dark milk chocolate' in stores, heaven only knows what it really is, because retail chocolate makers generally don't list proportions of cocoa butter and cocoa solids or other ingredients. Hersheys won't even give a precise number for the amount of cocoa solids in their chocolates, calling it a trade secret.

The ruby chocolate is interesting, it has fruity undertones, but not something I've worked with much yet, it was not quite on the market when I went to Chocolate School, so they couldn't talk about it.

Until fairly recently, you couldn't legally call 'white chocolate' a form of chocolate, either, because it has no cocoa solids in it.

[Mike Nolan]

I've updated the previous post several times.

I'm also not a big fan of cocoa nibs, and I find they're usually outrageously priced, anyway.

I forget where it is, but there's a minimum amount of cocoa butter that you need to have before chocolate can be tempered, which is manipulating the state of the cocoa butter so that you mostly have Form V (Beta 2) crystals.

Things labeled as chocolate coatings usually have fats other than cocoa butter in them, so they can't be tempered. But because cocoa butter is one of only a few fats that melt just below body temperature, chocolate coatings generally don't have the same luxurious mouth feel as a good coverture chocolate.

[Author]

Posts