“Und genau desahlb schmeckt diese Tafel so, wie sie schmeckt — nach bestem Kakao von den grünem Hügeln in Idukki, Indien. ” GARÇOA CHOCOLATE
Summary
- Mellow chocolate flavors, with a hint of almonds
- Solid dark bar, but nothing memorable
- Cost: CHF 10.50
Review
The bar has a striking appearance, with different edges and patterns for each “piece” to break off. I wonder if the design affects the crystallization; I’m sure removing the chocolate from such a decorative mold is a more complex process compared to your typical chocolate bar.
This is the first bar I’ve tried with cocoa sourced from India. It is a drier bar, requiring a bit of chewing action to generate saliva to melt the chocolate. It is a decent chocolate bar, with hints of almond. However, the flavors are not particularly memorable — literally, I find that I have already forgotten the flavor of the bar as soon as I’ve finished eating it.
For this bar, the design gets a thumbs up, but the chocolate itself is just all right. I will have to try another bar with cocoa from India to get a sense of the variety of the region.
The Story of this Bar
Last August (2018), I went to Zurich, Switzerland for a work trip. I took a day off to spend exploring the city. Zurich is a beautiful city — it’s compact, full of history, and dotted with fountains across the city. But, of course, it is also a city with great selection of chocolate.
I stumbled across the Markthalle by accident when on a quest for ice cream. The building was a modern in-door market, with restaurants, small shops, and flower boutiques. One such store was the (“Mountain and Valley”), a specialty store focused on “slow foods.” Slow foods, meaning local foods in the area, usually sustainably grown and marketed. A perfect place to find craft chocolate!
At Berg und Tal, I was pleasantly surprised to find a decent selection of chocolate, jams, honey, sausages, and other local foods. After sampling a few chocolates, I purchased four bars of craft chocolate and two sausage sticks. I ate one sausage stick while exploring the city and as breakfast on my way to the airport, but unfortunately the other sausage stick I ended up tossing at US customs after landing in the San Francisco airport.
Unfortunately, I took the pictures and ate this bar almost close to more than half a year since purchasing it, so you can see a bit of light chocolate ‘whitening’…so I wonder if it would’ve tasted better had I eaten it earlier. While this bar was just all right, at least it brings back fun memories of exploring the local gems of Zurich!