A friend of mine brought me a wrapper of an organic chocolate that she had eaten and said that she really like it. They didn’t have the exact one at my favorite store so I had to do a little hunting for it.
This is Terra Nostra organic chocolate (USDA certified organic), made by KFM International (Vancouver, BC, Canada).
Terra Nostra means “our earth” (I think) but it reminded me of Cosa Nostra and sounded like it was made by the mafia. The head dude’s name is Karlo. Is that Scicilian?
(Godfather voice) “Someday – and that day may never come – I’ll call upon you to do a service for me. But until that day, accept this chocolate as a gift on my daughter’s wedding day.”
The bars come molded into pillow-shaped sections for easy breaking and sharing. And even the wrappers are printed with soy ink, which I guess is most organic of all.
I first tried the Milk Truffle bar. This is a milk chocolate bar with a dark chocolate “truffle center”. I’m not sure why they call it a truffle center. It wasn’t soft or something like that, but maybe they add cream to it or something. It had a wierd taste, dark chocolate with milk chocolate. Not a bad thing, just wierd. I think I would buy this one again, just because it was a unique flavor combination.
Then I tried 73% Intense Dark chocolate. Ok, this was definately not so great tasting. As soon as it hit my mouth, it had a strange taste that reminded me of mold. You know when you eat a piece of bread and it has that taste like another piece, somewhere in the loaf, is moldy? That’s how this tasted. The after-taste was good, but that initial mold flavor really lingered. Even my 7-year-old said “Yuck!” and didn’t want another piece. This kid will eat dark chocolate until he’s in a coma, but he didn’t want this one.
Inside each wrapper is a nice simple recipe for chocolate truffles. The one in the dark chocolate bar just used organic heavy cream (3/4 cup) and the dark chocolate. Heat the cream to boiling (careful not to burn it) and then whisk into the hot cream, three 3.5 oz bars of the chocolate. When its well mixed, put it in the fridge to cool. Meanwhile, take one bar of the chocolate and grate it with a cheese grater. When the ganache has set, scoop out small amounts and shape into ball, then roll them in the grated chocolate. Serve as is, or refrigerate to serve later. This seems like a nice easy recipe, but you might want to try a different brand of chocolate to do it with.
One last one to end on a nice note. I was in the International Aisle at the grocery store and found this:
Took this pic from someplace else, but I just had to show it here because I thought it was so funny. Just an ordinary milk chocolate bar, with a damn funny marketing strategy. Sorry, girls, this one’s for the guys. :D
What do you suppose the strategy is on that one? Very strange!! Happy Holidays:)
What a funny candy bar, and what an interesting marketing campaign! I wonder, is it British? Or Australian? Oh well!!
Its British – I know, we’re nutso. But we also have flake. If you can get it (not dipped flake, weirded flake, or anything else, just good ol’ plain flake), do so. You’ll love it. If you don’t, send it to me and I’ll eat it for you.