Category: Listmania

The Bar: As a dark milk, the flavour notes of the Colombian beans are very much on display.

The Beans: The beans in this bar grow upon the remote slopes of Colombia’s coastal Sierra Nevada mountains. With no roads at these high altitudes, the wild beans have to be harvested by the indigenous Arhuaco people and carried down the hillsides on the backs of mules.

The Maker: Denise Castronovo is the woman behind Florida-based Castronovo chocolate. Read more about Castronovo here.

The Bar: Fudgy, rich and spiced. Krak has crafted an incredibly moreish dark milk chocolate bar. It’s not too sweet and you can taste the delicate nuances of the cacao, from the almonds to nutmeg and cinnamon to the tropical fruits.

The Beans: This bar uses Sierra Nevada cacao that grows off the Caribbean coast of Colombia. Mark, the maker behind Krak, has worked with Uncommon Cacao to build a fairer and more sustainable supply chain.

The Maker: Read more about Dutch pastry chef turned chocolate maker Mark Schimmel here.

The Bar: It features a smooth melting texture and a toasty malted flavour. It’s an interesting milk chocolate bar, with little bitterness and lots of creaminess.

The Beans: The cocoa for this bar was sourced from Produits des Iles SA (PISA), a central fermentery established in northern Haiti in 2012. PISA works with 1,104 small-scale farmers – 492 of whom are women – to pay premium prices for the unprocessed cocoa harvest and then processing it centrally, allowing farmers to earn more money for their quality beans.

The Maker: Standout Chocolate launched onto the craft chocolate scene as a one-man-band in 2018. Read more here.

The Bar: This 60% dark milk chocolate is thick in texture, with a fruity complex flavour. Fredrik (the maker) has coaxed out the citrus notes of the Madagascan cacao.

The Beans: The beans in this bar are sourced from Bertil Akesson’s estate in Madagascar. Bertil’s beans are famous throughout the craft chocolate world, having produced countless award-winning bars and winning many awards themselves.

The Maker: Once again, this bar is by Standout Chocolate. With two bars already in this list despite having only began making chocolate in 2018, Fredrik Martinsson is certainly living up to his brand’s name.

The Bar: The vibrant fruits of Cacaosuyo’s Piura dark bar take on a sweeter, almost caramelised flavour here. A little fermented tang from the milk, cuts through the bar and balances out the sweetness. The bar has a long and irresistible raisin finish with hints of butterscotch.

The beans: A rare criollo cacao is used. The beans are naturally very pale, with a fine delicate aroma.

The Maker: Cacaosuyo is a chocolate maker with a simple mission: to make the best chocolate in Peru. That’s a lofty ambition, but the Cacaosuyo team have devoted the last three years of their lives to it. 

The Bar: A creamy, fragrant and fruity milk chocolate.

The Beans: Friis Holm have used a blend of Nicaraguan beans from a co-operative in Waslala, in the nature reserve in the mountains of northeastern Nicaragua.

The Maker: Mikkel Friis Holm is a maker fascinated with genetics, and ensures he chooses the best varieties with the highest flavour potential. Read further about Friis Holm here.

The Bar: An aroma of dates and plums is joined by caramel, raisins and honey on the tongue, with a finish that keeps going and going.

The Beans: The beans in this bar come from the Norandino Cooperative in the Piura Valley of northern Peru. This well-sized cooperative has managed to establish a market for its high-quality beans and dissociate from the market price.

The Maker: Qantu is a Quebecois chocolate maker making waves on both sides of the Atlantic. Read more about them here.

The Bar: This bar has a wonderfully smooth texture, a deep, fudgey chocolate flavour and a gentle fruity note. It is also certified kosher, organic and gluten free.

The Beans: The beans used in this bar come from Peru and Ecuador.

The Maker: Set up by the original founders of WIRED magazine, San Francisco-based TCHO take a scientific approach to everything they do. Probes within the fermenting beans in Peru upload detailed data back to TCHO HQ, which is analysed alongside local weather reports to help control the fermentation to bring out the best flavours of the beans.

The Bar: Morin crafts a luscious milk chocolate, blending excellent flavourful cacao with creamy milk.

The Beans: The cacao used is grown by the Salazar family in the cloud forests of Costa Esmereldas.

The Maker: The prestigious Morin family have been making chocolate in France since 1884 and the company is now run by Franck Morin. Read more about Morin here.

The Bar: You will be hit upfront with citrus and honey notes, followed by a complex floral aftertaste.

The Beans: This bar is made from beans grown in Tumaco, a south-western province on the border with Ecuador known for its hot and humid climate. Blessed with bountiful rivers and heavy rainfall, tropical jungles and mangrove forests flourish, bringing with them the extraordinary diversity of plants that helps to give cocoa beans such complexity of flavour.

The Maker: This is the second appearance on our list for Castronovo; read about Denise’s story here.

The Bar: This is a pocket-sized piece of the Mediterranean. Denise, the mastermind behind Castronovo, talks about this bar by referring to the old Sicilian saying “a lemon is not a real lemon unless it is Sicilian”. Indeed she imbues this white chocolate with real lemon essential oil and lemon-infused sea salt.

The cocoa butter: Castronovo uses cacao sustainably harvested and grown in Central and South America. They pay premium prices for cacao grown by indigenous people who live in and protect the world’s most remote and threatened environments.

The Maker: Denise Castronovo spent 15 years in Geospatial Technology before turning her hand to chocolate making. She is based in Stuart, Florida. Read more about Castronovo here.

The Bar: A white chocolate bar unlike any other- hints of smokiness and a deep chocolatey flavour lend a unique depth.

The Cocoa Butter: The Madagascan cocoa butter is undeodorized. This means it has not had steam injected through it to remove the volatile components which contribute to its natural odour.

The Maker: Bertil Åkesson has a bar featured in every single one of our top ten lists; read about him here.

The Bar: Feitoria do Cacao has produced an original recipe of white chocolate to enhance the Azorean’s unique milk flavour by combining natural cocoa butter with a very low amount of sugar, without flavouring or emulsifiers.

The Cocoa Butter: The beans used come from Ecuador. The real star is the high-quality Azorean milk, however, which has been produced by the cows which inhabit this volcanic land.

The Maker: Feitoria do cacao was launched after Tomoko and Sue took a trip to São Tomé and Principe. Click here for the full story.

The Bar: This is everything you expect from a bar of good white chocolate. Smooth, sweet and creamy with a burst of genuine Bourbon vanilla.

The Cocoa Butter: This bar contains 40% pure cocoa butter.

The Maker: Zotter is an Austrian bean-to-bar chocolate maker with a penchant for the wacky. But at the heart of everything Zotter do is a simple, ethical approach to chocolate making. Read about Zotter here.

The Bar: The dark blonde bar has a soft, fudgy texture. We noted plenty of sweet caramel, touches of muscovado, and malt. This bar is undoubtedly a sweet treat with a sophisticated caramac-like quality, thanks to the toasting of the milk powder.

The Cocoa Butter: The cocoa butter comes all the way to Manchester from Madagascar.

The Maker: Dormouse is based in Manchester and in 2015 became the city’s first craft chocolate maker, creating its delicious bars directly from the bean. More about Dormouse here.

The Bar: This rich, high cocoa white chocolate is buttery in texture and melt, and has a flavour that is explicitly pure and warming cocoa butter, but in the background lingers notes of toffee and banana.

The Cocoa Butter: Madagascan cocoa butter seems to be the running thread of this list! It is sourced by working closely with the farmers on the Island and is fully traceable.

The Maker: Robert, the face behind Chocolat Madagascar, produced chocolate that is widely available locally but little known beyond the island. Chocolat Madagascar is truly a hidden gem, and worth learning more about.

The Bar: If you’re a mochaccino lover, then this white chocolate from Omnom is the bar for you. The Nicaraguan coffee beans give the bar a clear but not overpowering coffee flavour reminiscent of coffee buttercream.

The Cocoa Butter: This is another high-percentage bar, with 38% organic cocoa butter.

The Maker: Iceland’s first small batch artisan chocolate maker, Omnom is one of the quirkier makers in our chocolate library. They make their chocolate in a converted petrol station; click here for more.

The Bar: The vibrant fuschia colouring of this bar comes from the real pieces of raspberry which have been conched in for added zing. Infused into the bar is Bulgarian rose oil; with 1000kg of fresh rose petals being enough for only 300g of rose oil, this is an aromatic luxury. 

The Cocoa Butter: Georgia Ramon have used non-deodorised cocoa butter, giving the bar rich chocolatey flavour notes. The term ‘non-deodorised’ means that the cocoa butter’s natural aromas and volatiles (and antioxidant properties) have not been removed through steam injection. 

The Maker: Georgia Ramon was founded in 2015 by renowned pâtissier Georg Bernadini and his partner, Ramona Gustmann, to be a craft chocolate maker, shop, and café dedicated to producing the highest-quality handmade chocolate.

The Bar: Notes of almond within the white chocolate pair beautifully with the bright and tangy raspberries. The bar is made with almond “mylk” as opposed to dairy; a rare vegan white bar.

The Cocoa Butter: The beans are Ecuadorian, while the chocolate bar itself is made in Italy. Karuna, being committed to vegan chocolate crafting has used almond ‘mylk’ here.

The Maker: Karuna are a wife and husband team based in South Tyrol, Italy. Much of their craft is inspired by their shared time in India. Read more about them here.

The Bar: It’s unusual to include cacao nibs in white chocolate, but the sweet white chocolate is the perfect counterpoint to the thick layer of crunchy, intense cocoa nibs that cover one side of the bar. Together, they add up to a crunchy, sweet, chocolatey and delicious experience!

The Cocoa Butter:

The Maker: Jordi’s is the Czech Republic’s first bean-to-bar chocolate maker. Based in Hradec Králové, 50 miles east of Prague, founders Jiří Stejskal and Lukáš Koudelka started making chocolate in 2012. Read more here.

The Bar: As the name suggests, this bar has a remarkably pale, amber colouring. When eaten, layer upon layer of delicate flavour unfolds. Sharp currants along with softer berries come through, rounded off by a beautiful acidity. Finally, we noted a touch of treacle on the finish.

The Beans: The beans in this bar come from the well-sized Norandino cooperative, Peru. The cooperative has managed to create a market for its high-quality beans and dissociate from the market price.

The Maker: Qantu is a Quebecois chocolate maker creating waves both sides of the Atlantic. Read more about Quantu here.

The Bar: Taucherli‘s B9 bar has a powerful flavour profile: spicy, milky, red grapes and pineapple. Intriguingly, the colour resembles that of a milk bar despite being a high percentage dark chocolate.

The Beans: The beans are sourced from the Hacienda Betulia family plantation located in North-West Colombia. The cacao grows under an agroforestry scheme on 15 hectares alongside 30 hectares of protected native forest.

The maker: Kay Keusen, the maker behind Taucherlu, is redefining what it means to be a Swiss chocolate-maker. Read more about Taucherli here.

The bar: Fudgy in texture, this bar merges notes of stoned fruit, liquorice and aromatic spices. Such flavour complexity is testament to the quality of these Madagascan beans, as the only ingredients are cacao and organic cane sugar. Despite there being no added cocoa butter the melt is strikingly elegant, surprisingly smooth. 

The Beans: The cacao used hails from Bertil Åkesson’s Bejofo Estate. Bertil’s Madagascan terroir is highly regarded for the cacao it grows, which is characterised by heady fruit notes and dynamic complexity.

The Maker:  Desbarres is a micro-batch manufacturer or single origin, bean to bar chocolate, sourcing direct trade cacao from around the world. Read more about Desbarres here.

The Bar: An initial wave of tropical fruits sets the tone for this bar. However, as the bar melts and more aromas are released, some nuttiness emerges.

The Beans: Along the foothills of the Maya Mountains in southern Belize, indigenous Mayans were one of the first to commercialize cacao and the tradition continues today thanks to Uncommon Cacao. Uncommon founded Maya Mountain Cacao (MMC) in 2010 as their first origin project, and this is the first specialty grade, high quality, fine flavour cacao to come out of Belize.

The Maker: Castronovo crafts its chocolate in Florida, from fine flavour cacao that is sustainably harvested. Read more about Castronovo here.

The Bar: Bar’s made with Åkesson’s beans win awards all over the world, so it’s not a shock that his 75% Criollo bar has made our top ten. This has the typical rich and fruity taste of a great Madagascan bar, with berry notes followed by a lemony aftertaste and a subtle tartness. This is a satisfying, strong roasted cocoa with just the right amount of sweetness.

The Beans: Bar’s made with Åkesson’s beans win awards all over the world, so it’s not a shock that his 75% Criollo bar has made our top ten. This has the typical rich and fruity taste of a great Madagascan bar. We detect berry notes and a lemony aftertaste with a subtle tartness. This is a satisfying, strong roasted cocoa with just the right amount of sweetness.

The maker: Bertil Åkesson is one of the heroes of the bean to bar market, a true pioneer of the chocolate revolution. Read more about Åkesson’s here.

The Bar: Once again, this bar contains nothing but cocoa beans and sugar, but manages to give us a complex whirlpool of flavour with every bite. Zesty citrus notes are complemented by elegant florals, a combination which lightens this intense, coarse-textured chocolate.

The Beans: The cacao used in this bar comes from the area around the Andean city of Cusco. The beans from this region are regarded as the finest from Peru, with a fine aroma that is greatly superior to the hybrid varietals from the country.

The Maker: Cacaosuyo‘s mission is simple: To produce the best chocolate in Peru by seeking out rare and undiscovered cacao varieties from across the country. Read more about Cacaosuyo here.

The Bar: Taking silver at the Academy of Chocolate’s 2020 awards, this smooth and fruity 75% dark chocolate has a roasted finish and is full of flavours reminiscent of the lush Brazilian rainforest. As it melts in your mouth, deep woody notes anticipate a bright fruity kick, thanks to the local Brazilian pitanga fruit. A subtle hint of tobacco comes through on the finish.

The Beans:  In April 2009, Bertil Åkesson and his Brazilian partner, Dr. Angelo Calmon de Sa, purchased the Fazenda Sempre Firme estate in Bahia, Brazil. Known as “paraíso”, or “paradise”, to the locals, this 120-hectare cocoa plantation lies in the middle of the Mata Atlantica, the wild forest in southern Brazil famed for its extraordinary biodiversity. Parasinho, the traditional variety of cocoa grown there, gives all of Åkesson’s Brazilian chocolate a deep earthy quality enriched with fruity and woody notes.

The Bar: Another silver-awarded bar, this time from the International Chocolate Awards. It has a subtle profile, which is initially dominated by the bar’s creamy quality. It is incredibly smooth, with light spicy notes and just a hint of peach. The dark chocolate is finished off with a touch of sherbet and a slight astringency, giving it a really balanced flavour.

The Beans: The unique profile of this bar is owed in part to that fact that Friis Holm specified that the Nicaraguan beans used in this bar be turned twice during fermentation (hence the name).

The Maker: The precision with which Mikkel Friis-Holm’s bars are made comes as no surprise when we consider that this is a maker fascinated by the genetics of cocoa. Read more about Friis Holm here.

The Bar: Goodnow’s Nicaraguan bar has a wonderful melt, and distinctive flavour notes of dried raisins, burnt caramel and well-roasted black treacle. Containing just cocoa butter and cacao, this is a “two ingredients only” bar.

The Beans: These beans are grown in Nicaragua’s central highlands. Most cacao farms in Nicaragua are too small to generate enough volume to properly ferment the wet cacao (known as “baba”). As a result, many farmers simply dry their baba and sell it at local markets at a very low price, since unfermented beans don’t develop the flavor characteristics that we recognize as quality chocolate. Farm owners Giff Laube and Jose Enrique Herrera saw the potential in Nicaraguan beans and built a fermentation and drying facility on their farm, and began reaching out to local farmers, convincing them to sell their baba to Cacao Bisiesto for a higher price than they’d get at local markets.

The Maker: Read the story of how a Los Angeles real-estate agent and TV producer became single-origin chocolate makers Goodnow here.

The Bar: On taste, this dark chocolate bursts with rich sultana and dried fruit notes, with quite the “Madagascar” quality within the bar. The melt and texture is smooth, with a nutty finish.

The Beans: Known as the spice garden of Kerala, the Idukki region of southern India has long had the climate and ecology to grow cocoa. But it wasn’t until 2016, when GoGround started investing in post-harvest processing facilities and farmer education, that fine-flavour cocoa farming really took off. Now husband-and-wife Luca and Ellen, with the support of the Italian RIVA foundation, have built relationships with the smallholder farmers of Udumbannoor, paying them guaranteed weekly payments in exchange for freshly harvested cocoa beans.

The Maker: Swedish maker Fredrik Martinsson sources his beans directly from co-operatives and farmers all over the world, and aims to create “a better world through social, environmental and economic sustainability for the farmers”. Read more about Standout Chocolate here.