Amazing Cacao, Russian Bean-to-Bar Chocolate

A few months ago I was handed a package of bean-to-bar chocolate made by a Russian company. This is my first experience with Russian craft chocolate, so I was curious.

I thought I was about to eat a bar of chocolate, but what I found inside the wrapper was a lovely package of eight different chocolates. Each chocolate is made from a different cacao grown in different regions of Peru. The box also included many single region 70% to 75% dark chocolates, one lovely, not-too-sweet white chocolate, and an 80% dark-milk with no sugar in it at all (much like Zotter's unsweetened 70% milk chocolate 'dark style' and Hotel Chocolat's 80% Supermilk, two dark milk chocolates with just milk powder, cocoa beans and cocoa butter, and no sugar added). This 80% was very bitter, and definitely took some getting used to, but certainly a little easier on the palate than a pure 100%, thanks to the milk content.

If you like to taste a variety of single origin chocolates in one sitting, or over the course of a week or month, this tasting package may be the perfect thing for you. It was fun to taste the variety of flavours of cocoa beans from different regions of Peru. I had some favourites, and some not-so-favourites, but I will let you decide for yourself which regions you liked best.

What was most exciting about this product was the origin and taste discovery experience inside. There are so many single origin chocolates coming out of Peru and made from Peruvian cocoa beans now, that it can get confusing and overwhelming to pick a favourite region. This box offered a lovely overview of Peruvian cacao and some of the cacao growing regions in the country.

You can learn more about Amazing Cacao on their website: http://www.amazingcacao.com/about They also import to Russia organic ingredients, such as green coffee beans, fine organic cacao beans and cocoa butter and cane sugar.

Happy Chocolate Tasting!