Green & Black's Maya Gold

3.5oz (100g) bar

Ingredients: Organic fair trade chocolate, oft. raw cane sugar, oft. cocoa butter, soy lecithin, orange and spice flavor, oft. vanilla, o. whole milk powder

18g sugar/40g serving (45% by wt.)

Corporate Info: Check out this Brand Overview from March.

Today's Bar: Maya Gold is Green & Black's nod to “Mexican” or otherwise “Central American”-themed chocolate flavorings. Often that's a mix of hot chile and cinnamon, maybe pepper and/or vanilla; here it's (according to the website) a non-hot combo of orange, cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla, and they're claiming inspiration from the Maya of southern Belize.

Appearance: Green & Black's usual semi-glossy chocolate in a lightly scored mold. Color is kind of flat looking, with a purplish undertone.

Smell: Well-incorporated sweetness and light spice; the nutmeg stands out along with what I'm guessing is orange oil rather than some other orange extract.

Taste: I've had Maya Gold before and liked it, as it conforms to Green & Black's standard: Thoroughly flavored, balanced, not challenging. Texture is thick and rich. Flavor is sweet (it's only 55% cacao) but entirely appropriate to the chocolate here, as while it does have bitter and sour tones, they're all curve, no edge. Similarly, the spices are complex but blend entirely. Think of, say, a good oatmeal cookie or pumpkin pie, which should taste redolent of autumnal spices rather than separate cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, clove, and so on—they just have an aura of warmth that lingers pleasantly, in this case for a rather long time. I do think the nutmeg is standing out and perhaps the orange (we're not talking citrus here, but rather heady, aromatic orange oil), whereas I don't get a lot of cinnamon, and to my taste buds vanilla is more backup than headliner. So some flavors are louder than others, but they harmonize well.

Conclusion: Green & Black's Maya Gold isn't challenging, but as an everyday flavored chocolate its spice and balance excels.

Green & Black's Ginger Dark Chocolate

3.5oz (100g) bar

Ingredients: Organic fair trade chocolate, oft. raw cane sugar, oft. cocoa butter, soy lecithin, oft. vanilla extract, o. crystallized ginger pieces (ginger and cane sugar), o. whole milk powder

18g sugar/40g serving (45% by wt.)

Corporate Info: Check out this Brand Overview from March.

Today's Bar: This is the first of three weeks of ginger flavored bars, with today's being just plain ginger in 60% cacao. Sweet for me, but hey.

Appearance: Light grey-red-brown, matte looking but slightly glossy if you wipe away surface dust. Little lighter flecks under the surface, presumably crystallized ginger. Note: Green & Black's molding is very blocky, with wide but shallow scoring. I assume that keeps bars in one piece during shipping, but it makes them a little challenging to break cleanly. Oh well.

Smell: Not strong but sweet-sour and gingery. I anticipate a mild chocolate with minor tartness and sweet crystallized ginger pieces with no “bite.”

Taste: Goes down easy. Sweet, mild, with pleasant, rounded tang. Thoroughly shot through with ginger, which adds harshness-free flavor and soft, candied textural interest rather than discernible pieces within separate chocolate.

Conclusion: Ginger for the mass market: An introduction to ginger for nervous eaters, or an unchallenging, everyday noshing chocolate for ginger lovers.

Brand Overview: Green & Black's

This is the first in an occasional series of posts on brands of dark chocolate that I feel I know pretty well. In these posts I'd like to cover the basics: Who gets the money you're spending, where you can buy the products and how much they cost, and what kinds of products the brand offers and what kind of experience you can expect from the chocolate. I hope you enjoy this little break from individual bar reviews! 

Brand: Green & Black's 

Originally: British 

Who's getting the money now: Kraft 

Where to find it: In the US, all over the place. Here in Seattle I can find most of Green & Black's American product line in Whole Foods, and a portion of it in more general grocery stores like QFC (a Kroger brand). 

Cost: Usually around $4 a bar, though I tend to buy them when I find them on sale for $2.50 each (and once $2!), which happens at my local Whole Foods every few months. 

Product Range and Eating Experience: Green & Black's is organic and sometimes fair trade, and has a fairly wide, tasty, and interesting range of dark chocolate flavors. Mainstays are the 85% and 70% chocolate bars, but there are slightly lower-cacao flavors like ginger, cherry, mint, espresso, and spicy (not hot) Maya Gold. Flavorings tend to be strong and uniform, except for the relatively dull hazelnut current. There are also less-dark and non-dark options like peanut, toffee, milk, and white chocolate. Texture is waxy-rich and chocolateyness is deep and accessible, neither super intense nor insipid. Held by several dark chocolate lovers I know as the pinnacle of what's currently available in reliable, basic dark chocolate.

Green & Black's Organic Espresso

3.5oz (100g bar)

Ingredients: Organic chocolate liquor, o. raw cane sugar, o. cocoa butter, o. coffee, soy lecithin, o. vanilla extract

10g sugar/40g serving (25% by wt.)

It's no secret that I'm a fan of Green & Black's chocolate. The company produces USDA organic chocolate with a complex flavor at an affordable price point (I regularly find it on sale for $2.50 a bar), including several bars that have relatively low sugar content. And it's one of the few companies that offers multiple dark bars with flavor variations that go beyond terroir and a touch of vanilla.

Green & Black's espresso bar is one I buy occasionally, in part because it's a fun reminder of how natural a pairing coffee is with chocolate: Both are tropical, bitter beans made more palatable with sugar and maybe milk. Green & Black's does its coffee bar creamy throughout rather than crunchy with pieces of the beans, a choice I can take or leave depending on what I want at the moment.

The nitty-gritty (or not so gritty): This is a medium dark brown bar with a soft luster and a punchy coffee aroma. It hits the tongue with a thick richness like a strong espresso and the complexity that I expect from Green & Black's—here fruity, winey, and tannic. The chocolate is inseparable from the coffee, to my mind reflecting both the similarities between the two products (not that they're biologically related) and the skill with which they're blended, in terms of both flavor and texture. It's intense, dark chocolate flavor and lots of coffee, with no fooling around. I like my chocolate to commit.

Granted, coffee isn't my favorite chocolate mixer. It's fine, but a combination I only want once in a while, and often I like the added interest of bits of espresso bean crackling between my teeth. Regardless of my personal taste, this is a good bar.

Conclusion: Green & Black's Espresso bar is potent, well balanced, and super-smooth.

Green & Black’s Organic Dark Chocolate with Whole Cherries 60% Cocoa Content

3.5oz (100g) bar

Ingredients: Organic chocolate liquor, o. raw cane sugar, o. cherries (o. dried cherries, o. sunflower oil), o. cocoa butter, soy lecithin, o. vanilla extract

12g sugar/40g serving (30% by wt.)

As I’m generally a fan of Green & Black’s products I’ve tried most of their dark flavored bars too, and this is one I pick up every so often. It is exactly what it says: chocolate with whole cherries. The plentiful cherries are bracingly tart and chewy, the sweeter chocolate is creamy and dark enough to hold its own, and the two play off each other beautifully. The whole cherries add greater textural interest than smaller pieces would, and the flavor is more inspired than similar but tired cranberry.

Personally, I would prefer a slightly darker and less sweet chocolate, but I realize that others might not feel the same way, and as it is the pairing is well balanced. This is the bar I end up eating most quickly—not because it is necessarily better than others (though it is very good) but because it is tasty, interesting, and not so dark and intense as to overwhelm after a few bites. It’s a good thing I don’t buy it regularly!

Conclusion: Green & Black’s Dark Chocolate with Whole Cherries is simple yet inspired and well balanced.

Green & Black’s Organic Dark Chocolate 85% Cocoa Content

3.5oz (100g) bar

Ingredients: Organic chocolate liquor, o. cocoa butter, o. fat-reduced cocoa powder, o. raw cane sugar, o. vanilla extract, soy lecithin, o. whole milk powder

6g sugar/40g serving (15% by wt.)

Green & Black’s 85% bar is one of my favorites, a mainstay of the Chocolate Basket and the main reason I have an abiding fondness for Green & Black’s. I don’t know why it took me this long to review it.

The mouthfeel of this bar is fairly waxy: It’s firm and very smooth, but I wouldn’t call it creamy. The flavor  is deep and fruity, with only a touch of bitterness and a minimum of the unpleasantly sour aftertaste of many other dark chocolates. As one might imagine of such a dark bar it’s not exactly sweet, but the lack of bitter and sour notes make it surprisingly easy to eat, and the depth of flavor makes it more interesting than, say, the Newman’s Own 70% bar.

Conclusion: Green & Black’s 85% bar has a mild complexity with few sharp edges. An easy eating chocolate for lovers of very dark bars.

P.S. Big player Cadbury bought Green & Black’s in 2005, but thus far it seems to have maintained Green & Black’s high quality. Now that chocolate giant Hershey’s has made a play for Cadbury, fans of Green & Black’s might wonder if the chocolate would suffer under new ownership. Stay tuned…


[Update: It's Kraft! I have no idea what this will do to Green & Black's--we'll just have to see.]

Green & Black’s Organic Baking Chocolate with 72% Cocoa Content Including Extra Cocoa Butter for Easier Melting

5.3oz (150g) bar

Ingredients: Organic chocolate liquor, o. raw cane sugar, o. cocoa butter, soy lecithin, o. vanilla extract, o. whole milk powder

5g sugar/20g serving (25% by wt.)

I generally like Green & Black’s products. This bar is sold for baking rather than eating, and the extra cocoa butter did give it a smooth texture. I’m not sure what accounted for its particular taste, though, as I found it cloying, with a tart aftertaste that lingered unpleasantly.

Conclusion: I didn’t really enjoy this, but perhaps it’ll be better when I use it in baked goods.

P.S. I love that Green & Black’s attempts to use organic and fair trade cacao, but its website pats itself on the back about it so much it’s kind of entertaining.