Tasting
Setting the Mood
The chocolate bars being tasted should all be at room temperature. This allows for the greatest pleasure to the senses while tasting as it permits the chocolate to begin melting once it enters your mouth. You should conduct your testing in a room with natural or subdued lighting. The room should be quiet with no interference or noise to distract you. The senses should simply be exposed only to the chocolate and your experience with it.
Believe it or not, the best time of day to conduct chocolate tasting is the first thing in the morning. Your sense are most alert at this time and your taste buds have not yet had a chance to be influenced. Regardless of whether or not you are tasting in the preferred morning time or at another time of day, you should only have water to drink before and in between tasting. The water should be room temperature, flat, not bubbles, no ice, and no flavors. If you have already consumed food or other liquids, you should also have a bit of plain bread to cleanse the palate. The stronger the taste of the foods that you have consumed previously will influence the degree to which you can decipher notes of both smell and taste, so try try stay away from pungent strong flavors such as onions, garlics scallions and bleu cheese. There are five steps in tasting chocolate. They are sight, sound, touch and smell, mouthfeel and taste.
Sight
The chocolate bar should have an even and glossy surface. The color of the chocolate should be uniform throughout the bar. It should have a wonderful, smooth shine with no pitting or bloom. Bloom is due to a variety of reasons including temperature fluctuation where the chocolate was stored, the chocolate was exposed to moisture, water and/or high humidity or the chocolate is simply old. The edges of the bar should be clean, the mold clear and the bar uniform.
EXPERIENCE: Is it shiny or dull? What is its color, it’s texture? If you hold it between your fingers, it should begin to melt. If it doesn’t, it has added vegetable oil and is an inferior bar. Your chocolate bar should look shiny and beautiful with a smooth texture. It should be as beautiful to look at as it is to eat! The color of the chocolate bar can often tell you what type of cacao beans were used for that bar. For instance some Foresteros have a dark brown color and some Trinitarios and Criollos possess a light reddish-brown color. Also expect to see a coppery color and a variety of brown colors, especially in blends, single-origin and single-plantation.
Sound
The sound a high quality chocolate bar makes when you break it in two is called snap. Snap indicates both a high cocoa content and that the chocolate has been tempered correctly. The more crisp the snap sounds to your ear the better the bar. If the bar bends or crumbles instead of snapping, you are dealing with an inferior bar. Since milk chocolate possesses less cocoa and white chocolate actually has no cocoa solids, the will have little or no snap.
EXPERIENCE: Break the chocolate bar into two pieces, there should be a crisp, clean snap.
Touch and Smell
The nose is the most important part of tasting something. Although we see with our eyes first, smell is the sense that usually strikes us first when dealing with the sense. Smell is the most acute of the senses. The flavor of something is influenced by 75% smell and only 25% taste.
Cocoa is similar to wine and olive oil. The aroma depends on the type of beans used in the chocolate as well as where the beans where grown and what was growing around them. The term used to describe this phenomenon is terroir. There are literally hundreds of different aromas called notes when smelling chocolate. To learn how distinguish these various aromas, a chocolate notes chartis provided for you to learn to distinguish the various tastes involved. For instance, the Criollo beans grown in Venezuela may give off notes of strawberries, cream and butter, but in Madagascar, the same type of bean may give off notes of spice, cedar, and white wine. Please note that this done not mean that these are ingredients in the chocolate, the simply are notes. Although you should note any additions to the chocolate bar when tasting as well. It may take you awhile to learn how to do this. Everything worth doing takes time! The more you do it, the better at it you will become. Smelling is important. Keep rubbing it. Close your eyes if it helps.
EXPERIENCE: The chocolate should be dry to the touch. Rub the chocolate between your thumb and fingers, the chocolate should feel both smooth and even. This action releases the chocolate’s aroma which will help you in your tasting. Inhale the rich chocolate aromas. Try to identify the various notes from the Chocolate Notes Chart.
Mouthfeel
Mouthfeel describes how chocolate feels when you put it into your mouth as well as what your mouth feels like after you have swallowed it. If you are tasting a good quality chocolate, the chocolate should start to dissolve in your mouth immediately without you even chewing it. Chocolate melts at 97º F and the body’s temperature is 98.6º F which makes sense. The textures of chocolate can be smooth or gritty and it can possess a creamy or waxy feel. If it is waxy, check the ingredient label. They may have substituted vegetable fat for coca butter. Not something we want when looking for quality chocolate. A lot of chocolate makers add extra cocoa butter to chocolate for a more smooth texture. This is often too rich for some tastes. Don’t worry! You have to look for what you like in your mouth just like with food and beverages.
EXPERIENCE: Take the piece of the chocolate that you broke off and place it on your tongue. The chocolate should at first feel firm. Feel the chocolate with your tongue. Don’t chew it. Let it melt on your tongue. Feel the texture. Is it smooth or grainy? Is it dry or fatty? If you have grainy or fatty chocolate, you have an inferior bar. After that piece is gone, put another piece in your mouth. Chew it slowly. Feel the consistency of the chocolate.
Taste
The taste of the chocolate bar is associated with the notes of the chocolate bar. There are over 500 flavor components in chocolate. You can again refer to the chocolate notes chart while learning how to taste chocolate. It does get a little tricky though. There may be some notes that you can smell but not taste and there may be some notes that you can taste but note smell. The more time you taste the same bar in this manner, the more able you will be to differentiate the notes. When you set up your tasting, you should try to taste chocolates in the same group at the same time; for instance, dark, milk, white, Venezuelan, Ivory Coast, Mexican, Forestero, Criollo, Trinitario, 70% and 80%. Things to note: Is the chocolate light or heavy? Is the chocolate bitter? How do the flavors work on your palate? Are there any changes in texture or flavor? If there is a metallic, bitter or bad aftertaste, you have a bad chocolate bar. The notes listed on the chocolate notes chart are by no means limiting, they are the more predominant notes.
EXPERIENCE: Put a piece of the chocolate in your mouth. Allow it to melt by moving around in your mouth. The reason for this is that the taste buds in your mouth taste different things at different places. The tip of the tongue tastes sweet, the sides of the tongue taste salty and sour and the back of the tongue tastes bitter. Now come more tasting terms like those of wine lovers. The various notes of a chocolate bar will not be recognized all at once. You will notice some notes first, some notes second what is called mid-palate and some in the aftertaste. The aftertaste is also known as the finish, not to be confused with the surface look of the chocolate itself. In some chocolate bars you will find a short finish, where the taste of the chocolate leaves your mouth rather quickly. In a high quality chocolate bar, you will have a long finish which means that the tastes last longer and linger in your mouth.
Bernt, Thanks for the kind words! There are some really fantastic chocolate bars out there now. It takes a bit of time to develop all of your senses in relationship to the chocolate tasting experience. All good chocolate will give off an aroma. If you cannot smell it right away, rub it between your index finger and thumb to see if that enhances the aroma for you. Sight is a crucial part of the tasting process. We do eat first with our eyes. You can tell a lot about the quality of a bar by color, shine and texture. I wouldn’t have anyone close their eyes until they put the piece of chocolate on their tongue. That way they can simply focus on the notes as they come to them. This is hard for most people and takes time. Like fine wine and perfume, eat chocolate has distinct notes and a finish, all of which are different and not lasting the same length of time. Annmarie Kostyk, Chocolate Goddess
Thank you for the article. One of the best websites for chocolate tasting I have come across! I’m currently on a personal quest to find the best chocolate bar available. I have followed your instructions on how to release the aroma but still find it hard to smell. Most chocolates in my experience don’t give off much aroma. Any other recommendations? Also, how much does sight influence your evaluation? I currently have my “connoisseurs” close their eyes before they get a piece of chocolate.
Thanks again, Bernt.