I understand mocha: a little chocolate, a little coffee -- divine. Chocolate and coconut, chocolate and caramel, chocolate and mint. To my palate, these marriages all work for one very solid reason: the secondary flavor in each pairing is strong enough to hold its own against the dominant note of chocolate.
But chocolate and tea? In all my years as a tea drinker, I never once thought of mixing cocoa into my tea, or mixing tea leaves into my chocolate chip cookies. Tea, to me at least, is so nuanced and complex that even at its strongest I fear it would risk losing something elemental when mixed with anything chocolaty.
So I was intrigued when I was offered samples of a new line of chocolate bars, called Choclatea. With 12 varieties straddling 4 categories (very dark, dark, milk, and white), the bars combine familiar tea types (white, green, black and herbal teas) with varying strengths of cacao, and cocoa butter in the white.
I tried four bars:
1. Pistachio green tea (37% cocoa butter). This white chocolate square "laced with an earthy organic green tea enhanced with all natural pure pistachio" is tasty, but lacks that lovely mouthfeel you get with 'real' chocolate. It's pretty, too -- pale green and speckled with faint bits of, I guess, tea, and sweet, but with an odd aftertaste and no complexity. I'd hang the wrapper on a cork board but wouldn't buy it again. Don't really taste the tea.
2. Coconut green tea (64% cacao). Lovely coconut aroma as I peel back the foil. This one will be goooood. Nice snap, great coconut flavor. I'd buy it again because I love coconut and dark chocolate together. Don't really taste the tea.
3. Pomegranate white tea (72% cacao). A little fruity, a touch tangy. I like it though -- kind of like a jam-slicked layer cake. I can definitely taste something in this, but I can't put my finger on it. Don't really taste the tea.
4. Wild raspberry tea (37% cacao). Milk chocolate-based, sweet, fruity, pleasant, creamy. Lacking the depth and complexity of the darker chocolates, but that's to be expected. It's very gentle. One note, but a good one. Don't really taste the tea.
Bottom line: a nice quality chocolate bar in pleasant flavors and beautiful, eye-catching packaging. (My photos don't show the reverse side, sadly.) If you want chocolate, and the antioxidants that come with both dark chocolate and tea, give it a try. But if you want to actually taste the tea, get thee to a kettle.
Just for kicks, trend forecaster and fellow food blogger Dana McCauley and I agreed to taste the samples independently and to link to each other's posts without first discussing our impressions. I'm a bit terrified to see what she wrote, but here it goes. Click here to read for yourself.
