Saturday, September 29, 2012

Fresco 211 Ghana 73%cocoa

Fresco 211 Ghana, Medium roast, medium conche.

Rich chocolate base, some nutty notes. Low bitterness, minimal aftertaste. Enjoyable, though not remarkable. 7.7

That completes my survey of the various Fresco bars, with various roast and conche processes.  My conclusions?  Looks like I like the medium and lower conche process better, and the dark roast better than the medium roast (none of the bars were made with "light" roast).  I generally really like Madagascar origin cocoa, but those rated lower with medium roast and long and medium conche.

The only other Jamaica origin bar I've tried was the Amedei I Cru Jamaica 70% cacao bar, which I rated fairly highly at 8.0.  The two Fresco Jamaican bars also were solid 8 tastes.  The highest rated Fresco bars were the two from the Dominican Republic, and I have more experience with cocoa from that country.  However, two were rated in the range of 6 (Mast Brothers Dominican Republic 81% cacao at 6.2 and Dagoba Conacado Dominican Republic 73% cacao at 6) and two were rated 8 or higher (Rogue Chocolatier Hispaniola (Dominican Republic) 70% cocoa at 8.3 and David Bacco Chocolatier Elvesia Dominican Republic 74% cocoa at 9.2)

Certainly manufacturing processes directly lead to one's taste experience with chocolate bars. I can see how the changes used in the Fresco series had effect with same-origin cocoa and how similar processes had differing results with different-origin cocoa.  So if you are thinking of making your own bars from cocoa beans, be ready to try different processes in order to find the best results.

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