Prestat - Organic Dark Chocolate - 63%

Price: $13.95 for 80g

Comparative Price: $17.40 per 100g

Rating: 2 out of 5

Buy again: No. Organic is great but there's better chocolate for this price

Sold in well known UK consumer dens likes of Selfridges, Harrods and Liberty (but having said that also the slightly more ordinary Waitrose and John Lewis) I stumbled across this chocolate in David Jones.

Rather impressively the Prestat packaging declares themselves as, 'by appointment', purveyors of chocolates to the Queen, and surely if its fit for the Queen its good enough for me.

The only other time I have eaten Prestat chocolate was when I stumbled across a store in a Singapore shopping centre. I enjoyed a few individual chocolates and from memory they were nice, although it preceeded my foray into good chocolate. I have also seen their Choxi range out and about.

Sight

The first thing one notices with this chocolate is the packaging, and whilst it grabs your attention, in a magpie collecting way, I am not sure I like it.  The formal statements and crests proclaiming their status as, again, purveyors to the Queen doesn't quite fit with the garish hot pink, red and gold packaging.  Maybe its all the swirls, its a little too school girl doodling for me.

But to be fair, on unwrapping the obligatory gold foil the block itself is very attractive, so much so I've even added an extra photo.  The chocolate itself is darker and duller than the photo appears, but that's not necessarily a negative.  Although one bad omen, I noticed when taking the photo there are no well defined squares, a pet hate of mine.  I even deplore my much loved Valrhona for not making it easy to break off even, rationed (as I do need to ration my comsumption) squares.  Obviously the Queen has no such rationing needs...

Sound

A very good, very clean snap that dare I say even resonates - my hopes are high again.

Aroma

Initially a somewhat strong aroma, but I would almost call it shallow.  You get an intial chocolate hit but then it quickly disappears.  My hopes are fading with it...

Taste and Texture

So let's get the real stuff over and done with.

The first thing that strikes me is ITS NOT MELTING...it really takes a little while for the melting to kick in which suggests it may not have a high cocoa butter content.  Cocoa butter is the third ingredient on the ingredients list, but I'm still unsure how much is actually in it.  Or perhaps it has something to do with the next ingredient, 'fat reduced cocoa powder' which I haven't spied on packaging before (albeit, at least it is organic!). However the chocolate is smooth and I can live with a slow melt if the flavour is there, but here I have a problem.

The chocolate is bitter, and not pleasantly so, almost an acrid bitterness that I find quite strange for chocolate. But either way its not the standard dark chocolate bitterness, not that I would expect this from a 63% anyway as it is hardly a very dark chocolate.  

In its defense, it does develop some hints of coffee and caramel as the tasting goes on, but sadly no real depth of flavour. Towards the end it takes on a very slight sweetness, however it is slight and I would expect this as it hits the back of my mouth where my 'sweet' receptors reside (apparently this is an anatomical feature of taste buds - not me making it up).  Things also look up towards the end as it finally takes on a smooth consistency and mild flavour, but then it finishes on the bitterness which just doesn't seem quite right.

Summary

So I guess my hopes for this one are dashed and I'll leave it to the Queen.  

Interestingly this retails for 3.59 pounds on their website, which at exchange rates current at the time of writing is roughly around $8.00.  Maybe if I was paying $8.00 it might be a slightly better proposition, but taking on board its reasonable price in the UK the $14 I forked out feels rather excessive, particularly when you can get other (and I would personally say better) imported chocolates for the same price.

The packaging may attract some, I like that it is organic, it does deliver a wee bit on taste but for such little real flavour I cannot forgive it its lack of melting prowess.  And then there's the bitterness, which I can still taste in my mouth as I write this, and ultimately I can't get past this strange development.   Therefore I would only rate this as 2 out of 5.

http://www.prestat.co.uk/

3 August 2009

Reviewer: Shari