Valrhona - Tanariva - 33%

Price: $11.25 for 70g

Comparative price: $16.07 per 100g

Origin: Madagascar

Rating: 4 out of 5

Buy again:  Possibly, milk chocolate isn't for me, but if I was to buy milk this would be it

So...a surprise entrant on my website.  An interloper.  A milky chocolate at only 33% - quite unheard of for me; my tastes tend to lie on the darker side of the cocao tree.

This has great pedigree being from the French masters at Valrhona, but it does disturb me looking at the ingredients of milk chocolate compared to dark.  Aside from the usual suspects such as cocoa mass, cocoa butter, vanilla, soy lecithin we also find whole milk powder, dried skimmed milk and vanilla (natural extract) along with natural vanilla flavour.  Now this is the good stuff, so it doesn't have some of the chemicals and other such seen in cheaper chocolates, but this is still more than I am use to seeing on my ingredients list.  

Sight 

It’s odd to eat milk after avoiding it for many years; it looks rather insipid and pale to my eyes.  But trying to put my objective, open minded hat on - it is a pale brown colour, not particularly glossy and proudly wearing the iconic Valrhona stamp.  It is also moulded into attractive geometrical patterns and is very well finished with no air bubbles.

Smell

The smell is sweet, light and milky – but again this is my dark bias coming through.  It smells a little like malt but for the most part the aroma is dominated by a distinct sweetness. 

Sound

What a shame.  Valrhona normally offers me up such a wonderful snap however this milky offering only provides a poor break - in fact, did I even hear a snap?  There is nothing clean or distinct about and with no real sound.

Taste & Texture

This is Valrhona and of course the texture is good, although thicker on the palate than many other Valrhona products - perhaps this is a characteristic of milk chocolate.  But it does impart its flavour well as I engage in the giddy sensation of sweetness permeating the far region of my palate. 

But as for taste, I'm back to malt - there is an immediate hit of malt quickly followed by an onslaught of sugary sweetness.  The malt tones soften onto a milky maltiness, although the sweetness remain.  There is no real chocolate taste with this, not as a dark aficionado would define it anyway.  There are hints of it to begin with but these are brief and teasing only.  To be honest, I find it difficult to distinguish any particular flavour; at times I sense small hints of sharpness that work really well against the sweetness but nothing is given the full opportunity to develop.

Summary

So we have established that the sweetness is both new and alien to me but this is a nice chocolate, for milk.  I do like it and would even consider buying it when I was in the mood for something a little more sweet.  It does remind me a little of my Cadbury milk chocolate eating days, (getting hooked into the sugar), but with much more integrity here.  There is hints of flavour progression and it does offer more than the milkiness.

I would rate this as 4 out of 5.  This is as good as milk gets for this little black duck, but a slightly lighter duck I suspect would rate this higher!

Buy online at Cocoa Kiss now

Reviewer: Shari
4 February 2010