Know Your Chocolate

What makes good chocolate, good?

Cocoa percentage gets a lot of attention. But it doesn't tell you everything.

What's in the chocolate, how it's made, and how it tastes and melts can all tell you something.

Here's what to look for.

First, turn the pack around.

The ingredient list can tell you a lot about what you're buying.

Cocoa Mass

Made from ground cocoa beans. It contains the cocoa solids and cocoa butter naturally found in the bean and provides much of the chocolate's cocoa flavour.

Cocoa Butter

The natural fat found in cocoa beans. It plays an important role in how chocolate melts, feels and behaves.

Sugar

Balances the natural bitterness and acidity of cocoa and determines much of the sweetness.

Milk Ingredients

Used in milk and white chocolate and contribute flavour, sweetness and texture.

Emulsifiers & Flavourings

Ingredients such as lecithin or vanilla may be used in small amounts. Their presence alone does not mean a chocolate is poor quality.

A shorter ingredient list isn't automatically better. What the ingredients are, why they're there and how the chocolate is made matter more.

54%. 70%. 85%. What does that actually mean?

The cocoa percentage tells you how much of the chocolate comes from cocoa ingredients, such as cocoa mass and cocoa butter.

But the number doesn't tell you exactly how that percentage is divided between them.

Two 70% chocolates can therefore be quite different. They may use different cocoa beans, different amounts of cocoa butter and sugar, and different production methods.

Take a 70% chocolate, for example:

70%

Comes from cocoa ingredients: cocoa mass and cocoa butter together.

The split?

The label doesn't tell you how much of that 70% is cocoa mass and how much is cocoa butter.

30%

Everything else. Mostly sugar, plus any milk, emulsifiers or flavourings.

Cocoa percentage is information. It isn't a quality score.

85% isn't automatically “better” than 70%, and 70% isn't automatically “better” than 54%.

What gives chocolate its melt?

Cocoa butter is the natural fat in the cocoa bean and an important part of the way chocolate melts and feels. Some chocolate style products use other vegetable fats instead of some or all of the cocoa butter.
Made with cocoa butter

Chocolate

Uses cocoa butter as the characteristic cocoa fat and has the melting and handling properties associated with chocolate.
Made with other vegetable fats

Compound Chocolate

Uses other vegetable fats in place of some or all of the cocoa butter. It behaves differently and can be easier to work with for some applications.

These aren't good and bad versions of the same thing. They are different products that can make sense for different uses, budgets and levels of convenience.

Knowing which one you're buying helps you understand what to expect from it.

You can learn a lot by tasting it.

You don't need to be a chocolate expert. Pay attention to a few simple things.

1. Look

Notice the surface, colour and general condition of the chocolate. Remember that storage and temperature can affect appearance too.

2. Smell

What aromas can you notice before you taste it? Cocoa, roasted notes, fruit, nuts, vanilla or something else?

3. Let It Melt

Don't immediately chew it. Let a small piece melt and notice the texture. Does it feel smooth, creamy, waxy or something else?

4. Taste

Go beyond simply “sweet” or “bitter.” Notice the cocoa flavour and any fruity, nutty, roasted, caramel or other characteristics you can identify.

5. Aftertaste

What happens after you swallow it? Does the flavour disappear quickly or stay and develop?

Darker doesn't automatically mean better.

A higher cocoa percentage usually means a different balance of cocoa ingredients and sugar. It can make a chocolate more intense and less sweet, but that doesn't tell you the quality of the cocoa or whether you'll prefer it.

A well made lower percentage chocolate may be exactly right for one person or one recipe, while a higher percentage chocolate may suit another.

Percentage describes the chocolate. It doesn't grade it.

And if you're cooking with it?

The right chocolate also depends on what you're making.

Eating

Flavour, sweetness and how the chocolate melts become the main experience.

Baking

Cocoa intensity, sweetness and how the chocolate works with the other ingredients matter.

Ganache

The chocolate affects flavour, texture and how the finished ganache sets.

Melting & Coating

How the chocolate melts, flows and sets becomes particularly important.

So, what is couverture?

Couverture is chocolate made with a relatively high proportion of cocoa butter, giving it particular melting and flowing characteristics.

This makes it especially useful for applications such as coating, moulding, ganache and other chocolate work.

“Couverture” isn't simply another word for “better chocolate.”

It describes a type of chocolate and how it is formulated, particularly for certain applications.

So, what makes good chocolate?

There's no single number that tells you.

Cocoa percentage tells you something.
The ingredient list tells you something else.
How the chocolate tastes and melts matters.
And what you're using it for matters too.

The point is to understand what you're buying and whether it works for what you want from it.

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