Recipes

After each year's tasting, I go over the chocolate again at a leisurely pace. I taste and retaste them to determine which one I liked best and scored them on a 1 to 5 scale. I only did this for the darkest category.

2004 Favorites

Getting tiresome, some of these. The only newcomer is the Suchard. Really, this time there were a lot of excellent chocolates. I tasted the top 13 contenders four times each before I made my final ranking.

2004
Chocolate	Percent Chocolate
Cote d'Or, Noir de Noir	70%
Trader Joe's	70%
Chocolove	70%
Suchard Sensations Noir	70%
Galler Chocolate Noir	85%

2003 Favorites

Again, the top four were all very good, and are presented in no particular order. We did not have Trader Joe's this year, they ran out just in time for the tasting. Otherwise, my favorites look remarkably similar to last year's.

Top Four
Chocolate Name	Percent Chocolate
Sainsbury Belgian Plain	72%
Galler Chocolate Noir	85%
Chocolove	70%
Gaston Total Eclipse	72%

Runner's up
Chocolate Name	Percent Chocolate
Frey Noir Special	72%
Rovira Rajoles	70%
Baratti	70%
Dolfin Noir	70%
Munz	70%

2002 Favorites

The top four were all very good, and are presented in no particular order.

2002 Top Four
Chocolate Name	Percent Chocolate
Swartenbroekx	77%
Galler Chocolate Noir	85%
Chocolove	70%
Gaston Total Eclipse	72%

Second Four
Chocolate Name	Percent Chocolate
Cote d'Or Noir de Noir	70%
Schokinag	71%
Trader Joe's	70%
Café Tasse Extra Noir	77%

2000 Favorites

Dark

2000 Favorites
Percent Chocolate	Chocolate Name	Comments	Rank	Score
70	Chocolove Strong Dark	Rich, good aftertaste. Strong, slightly sweet	1	4.5
70	Valrhona Pastils Extra Noir	Fruity and sweet with a sweet aftertaste	1	4.5
72	Michel Cluizel Chocolat Amer Brut	Rrich, chewy, strong chocolate flavor, slightly dry aftertaste	1	4.5
72	Droste Chocolade Extra Puur	A bit grainy, slightly sour		3.9
70	El Rey Gran Samán	Slightly grainy, sour aftertaste. Coarse flavor		3.2
73	La Maison DuChocolat Cuana	Sour and dry aftertaste		3.5
77	Chocolov Extra Strong Dark	A bit grainy and chalky		3.5
71	Valrhona Noir Amer	Sour undertone, chocolate taste overpowered by fruit flavor		4
70	Scharffen Berger	Sour	3.2
70	Valrhona Guanaja	metallic overtone		3.5
70	Lindt Excellence	Heavy flavor, buttart/metallic		3.2
70	Callebaut Extra Bittersweet	Sweet, dry, heavy flavor		3
70	Dolfi Chocolat Noir Extra	Rich, thick, chewy. Slightly dry and chalky		3.9
88	Dolfin Noir Extra	Creamy, understated taste, slightly dry after		4
70	Swiss Noir	Sweet, very dry, sour overtone		3
77	Hachez Cocoa D'arriba	Good at first, deteriorates to bitter		2.5
77	Arks Edelbitter	Bitter		2.8
70	Kunzli	Chalky, good flavor		3.5