The Chocolate Ambassador

Hi! Your journey through real chocolate starts here.

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🍫 Most people don’t realise it, but their entire idea of chocolate has been rehearsed for them.
Not by farmers. Not by chocolate makers. By a system that built products to last on shelves 🥲

When dark chocolate is remembered as bitter and almost black, it’s because the mass market version was made with low-grade cacao beans, over-roasted to hide defects, and processed until any natural complexity was gone. That’s not what fine flavor cacao tastes like 🫢

When chocolate is blamed for cavities or acne, it’s because the products most people eat are loaded with sugar and dairy 🥹 the perfect fuel for oral bacteria and for triggering high-glycemic responses that can aggravate skin. Single origin dark chocolate with high cacao content and with minimal sugar behaves very differently 😉

When “dark is always better than milk” became a rule, it’s because milk chocolate in the industrial world is mostly sugar and cheap fats. In reality, a well-crafted dark milk chocolate with a higher cacao percentage can surpass a mediocre dark in both flavor and quality 😜

Even ‘sugar-free’ is rarely the health upgrade it claims to be. The sweetener matters and so does proportion 😉 If an alternative sweetener is the first ingredient and cacao comes after, you’re not really buying chocolate; you’re buying a block of sweetened fat, sometimes with cocoa butter, if you’re lucky 🙄

Switch to bean to bar chocolate, and these ideas start to collapse!

Which has influenced your chocolate choices most?

We talk about chocolate quality all the time.
But how often do we actually recognize it when we see it? 🤔

Not in vague "Criollo" claims 🙄
Not in gold foil or 85% stickers 🥱

The real signs are on the packaging if you know what you are looking for 😉

This single-origin 78% dark chocolate from @dicktaylorchocolate is made with cacao from Molekula Island in Vanuatu 🇻🇺

📍An origin planted with 90–95% old Amelonado cacao trees 🌳

Dan O’Doherty, founder of @cacao_services_inc explains 👇🏻

“This homozygous genotype is rare, even in countries such as the Ivory Coast and Ghana. Nothing new has been planted since cacao was introduced in the late 19th century.”

This makes Vanuatu one of the few regions where this genetic strain has developed naturally in the wild, and it is part of the ten major genetic clusters identified by Motamayor in 2008 🤩

What makes you more curious to try this chocolate bar? 👇🏻

In bean to bar chocolate, defects shouldn’t be part of the equation 👎

Before purchase, we celebrate rare genetics, flavor complexity, and craftsmanship 💯

But once flaws appear — fat bloom, sugar bloom, muted flavor — suddenly it’s “still edible,” “melt it down,” or “use it for baking”? 😒

No 🚫 I didn’t pay $15–25+ for a chocolate bar just to turn it into brownies 🙄 And no consumer should be expected to temper chocolate at home to fix a defect 🤐

We’re not talking about mass-market confections; this is chocolate made for tasting!
It’s sold as a premium product, not just a source of calories 🤨 🍫

Defects can’t be dismissed with shortcuts after the transaction is complete 💸 🤝

💬 I’ve tasted bars stored well beyond their Best By date — perfect appearance, no bloom — but the texture was dry, the snap hard, and the aromas & flavors flat 😮‍💨🥱

That’s what happens when cocoa butter crystals shift from form V to form VI: a slow, silent transformation that alters the tasting experience.

This isn’t about food safety; it’s about sensory loss 😉

Some criticize intentionally aged chocolate, questioning how flavor is preserved 🤔 yet they’ll claim a random bar forgotten on a shelf for five years is just fine to enjoy? That contradiction speaks volumes 😵‍💫😵‍💫😵‍💫

This is a call for coherence, awareness, and a more informed conversation.

Have you ever tasted chocolate well past its Best by Date? Did it still hold up? 👇🏻

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The Chocolate Ambassador

BLOG

Latest Articles

Kasama Tanduay Gold Rum Barrel Aged 75% Dark Chocolate

Domori Criollo Guasare 70% Dark Chocolate

Goodnow Farms Malekula Island 70%

Castronovo Chuao Venezuela 72%

ChocoMe Chuao 72% Dark Chocolate

Venezuelan Cacao: A Legacy of Heritage and Fine Flavor

Partnerships & Collaborations

SERVICES • WORK WITH ME •

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Follow me on Instagram

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