It's been ages since we've talked about chocolate here — just about two years ago I reviewed a handful of bars, and then nothing since. I've gone right on eating chocolate, nearly every day. This month I've been working my way through several winter-themed bars, including the two peppermint stick bars under consideration today. For regular, non-candy-cane peppermint + chocolate, my favorites are usually Dolfin Noir Aux Feuilles de Menthe, which I nearly never get my hands on, or Divine's Mint Dark Chocolate, my "everyday" chocolate mint. Madecasse's Peppermint, which they have reissued as a limited edition again this year, is also quite good (and I am still trying to find a bar of their other holiday flavor for 2015, Orange Cranberry).
But today, we're doing peppermint sticks. Vosges makes a lovely Peppermint Candy Cane bar but they sold out this year before I ever laid eyes on one. So, on my plate at the moment: Taza's Peppermint Stick and Chuao's Peace, Love & Peppermint.
If you have a favorite chocolate mint bar, or ANY favorite chocolate you'd like to discuss, do comment!
Taza Peppermint Stick
Taza's Peppermint Stick is a stone-ground organic chocolate bar, and if you've never had a Taza bar, the texture might charm you, and then again it might not: I love the sensation of having the chocolate and gritty sugar melt together in my mouth, and their round disks, ground with flavors from coffee to cinnamon to chili to almond, and wrapped in folded paper, are staples in my house. This bar, with 60% dark chocolate, is not round, I do not know why, and while it's delicious, it isn't quite what I expected. The peppermint stick is likewise ground, so you don't get any chewy pieces, and it doesn't really taste like your standard commercial candy cane anyway. A sensation of heat from the mint does build up after a bite or two, and it is delicious, but it isn't really what I'm looking for in a candy cane bar. (Their Spiced Eggnog disks, though, are perfect, and highly recommended.)
The Taza Peppermint Stick bar is $6 for 70g, although you can find them for less online.
Chuao Chocolatier Peace, Love & Peppermint
Like the Taza, this one is 60% cacao, and also like the Taza, this bar only appears around the holiday season (it was first introduced in 2014). But in this case the chocolate is smooth as can be, with decent sized bits of candy cane — exactly the sort of candy canes children used to get in their stockings at Christmas. There is just the right amount of mint flavor, and they're decently chewy. I am very good about chocolate, usually: I eat about 1/4 to 1/5 of a bar every day after lunch. Twice now, I've gobbled down a half of one of these without even noticing.
I'm a big fan of Chuao in general, but should note that not everyone is: my sister ordered a bunch of bars after I recommended them, and she did not care for their base chocolate, which I assume is Venezuelan. So maybe try one before you order a case. The brand's two other holiday flavors this year, neither of which I've tried, are Hope, Joy & Gingerbread and Caramel Apple Crush. And if you like Green & Black's Maya Gold, do try the similar bar from Chuao, Spicy Maya. It is excellent with a cup of hot chai tea.
Chuao Peace, Love & Peppermint is $6 for 80g. The brand offers coupons from time to time; I got this bar at half price during a holiday sale.
Note: top image is cane card [cropped] by liz west at flickr; some rights reserved.
I will have to pick one of these up on the way home! (Yes, we finally have Chuao in Canada, mostly at Indigo, the bookstore chain. Weird. I tried the Pretzel Toffee Twirl the other day. Still think the Potato Chip is my fave — which I owe to you.)
And we just got a local Wegman’s supermarket which carries some of them, so they are easier to get my hands on too. They did not have this one though. My son likes the Cinnamon Crunch and I have been eating lots of the Honeycomb bars lately.
You can get Chuao at MEC as well.
Hey, thanks! Possibly even weirder than Indigo that you can get them at MEC, but good to know.
Hey, what’s better than chocolate to bring on the trail?
I liked the Honeycomb and the Panko one, too. Do they not make the Pods anymore? I also lusted after those, but was too cheap to order and ship them.
They are called mini chocolate bars now, and don’t think they’re the same pod shape but not sure. I usually only order online around the holidays when they do free shipping and I don’t have to pay for cold packs.
I just bought a package of the Chuao Peace Love & Peppermint mini bars at Starbucks this morning, and I can report that the chocolate is indeed pod-shaped.
Thank you! And do you like the bars?
I don’t generally meet chocolate I don’t like.
That said, I wasn’t wowed for some reason. I think I got less peppermint flavor than I wanted.
Ah, you might want the Divine bar then.
I do love chocolate. My favourites of late: Chuao Honeycomb (dark), Purdy’s Salted Butter Toffee (dark), and practically anything from Dolfin. My favourites from Dolfin are Pear and Grilled Almonds, Fresh Ginger, and Hot Masala (dark, dark, and milk). Yesterday I picked up three of Theo’s Christmas bars including Peppermint Stick. I can’t wait to try it.
I wish I had your restraint, Robin. 1/4 to 1/5 of a bar? I’m lucky if a bar lasts me two days. On a non chocolate note, I also picked up the rose flavoured Anis de Flavigny. They are terrific, better than the violet ones even. Anyways, thanks for giving me the opportunity to gush about chocolate. I’ll have to try Peace, Love & Peppermint the next time I go pick up a bar of Honeycomb.
The Chuao honeycomb is SO good. Do report back on the Theo, their Valentine’s Day bar with cinnamon was almost too hot to eat — weird! And wish I had your access to Dolfin! I adore those little cumin squares but am too cheap to have them shipped to me.
I really am pretty good about the chocolate, the vast majority of the time…I have my bit with some hot tea after lunch and that’s usually enough. It helps that I only let myself have any after I’ve already eaten a meal.
I’ll be sure to report back on the Theo bar. I’ve never tried anything from them before. I get my Dolfin bars ar the same Italian Grocer that I get Les Anis de Flavigny from. They also carry Amedei which I’ve been meaning to try but the price feels a little high. Maybe a Christmas Splurge is in order.
I’m referring to this bar in particular.
http://www.amedei.it/it/prodotto/5927/HBSEVAOK/blanco-de-criollo-cioccolato-fondente
Yikes at that price.
Wow. I bought an Amadei bar once and did not love it, but now I cannot remember which is was. Seems like it was anise, maybe? I know I did not pay that much for it.
Hi Robin, the Theo bar was pretty disappointing. The chocolate was okay if a little smoother than I normally like. What really disappointed me is that there’s no actual peppermint candy inside. The chocolate base is flavoured with peppermint oil but the actual crunchy bits of candy are unflavoured and uncoloured. If you’re going to call your bar Peppermint Candy Stick and have a snowman holding a candy cane on the wrapper then there very well ought to be some actual peppermint candy inside of said bar. I feel cheated.
Oh, what a shame! And I almost bought one today but decided it would go stale before I ate it since I’m a bit overstocked on chocolate at the moment. They also had a Nutcracker Brittle bar that looked good, maybe I’ll get one of those when I finally finish off what I’ve got.
As for me, I think I’m going to try making my own. I know a place that sells 300g bags of valrhona callets for $12. Add crushed candy canes and voila. How hard can it be?
Ha, you tell me how hard it turns out!
I love chocolate and mint together. I always buy some Ghirardelli peppermint squares for my mom and for myself this time of year. They make dark chocolate ones too now, so looking forward to opening my bag. I’ll have to find that Chuao one. Speaking of them, Trader Joe’s made a knockoff of their Firecracker bar and I found the TJ’s one to have much better chocolate (and much cheaper too!). My favorite “base” chocolate is Chocolove, so I just looked it up and indeed they have a Peppermint in Dark Chocolate bar, so I will be looking for that.
I had the most amazing chocolate thing yesterday. A vendor brought a tray of fancy bite size pastries (cheesecake, lemon bars, etc.) from a local store and there was one and it was eye roll back in your head good. I have no idea what it was – kind of mousse like, but the texture was sooooooooo smooth, with something very slightly crunchy in icing. Even my husband who doesn’t really like chocolate agreed it was pretty amazing. I know am on a quest to find out what that thing was and how I can get more of it in my life.
I have never loved that particular Chocolove as much as the Divine mint bar (the Divine is just mintier, plus the chocolate is darker) but I do like Chocolove in general.
And we will await your word on this amazing thing, LOL!
Christmas season means marzipan for me! A little chocolate on top adds some verve, though.
I meant to get my son some German marzipan for his stocking this year and failed.
Mmmm, have you tried the Ritter Sport dark chocolate marzipan bars? It always makes me happy to spot these in a store.
I’ve seen the Tazo Gingerbread one here in Montréal but not the peppermint. Anybody tried the gingerbread? I have gotten hooked on gourmet bean-to-bar chocolates, namely Marou from Vietnam and the SF Dandelion brand Venezuelan bar.
When I am feeling less fancy, I go for the Mink chocolate bars from Vancouver – the port wine flavored one and the pistachio filled one are my favorites, but the shipping charges are astronomical so I don’t order as often as I would like.
I have not tried the gingerbread.
And I hate paying to ship chocolate!
So I bought the gingerbread one… It is very good but quite sweet. I could only eat two squares of it at a sitting. Same for the eggnog flavor – good stuff but sweeeeet.
Thanks! Agree the Eggnog is sweet — they’re all sweet, I think they’re only 60%. I usually eat very small quantities anyway.
Divine has a spiced cookie chocolate bar that I LOVE, but unfortunately I haven’t been able to track it down this year. This is the one:
http://www.candyblog.net/blog/item/divine_spiced_cookie
And I love the Lindt chocolate bars with the popcorn inside them. Those are very easy to find at Target, unlike the bar I mentioned above! Target did have several different kinds of Divine, just not my favorite.
Oh, I have not seen that one either!
I’ll go even farther off topic to note that my favorite holiday treat is Edy’s peppermint ice cream, which is a limited edition for September-December only. It might be sold out already. Unfortunately, it doesn’t come in small containers, so I guess I ate enough last year for two or three years.
Not chocolate, but it would probably be great with hot fudge sauce.
Ha, and my favorite is Ben & Jerrys Chocolate Peppermint Crunch. There was a local shortage earlier this year and I was worried it got discontinued, but luckily it’s back. The best thing about it is that nobody else in my family likes it, so it is safe ice cream.
I have an abundance of mostly dark chocolate in my pantry between my “oh look Artisanal dark chocolate I must buy and try” and perfume for chocolate swaps. That said, I’m always game to try highly recommended brands and specific flavors. I tend not to order them as i have easy access via brick & mortar stores if I ever run out. I have a Wegmans within walking distance from my house and they carry a decent selection.
Wegmans does have a nice selection, and so does my local Whole Foods, and we have another store called Food Source or somesuch (it’s like a fancier Whole Foods) that has a fantastic mix, especially at the holidays. But there are a few brands, like Dolfin, that I never see anymore.
I fear my palette is not sophisticated enough to prefer dark chocolate over milk, so mostly these sorts of fancy bars are not made with me in mind (AND dark chocolate can trigger migraines for me, which adds disincentive).
I *am* rather fond of the common and delicious caramel corn Cadbury bars I can only buy when I’m in Canada.
And I could make the filling for a French Silk pie (basically a whipped chocolate egg custard) and eat it straight from the pan–who needs pie crust when that’s around?!
My son likes milk too, and gosh, there are lots of fancy milk bars now. Divine makes a few, and Chuao makes lots (maybe even more than dark). He also likes Ritter (at Target or Wegmans), Lindt and Chocolove (they do some milk bars, and even their dark chocolate is not all that dark). And Vosges Mo’s Bacon bar, the original one, is milk!
LOL! Clearly, you’ve done far more field work in this area than I have! Usually, if I Jones for chocolate, I just head over to See’s for a few treats. . .
Hey, I can’t put ALL that obsessive compulsive behavior into perfume!
Wish we had a See’s in Boston
Taza is one of my go-to gifts when I travel; their tiny factory is a few blocks from my apartment. I almost applied for a quality and safety supervisor position there, but I was concerned about how much weight If gain! Now to get my hands on the spiced eggnog….
Oh how cool — I could NEVER work there either, I’m sure! They are making some sort of fig & chocolate jam, do please investigate and tell us if we must all order some
Fig and chocolate jam? My eyes are rolling back in my head just thinking about it.
Haven’t tried any outstanding mint chocolate lately, but I’m planning the moment when I open my Theo’s Fig, Fennel & Almond bar.
Those are good too!
I just tried the eggnog today – yum! Very sweet though.