Paradai – Nakhon Si 70% Red Pod

Description

Paradai makes beautiful chocolates in Thailand, and has won many (including the highest) awards at the International Chocolate Awards. Also with this chocolate, and it is extra special.

Made from cocoa from Nakhon Si Thammarat, a province in southern Thailand. Didn’t they already have a bar of that? That’s right! Two even, a 75% chocolate and a 100%.

But this is an extra special version.

Normally all harvested cocoa is processed together, but for this bar the cocoa pods are sorted by color and only the red cocoa pods end up in this bar.

The cocoa from this region is about 90% yellow, and 10% red. Normally this is not taken into account, and everything is fermented together and further processed into chocolate. For this bar everything is separated and only the red pods are used.

Here is the description from the maker:

“When the cocoas from the farms arrive at our fermentation station in Nakhon Si Thammarat, we have seen that there is 10% Red pod cocoa in it. I was wondering if the red tastes different from the yellow. (Most cocoa in Nakhon Si Thammarat is yellow pods). So we separate Redpod and ferment them separately.

So I start to notice the difference from day 1 of fermentation, it ferments faster, the temperature of fermentation is higher and the aroma is different, and the beans definitely taste different. So then we decided to make a bar from this cocoa.”

And with success…definitely (also) a fruity chocolate bar, but indeed also very different from the ‘regular’ (disrespectfully) Nakhon Si bar. Ordering it at the same time as this bar is actually recommended because then you have a super fun tasting – but this bar is also worth ordering on its own, it was not for nothing that it was awarded gold at the world finals of the International Chocolate Awards.

Flavour notes: Citrus, sour cherry, lyuchee, guanabana, raisin, chocolatey, dairy, melon, rum, honey.

Ingredients: cocoa mass, cocoa butter.

Allergy note: no traces of nuts, soy and lactose. So suitable for all allergies. Contents 50 grams.