Review - Twentyfour Blackbirds

Last summer my wife and I got away for a weekend to Santa Barbara, CA. Santa Barbara is a gorgeous little beachfront town, and it always feels like vacation there. And as it turns out, it's becoming a bit of a hot spot for artisanal chocolate!

On a previous trip to Santa Barbara, we had discovered an amazing chocolate shop called Chocolate Maya. Nothing but artisanal chocolate from floor to ceiling, Chocolate Maya is kind of a ground zero for chocolate lovers. So of course, when we are in town, it's always on our list to visit.

However, on this particular trip, we discovered another shop. Isabella Gourmet Foods is a great little grocery off of State Street. They sell really great local and artisanal products out of their very cozy shop. I picked up some twenty-four blackbirds drinking chocolate and a canister of Golden Door Ginger Cookies.

Twenty-four blackbirds was started by Michael Orlando while he was busy working as a marine scientist. In a short time, the chocolate won, and he moved to making chocolate full time. It didn't take long for his small company to begin selling a drinking chocolate.

The ginger cookies were also made locally by an interesting company called Golden Door. Their website is a bit overwhelming. I can't tell what exactly they do. They seem to be a resort destination, they have a speaker series, they sell food products... a bit of everything, I guess.

To complete the full Santa Barbara drinking chocolate experience, I picked up a handmade mug and creamer at another local craft store. I sadly didn't get the woman's name who made them, and cannot read it from the bottom of the stoneware.

I absolutely love the colors of them, and the faces are made completely by hand, with the designer using her fingers and fingernails to create them. Really beautiful work!

So lets talk about that chocolate!

It comes with an instruction card and some bits of information about how the chocolate was made. Hand wrapped in craft paper and tied with twine, the packaging is minimal and perfect. Their regular eating bars are decorated with bird artwork and molded with a beautiful leaf impression.

Also on the card is instruction on making a chocolate syrup from the bars. The bars are small, 1 ounce each, which lets you perfectly control how much you're going to make. Simple and to the point, the smooth, flat bars smell amazing as you unwrap them.

I made mine with 2% milk, and I used the creamer to bring along a bit of heavy cream, which I added as I enjoyed the drink, giving it a creamier, less concentrated flavor and bringing out different flavor notes.

The cookies were the perfect snack to serve with it, as well. I'm not a huge fan of serving chocolate cookies or snacks with a chocolate drink, so the strong ginger flavor really paired well with it. And the cookies are crisp, which, of course, is perfect for dunking!

I can't recommend twenty-four blackbirds drinking chocolate enough. It's a really amazing drink, and is definitely helping to raise the bar of what should be expected of a hot chocolate. This is top-of-the-line hot chocolate, the exact kind of drink that made me realize everything that was wrong with hot cocoa from a packet. If you like hot chocolate, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Review - Tcho Superberry & Regular Drinking Chocolate

This time I'm taking a look at a couple selections from Tcho chocolate. Tcho is a trendy chocolate maker in Berkeley, CA, with the slogan of "New American Chocolate". Their bars come in a huge variety of flavors. I wouldn't say they are one of my favorites, but I do buy their bars when I come across them, mainly because of the interesting, fun flavors.

TCHO has some fascinating ties to the technology world. One of their founders, Timothy Childs, worked on vision systems for NASA's Space Shuttle, and their current CEO and President (Louis Rossetto and Jane Metcalfe, respectively) are co-founders of Wired magazine. Pretty cool!

I've enjoyed their drinking chocolates for quite some time now, at least a couple years. Long enough that their packaging tins have changed design, in fact! The square tin is their older style, the cylinder is the latest.

The flavors of Tcho's that I'm enjoying today are their Regular Drinking Chocolate and the Superberry Drinking Chocolate. Oddly, it looks like they don't sell the Superberry flavor anymore. Wonder why? I attempted to contact them to ask why, but haven't heard back as of publishing this review.

I made a small portion, closely following the directions on package. Superberry was very interesting, unlike most of the other flavored drinking chocolates I've had. It tasted of deep, dark chocolate with an infusion of raspberries and blueberries. Definitely not your ordinary hot chocolate, which really makes it a shame that they no longer sell it. It's fruity, but not overwhelmingly so. I actually wish there was a bit stronger of a fruity tang to it. Still, a great variation on the standard hot chocolate.

For their Regular Drinking Chocolate, there are multiple instructions for the drink. I did the instructions for the shot. Very rich and dark, with tangy notes, very slightly fruity, but not at all like the Superberry. Very tasty, but more than a shot of this would be a lot, unless you took your time drinking it and had something to dip in it. Drinking this chocolate definitely brings out the intense flavors and subtle notes in a way that you might miss if this was a bar chocolate.

I also tried the drinking chocolate in a milder mix, using 1½ cups of milk and the same 3 tbsp of chocolate that the directions call for. It created a very mellow hot chocolate. Very dark, not sweet at all, and none of the fruity tanginess that it had as a stronger shot. It is very good, especially as a morning drink.



All in all, I would definitely recommend Tcho drinking chocolates. Delicious chocolate, definitely a treat if you're still only used to the powder packet varieties of hot chocolate. It's sad to see their Superberry off the market, as the world of quality drinking chocolates can certainly use all the gourmet varieties it can get. Maybe some online sellers still have it in stock? If you find it, give it a shot!

Review - American Heritage Hot Chocolate

It's Thanksgiving time! Turkey, pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce, those mashed sweet potatoes with the marshmallows melted on top... Mmmmm.... The Pilgrims at Plymouth Colony probably loved those sweet potatoes with the marshmallows on top! Ok, ok, they probably didn't have marshmallows.

Sadly, the Pilgrims didn't have chocolate, either. Reports online vary, but I've read that chocolate did not arrive in the American colonies until about 1670, when European chocolate was being sold in Boston. While Baker's Chocolate is arguably the oldest producer of chocolate in America, setting up shop in 1764, I also read that cacao beans were being imported into Boston as early as 1682. Benjamin Franklin was reportedly selling chocolate from his printing shop in 1735!

So what is this I have here? American Heritage Chocolate's Finely Grated Chocolate Drink. As I've mentioned before, chocolate was a drink long before it became an edible bar. This is hot chocolate as the colonists may have enjoyed it. It's a brand created by Mars (the folks who make M&M's and Snickers bars) using a recipe from 1750 and ingredients only available at that time in the United States.

In keeping with the theme of being historically accurate and tied to America's founders, American Heritage Chocolate is only sold at museums and historic sites here in the States. Places like George Washington's Mount Vernon and Thomas Jefferson's Monticello. In fact, Washington served chocolate to guests of Mount Vernon from 1758 until his death in 1799!











I bought mine from their website and had it shipped. If you go now, you'll notice the packaging has changed. When I got mine, it came in this cool little burlap bag. I had also purchased some chocolate sticks, and those came in a little burlap sack, too. Very cool! The new packaging is a canister. Not bad, but not as fun as the burlap bag!

But what really matters is what's in the bag.

It's not a powder mix but ground up chocolate, which is always preferable. It smells sweet and very much like cinnamon and vanilla. It's a very pleasant smell, and very different from other chocolates I've had, even though I've certainly had plenty with vanilla and cinnamon.

The instructions say to make it with water. Water always lets the real flavor of the chocolate come through, so I stuck with the instructions.

It's very good, definitely a distinct flavor, very tasty. It's easy to believe the colonials drank chocolate similar to this. Something about it feels very earthy. Maybe there's even a potpourri essence about it.

Using the amount of chocolate listed in the instructions made this a rather thin hot chocolate, and a very small portion, only about half a cup. Out of curiosity, I went ahead and made another small batch with milk instead of water.

This one was much more satisfying! Creamy and yummy, the milk was perfect with the flavors of the chocolate. While it may not be historically accurate, I much prefer it with milk.

If you're a history buff, or maybe want to bring a touch of old time charm to your Thanksgiving, this is definitely worth checking out. It's also a great hot chocolate to have on hand for Christmas!

Happy Thanksgiving!