Wine & Chocolate Tasting

February 25, 2017

Wine and chocolate two of my all-time favourite things. So why not combine the two and do a wine and chocolate tasting? Well that’s exactly what we did on Friday 17^th February with the help and the chocolate know how from our good friend Neil of Kneals Chocolates.

(Neil of Kneals Chocolates, talking with guests) 

Now I must confess unless chocolate comes in some form of dessert it’s not something I would normal pair and enjoy with wine on its own. But regardless of this I’m always willing to give things a second go.

Reading up online trying to match wines with just chocolate by itself is somewhat of a minefield, everything is really geared towards chocolate in dessert form and the subject really seems to divide opinions on what works best if at all.

Now the temptation (and a good excuse) with this tasting would be to pair all the chocolates with dessert wines. However we went with an array of wines to show a plethora of chocolate and wine matching options, and not wanting to brag too much but I think we hit the cocoa bean pretty much on the head. A testament to the amount of emails which had passed between myself and Neil leading up to the tasting.  

The wines and their accompanying chocolates . . . 

(Chocolates top left to right 1 - 4, bottom left to right 5 -8)

1. Cipriano Frizzante Prosecco

White chocolate with a raspberry crumb.

2. Gardet Brut Tradition Champagne N.V.

A white chocolate vanilla truffle with a milk chocolate and vanilla ganache.

3. Wish Bone Shiraz/Grenache, 2015

A 66.8% Brazilian dark chocolate, this offers hints of tropical fruits

4. Pablo y Walter Malbec, 2014

Sea salt & black pepper

5. Moscato d’Asti Alasia, 2015
A peach melba white chocolate with a peach and raspberry ganache.

6. Kopke 10yr Tawny Port

41% milk chocolate, topped with cocoa nibs.

7. Henriques & Henriques Full Rich Madeira

Sea salt caramel. Milk chocolate with a soft sea salt caramel.

8. Barbadillo Pedro Ximenez (PX) Sherry

A dark chocolate (70%) soft caramel with a very small amount of sea salt.

 

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