Amano Chocolate Giveaway

Yes, another giveaway from BlakeMakes. And, yes, more chocolate! This is definitely MY summer! Amano’s chocolate came in the mail a few months ago…actually while we were on vacation in May. Since we were away, I asked my friend to pick it up at our doorstep and keep it at her home until we returned.

After we returned, I kept forgetting to get the chocolate from her. Finally, we both remembered, and I came home with my chocolate (of course letting her taste some of it first). By then, it was well into June and my summer was already busy. I wanted to keep the chocolate to use for a recipe…but then I just never got around to it. But, I definitely did get to taste it and I still have some left…hoping still to use it for a recipe.

My brother-in-law is big into wine tasting, my best friend’s husband is big into coffee tasting, but did you ever hear of chocolate tastings? It wasn’t until I received my chocolate from Amano and checked out their website that I really understood that there was such a hobby. Here’s what they have to say about chocolate tasting (it’s quite interesting):

Chocolate tasting is not unlike wine tasting. Each type of chocolate bar contains its own set of unique flavor profiles. Since the cacao bean is the source of all chocolate (as grapes are the primary source of wine), its flavors can be imparted by a multitude of variables, such as topography, weather (e.g. rainfall, amount of sun, etc.), soil conditions (e.g. type, nutrient content, drainage properties, etc.), post-harvesting processing (e.g. fermenting, roasting, etc.), and of course genotypic properties. With so many variables affecting the flavor of just one chocolate bar, it’s important to taste carefully so that you can extract the fullest flavor potential. <read the rest here>

I think I could get into this.