Tag: Ococoa

B is for Bärenjäger

Sorry that it’s been a while since my last post! This round of Eating the Chocolate Alphabet has been more difficult than the other ones. 😢 Yes, I’m struggling to find alcohol-related chocolates; but, honestly, I’ve had this bar since mid-January {well, to be honest, I bought 2 bars that day for photographic purposes & ended up eating one, so I had to buy a backup “prop” late last month!}

What I didn’t realize when starting this round of the Alphabet was a little thing called timing. While I tend to get great natural lighting for photos in the morning & early afternoon, tasting alcoholic chocolates that early makes me loopy and not very productive for the rest of the day. 😲 I really need to figure out a better system and stop rationalizing that it’s “5 o’clock somewhere” in the world! 🤷‍♀️

Anyway, back to the chocolate!

When I announced my new theme on Instagram, one of the first people to reply was Diana Malouf from Ococoa telling me that she makes a caramel bar with Bärenjäger (honey liqueur). Well, no arm twisting needed…I had found my “B” bar!

The 6-rectangle bar made with milk chocolate, white chocolate, cream, sugar, honey liqueur, butter and salt sports a cute honeycomb transfer pattern on the back. Each crisp rectangular shell is generously filled with a creamy/smooth, sweet & lightly boozy caramel filling that reminds me of dulce de leche or cajeta. 😋

During yesterday’s photo shoot, I ended up eating ALL 6 RECTANGLES! 🐷My advice when ordering this bar is to get AT LEAST two of them!

Looking online, I see that Bärenjäger translates to “Bear Hunter” in German.  According to the manufacturer’s website, the beehive-to-bottle recipe dates back to 18th Century Germany and was formulated to lure bears out of their dwellings by hunters (who also ended up consuming this drinkable honey).

Diana showed me the bottle of honey liqueur at her shop (though I didn’t taste it since I was driving),

But, now I realize that what I found at BevMo was a different formulation: Honey & Bourbon

Don’t you just love the little beehive bottle topper!

In case you’re curious, the Honey & Bourbon has a warming, but short lived “burn” and a vibrant honey aroma. Now I need to try the Honey Liqueur version…for research purposes, of course! {hey Diana, I’m coming over}

Ococoa is best known for their nut butter cup collection + other seasonal confections, one of which is their Smokey Scotch Truffles, just in time for Fathers’ Day. If your Dad (or you) enjoys a peaty Scotch, those truffles are a MUST HAVE! Visit their website for more information & let them know that Trish from Eating the Chocolate Alphabet sent you! ❤️

I is for Irish Whiskey

When I was initially going through inclusion ingredients in my head during the planning stages for “round 2” of this Eating the Chocolate Alphabet project, I don’t think I fully realized that the letter “I” would be relatively difficult to fill. Maybe it’s me, but the only English-language foods that I could think of involved the word “ice.” Now it’s your turn, go ahead & take a moment, I’ll wait! While I was waiting, I did a search for Spanish foods and discovered Idiazábal (a Basque smoked cheese); if someone finds a chocolate paired with that ingredient, I’ll try it! Google also revealed that there are imbe fruit, ink nuts or iyokan (which is a Japanese citrus similar to a mandarin orange), but I’ve never seen any chocolates with those flavorings, have you?

Since I was undeterred, it was now time to find an “I” word modifier: like Icelandic, Irish, Italian or Israeli. I’ve had several chocolates with Icelandic Sea Salt, but that didn’t seem “special” enough for this blog. Someone suggested Irish Coffee, but I’m not a fan of the coffee flavor profile. So, when Jack from Chocolate Covered San Francisco mentioned that he had an Irish Whiskey bar, I knew I had finally found something I could feature and enjoy!

Ococoa is not unfamiliar to me since in mid-January I tried Diana Malouf’s flavorful and unique ingredient/flavor combinations that are part of her 9 piece Butter Cup Collection. If only I had paid more attention to her other product lines during that visit, this Irish Whiskey Caramel bar could have avoided a 700+ mile journey to reach me!! Oh, the irony!

This Irish Whiskey Caramel bar is made up of 6 thick filled rectangles, decorated on the “back” with a wood-grain patterned transfer sheet. The tops of some of the rectangles were starting to implode a little bit, partly because of the transit and partly because, by the time I was sampling this bar, the “enjoy by” date had elapsed by about a month :’(

There was a strong alcohol aroma and the rectangles cracked while I was segmenting this bar by hand. The milk and white chocolate caramel center from the first rectangle I tried seemed a little grainy and/or crystallized rather than runny, chewy or gooey.

However, when I bit into that piece (and all subsequent pieces), the middle was creamy and smooth, almost like a dulce de leche texture, but wow…it is BOOZY! Probably not what I should have been eating first thing in the morning! It would make for a perfect after-dinner treat though!

Overall, I liked the amount of burnt sugar caramel encased in the thin dark chocolate shell and the slight back-of-the-throat burn from the alcohol. Next time I want to try the Honey Liqueur Caramel bar, the Cardamom Orange truffle bar or the Peat Smoked truffles!

To learn more about Ococoa, please visit: https://ococoa.com/

And if you find any other unique “I” inclusion ingredients, PLEASE send me a message to let me know!!