Krak Chocolate - St. Vincent and the Grenadines 55% - Juniper

Krak Chocolate calls this bar Juniper, and the name is not decoration: juniper berry is in it. The berry - the same one that flavours gin and jenever, and gives jenever its name - adds a fresh, almost citrus note that cuts straight through the sweetness of the chocolate. If you mainly know juniper from a game marinade or from sauerkraut, the combination comes as a surprise. There is no jenever and no alcohol in the bar, only the berry itself.

What it tastes like

Round and full, fresh and fruity at the same time, with citrus running through it. At 55% cocoa this is a good deal darker than milk chocolate usually is: the cocoa is clearly there and the bar is less sweet than an ordinary milk bar, which is exactly what gives the juniper room to show.

Where the cocoa grows

St. Vincent and the Grenadines is a small island nation in the eastern Caribbean, north of Venezuela and roughly halfway between Grenada and Barbados. The cocoa is not gathered on one estate: it grows all over the island, in among corn, banana and ginger plants and under the shade of coconut and mahogany trees. The St. Vincent Cocoa Company looks after some 250 hectares there and buys from around 100 local farmers, so a single bar draws on a great many small plots. Krak then makes and packs the chocolate itself in the Netherlands, which is why the origin on the wrapper refers to the beans and not to where the bar was made.

Specifications

• Maker: Krak Chocolate, made and packed in the Netherlands
• Type: milk chocolate, 55% cocoa
• Bar weight: 80 g
• Flavour: round, fresh and fruity, with citrus notes from the juniper berry
• Contains juniper berry; no jenever and no alcohol
• Origin of the cocoa: St. Vincent and the Grenadines
• Sourced from around 100 farmers through the St. Vincent Cocoa Company