Lithuania. No there is another country I wouldn’t have linked to chocolate some years ago.
How little did I know back then. Today I know bean-to-bar chocolate producers are popping up everywhere. In center point of this movement seems to be the USA and UK, but in nearly every country there are chocolatiers stepping up to the challenge.
Chocolate Naive is on of those inspired companies who put quality before quantity. They produce chocolate all the way from cocoa bean to finished bar from their workshop in Giedraiciai, Lithuania.
And the origins they state on their website are enough to make your mouth water. Peru, Grenada, Madagascar, Vietnam, and so on.
Agné Laskauskaité was so kind as to offer my a very broad array of samples of their products. I’m very happy with that, as it seems a bit difficult to find their products in my homeland Belgium. I’ll spread their products over several reviews, because I think they all deserve full attention, rather than cramping them into a single text.
So let’s start with the two dark origin bars I found in the package. First on the line, the Trinidad and Tobago bar (being the purple one on the right)!
These samples come in such a great package! It’s almost like little books. On the front you get their logo and the origin. On the back the cacao bean used,the percentage, the roast and the conch time! Perfect! I love it when a producer shares this information.
This bar features 70% of cacao, lightly roasted and conched for 60 hours.
Inside a perfect square of brown gold is preserved by a cellophane blister. Opening this foil reveals a great aroma! Hard not to dig in right away!
The little square looks very nice and shiny with the Naive logo embossed on it. Simple and beautiful.
Made with Trinitario beans from Trinidad and Tobago, situated just in front of the coast of Venezuela. I haven’t tried any chocolate from this origin, so I’m not sure what to expect. let us find out together!
Bean: Trinitario
Origin: Trinidad & Tobago
Production: Chocolate Naive – Lithuania
Price: Unknown – sample
Color: Deep ebony brown.
Aroma: There is a hunch of leather and lots of spices, including just a smidge of fruit.
Taste: Sweet at the start, a bit spicy with a touch of tobacco and even some hay for a moment, before going to a sweet bread-like aroma. The texture is a bit grainy and a bit dry. This isn’t a bad thing to me, as there is no excess cacao-butter feeling to it. Next come subtle yellow fruit tones to mind – delicate and illusive, difficult to specify the exact fruits. Even a hint of vanilla twirls around. The melt is pretty quick but leaves a really satisfying chocolate aroma in the mouth. The aftertaste stays in line with the aromas detected before, although it seems short-lived.
Rather enjoyable, though it could do with a longer melt. It is gone to soon! Fresh and Light on the palate and no trace of bitterness, it is a morning chocolate to me. Balanced and satisfying, it offers everything a good bar should provide.
