Chocolate review: Hershey's Cacao Reserve: Milk Chocolate
I was a little surprised to see Hershey trying to break into the premium chocolate market, but I figured that it was worth a try...
I bought a single-serving pack (36g) of their 35% milk chocolate, because... well, you might as well start with the basics, and I generally prefer milk chocolate to dark. The ingredients are: sugar; cocoa butter; milk; chocolate; milk fat; organic soy lecithin, vanilla beans. Mostly good, but I'm not sure why chocolate needs to be on there - do they buy in a couverture, and mix it with their own chocolate? Also, if they use actual vanilla from vanilla beans (instead of artificial vanillin, or vanillin from wood pulp), then this is a good thing, but I'm not sure that the difference is anywhere near as noticeable as it in, for example, ice cream, and the money could probably have been better spent elsewhere.
The mouth feel is not bad. It doesn't have the gritty texture of normal Hersey's, which is enough to move it above "terrible". It doesn't melt in the mouth as smoothly or as evenly as I'd expect for premium chocolate.
The taste is nothing special. I mean, it's chocolatey, in a bland way, but there's nothing special there. A little overly sweet, probably because sugar is so high on the ingredient list, but not unpleasantly so. I'd imagine that the 65% dark chocolate is less sweet, but I don't think I'm going to find out.
The sweetness lingers into the aftertaste, and it's about the only thing that does. There's a bitterness that probably comes from the lecithin, because it's not a cocoa bitterness. Again, not unpleasant, but not what I'd expect from any chocolate that considers itself "high quality".
Overall, I think it's about average, maybe a little below average. Which makes it rather better than normal Hershey's, but nowhere near living up to the way it's being marketed. Dove, for example, is a better chocolate with far less pretension. And, I think, less cost.
While it's very good by Hershey's standards, it's by no means a high-end chocolate. If it was being marketed as a middle-of-the-road chocolate, I'd have no problem with it, but as a gourmet's chocolate? Absolutely not worth it.
I bought a single-serving pack (36g) of their 35% milk chocolate, because... well, you might as well start with the basics, and I generally prefer milk chocolate to dark. The ingredients are: sugar; cocoa butter; milk; chocolate; milk fat; organic soy lecithin, vanilla beans. Mostly good, but I'm not sure why chocolate needs to be on there - do they buy in a couverture, and mix it with their own chocolate? Also, if they use actual vanilla from vanilla beans (instead of artificial vanillin, or vanillin from wood pulp), then this is a good thing, but I'm not sure that the difference is anywhere near as noticeable as it in, for example, ice cream, and the money could probably have been better spent elsewhere.
The mouth feel is not bad. It doesn't have the gritty texture of normal Hersey's, which is enough to move it above "terrible". It doesn't melt in the mouth as smoothly or as evenly as I'd expect for premium chocolate.
The taste is nothing special. I mean, it's chocolatey, in a bland way, but there's nothing special there. A little overly sweet, probably because sugar is so high on the ingredient list, but not unpleasantly so. I'd imagine that the 65% dark chocolate is less sweet, but I don't think I'm going to find out.
The sweetness lingers into the aftertaste, and it's about the only thing that does. There's a bitterness that probably comes from the lecithin, because it's not a cocoa bitterness. Again, not unpleasant, but not what I'd expect from any chocolate that considers itself "high quality".
Overall, I think it's about average, maybe a little below average. Which makes it rather better than normal Hershey's, but nowhere near living up to the way it's being marketed. Dove, for example, is a better chocolate with far less pretension. And, I think, less cost.
While it's very good by Hershey's standards, it's by no means a high-end chocolate. If it was being marketed as a middle-of-the-road chocolate, I'd have no problem with it, but as a gourmet's chocolate? Absolutely not worth it.