Impact
Right down the road from Graceland & Sun Recording Studios in Memphis sits a little chicken shack called Uncle Lou’s. No chicken little though, Uncle Lou features a stealthy secret sauce called Corruption - anyone clean who comes in for but a bite leaves corrupted... shady operators willing to do whatever for more. His stuff just has that effect on people.
Seems Lou could have a new partner in crime next door in neighboring Missouri to run some interstate commerce across state lines: ex-defense attorney Shawn Askinosie. Cacáo beans that Philippine monkeys might’ve discarded, goat’s milk straight from the barnyard, salt scrapped off the ocean's floor & an extra dab of cocoa butta, all conspire to make this bar filthy-corrupt. Thoroughly adulterates an otherwise perfectly good chocolate.
Put this dynamic duo & their leering grins together – just 2 everyday Joes - for some deep-fried chicken-molé.
Seems Lou could have a new partner in crime next door in neighboring Missouri to run some interstate commerce across state lines: ex-defense attorney Shawn Askinosie. Cacáo beans that Philippine monkeys might’ve discarded, goat’s milk straight from the barnyard, salt scrapped off the ocean's floor & an extra dab of cocoa butta, all conspire to make this bar filthy-corrupt. Thoroughly adulterates an otherwise perfectly good chocolate.
Put this dynamic duo & their leering grins together – just 2 everyday Joes - for some deep-fried chicken-molé.
Appearance 4.4 / 5
brand-inside-a-brand wrapper includes customer-facing mug-shot of lead farmer/accomplice Peter V. Cruz, shirt unbottoned, wide-open & way down on his plantation hideway
brand-inside-a-brand wrapper includes customer-facing mug-shot of lead farmer/accomplice Peter V. Cruz, shirt unbottoned, wide-open & way down on his plantation hideway
| Color: | medium buff w/ just a drop of pigment along the purple-red-orange spectrum |
| Surface: | overall solid; surface scratch here ‘n there; micro back-side craters |
| Temper: | thin polish coat |
| Snap: | tinny but w/ reverb; gently sanded/porous edge |
Aroma 8.8 / 10
accident-in-the-making? / destined-for-disaster?: spanking new pleather car seats (leather, plastic, vinyl) -> hyacinth (incl biscuit part) the hanging Febreze™ air freshner on the rear-view mirror -> that cinnabon-bon found in Davao 77 hovers over the dashboard -> drives smack toward an oak tree
Mouthfeel 11.9 / 15
| Texture: | powder & stick hydrate into a round rubber ball... |
| Melt: | ... the harder the chew, the higher the rise |
Flavor 41.7 / 50
gods of destiny barely manage to avert total disaster: beautiful cinnabon-bon -> caramel twisting into mocha toffee -> salt & milk come fore -> goat walks into a Milk Spud -> whipsaws between chicory & chalk -> mineral bites (silica & sodium crystals) -> slender bitter pili nut kernels -> thickens toward black mission fig with slight goat underfoot -> effectuates caca de gato (mabolo aka ‘velvet apple’ – flesh fruit tasting of cream cheese & cat feces)
Quality 15.8 / 20
As ever, Askinosie thinks outside the wrapper. Steep as far as most Dark-Milks go at 62% + his penchant for mass-over-fat adds more heft though core cocoa flavor submerged in the Rime of the Ancient Mariner (“water, water everywhere & not a drop to drink”) by substituting chocolate for water. Suffers from the same ailments as its non-milk relative (Davao 77): struggling for balance at the mid-palate & a deteriorating finish.
Prior to that, he’s in the zone of zones on this one, a recipe as special as a Zen Master’s koan. Who day / how dat? Don’t ask / don’t tell still holds in the cocoa barracks. Just excellent thick-brooding mocha-toffee. Davao cacáo nicely mediates the goat for the most part; very little tang or heavy hoof that tramples all over this bar-smith’s other DM – a 52% from Xoconochco. Both the 10% differential in cacáo-content + the origin set a better tone.
ING: cocoa mass, sugar, goat’s milk pwdr, cacáo butter, sea salt
Reviewed Autumn 2009
Prior to that, he’s in the zone of zones on this one, a recipe as special as a Zen Master’s koan. Who day / how dat? Don’t ask / don’t tell still holds in the cocoa barracks. Just excellent thick-brooding mocha-toffee. Davao cacáo nicely mediates the goat for the most part; very little tang or heavy hoof that tramples all over this bar-smith’s other DM – a 52% from Xoconochco. Both the 10% differential in cacáo-content + the origin set a better tone.
ING: cocoa mass, sugar, goat’s milk pwdr, cacáo butter, sea salt
Reviewed Autumn 2009