Impact
The Merry Mex hooks up with Rodrigo y Gabriela in this ‘Buster Voodoo’ jam. The only problem: the fretboard proves too short & they run out of notes. Plus the footpedals short-circuit. Oh no... don’t matter, they still rock ‘em out at force-level flavors.
Appearance 3.4 / 5
looks like hell... beautiful hell
looks like hell... beautiful hell
| Color: | dusk brown |
| Surface: | chipped / flaked up front; pelted & welted w/ nibs out back |
| Temper: | dust-flat |
| Snap: | creepy |
Aroma 8.9 / 10
stir-crazy: sticky cacáo stuck in rubber & fruit sap oozing bubble-yum & red licorice tread -> whips up cotton candy fumigating guajillo pepper + cinnamon stick -> all over a studied fraction of roasted wood chips; exceptional
Mouthfeel 12.1 / 15
| Texture: | frazzled & gummy |
| Melt: | liquifies by the end |
Flavor 44.9 / 50
pure piloncillo / sugar-sweet pop goes Skittles™ over the rainbow w/ tart Sunburst fruits of juju bean texture (litchi, dried raspberries, tamarind, moraberry, guava, mango, soursop... & raisins too) bleeding all over a root beer-inflected cocoa -> Nibs grind into cotton candy, congeal into some candy corn -> organ pipe cactus (aka ool / pitahaya dulce) -> nopales -> cherimoya -> supreme banana-foster stemwinder
Quality 17.8 / 20
Triple-tiered sensation (cocoa - nibs - cacáo pulp; add sugar for a Chocolate Quad). Madre husbanding the elements, then mothering them into a cross between Corallo’s Grand Kru (that distilled with brandied cacáo pulp) & Cocoa Puro’s Kaka’wa Beans (covered in multi-layers of chocolate’s differing formats).
Little top heavy (a Madre preference for pronounced flavorings) as pulp’s acids -- a prominent agent in developing flavor precursors during the fermentation stage -- exert a dominant influence, putting a chokehold on the cocoa & the Nibs, both of otherwise good chocolate instincts, as well as gums up the mouthfeel. A slightly higher base couverture content (maybe 75% - 80%, plus a few more degrees on the roast) would vault this into a more balanced contention for higher honors. Ditto the conche; handled here quite lightly as demo’d in that segregated layers hardly integrate, tasted right off in that pure sugar opening.
Still, Madre flavors up more than just a novel compound; a winsome one too.
ING: cocoa mass, sugar, cacao butter, cacáo pulp, Nibs, vanilla, lecithin
Reviewed October 5, 2010
Little top heavy (a Madre preference for pronounced flavorings) as pulp’s acids -- a prominent agent in developing flavor precursors during the fermentation stage -- exert a dominant influence, putting a chokehold on the cocoa & the Nibs, both of otherwise good chocolate instincts, as well as gums up the mouthfeel. A slightly higher base couverture content (maybe 75% - 80%, plus a few more degrees on the roast) would vault this into a more balanced contention for higher honors. Ditto the conche; handled here quite lightly as demo’d in that segregated layers hardly integrate, tasted right off in that pure sugar opening.
Still, Madre flavors up more than just a novel compound; a winsome one too.
ING: cocoa mass, sugar, cacao butter, cacáo pulp, Nibs, vanilla, lecithin
Reviewed October 5, 2010