Bespoke
Impact
‘Bespoke’ in places like London -- over there’s the home of English -- means ‘tailor-made’.
Back in Manhattan, the city had to carve out an alley off 1st Street called Extra Place for retailing this because it’s extracalifragilisticexpialidelicious. And NYC could be tasting a brand new queen of the chocolate scene. Kee Tong is great; Rachel Zoe Insler may be even greater. As Rod Stewart says, “ya always got to be lookin’ over your shoulder”. He should know; just ask Mick Jagger who peered over his to usually notice Rod.
This neuroscience major brings cognitive awareness, combined with deft sensory touch to re-engineer textures & flavors that feel classically yet radically customized.
Bespoke, as in thus spoke Rachelthustra.
Back in Manhattan, the city had to carve out an alley off 1st Street called Extra Place for retailing this because it’s extracalifragilisticexpialidelicious. And NYC could be tasting a brand new queen of the chocolate scene. Kee Tong is great; Rachel Zoe Insler may be even greater. As Rod Stewart says, “ya always got to be lookin’ over your shoulder”. He should know; just ask Mick Jagger who peered over his to usually notice Rod.
This neuroscience major brings cognitive awareness, combined with deft sensory touch to re-engineer textures & flavors that feel classically yet radically customized.
Bespoke, as in thus spoke Rachelthustra.
Presentation 4.2 / 5
no-frills utilitarian; ditto the generally hand-rolled lumpen truffle shapes
Aromas 4.6 / 5
dusted, dark, & dense equal daunting (heavily ponderous)
Textures/Melt 9.5 / 10
| Shells: | snap thin as rice paper but actually thicker than that |
| Centers: | hi-cream silk-allure, wisps of plein-air... that outdoor art which often focused on cloud studies (Jean-Michel Cels, John Constable, or Pierre-Henri de Valenciennes) |
Flavor 45.8 / 50
serious fun; flavors well-expressed in round cream base to link up & harmonize; so much cream should smother chocolate & there is bitterness-supression but nice dry tannins manage to punch thru, a tribute to both couverture selection & manner of deployment/pairing (& any mistakes mainly couverture-induced)
Quality 27.1 / 30
Luxotic. Protégé of Keith Hurdman (ex-Melt in UK) displaying signs that the pod falls close to the tree. Very C-spot ready... making the jump from academia, as it were, to the pros in a single bound. Lots of game, charisma, & polish.
Selections
Single-Estate - classic-looking dirt-ball; a misnomer though as this uses Santander’s 70% which pulls cacáo from more than one plantation but still a pretty true exposé of that bar done up in ganache; super cream fill that further softens the Santander pastels, especially the hibiscus/cherry components w/ a wink toward marshmallow; a good crowd-getter... tannic enough to draw the darksider acolytes yet on this side of the sweet-light to attract novitiates
South Hampton - bounce & gravitas / power & finesse... apricot bleeding thru the wall, quickly meets up w/ streamline Black Ceylon tea to race across cream framed in a bouyant Valrhona couverture; instant lotto jackpot
Strawberry Balsamic- brash & imbalanced; a triple play of the berry, the grape, & the seed that converge on one another & stack nearly in unison w/ too little off-set as even the couverture (possibly Valrhona’s Caraïbe) follows in too close an alignment
Cognac - whether Grande or Petite champagne grapes, this is all massive-nitro; cream-collapse around fruit shards (truffle shell fragments); initial bright red scope, then concentrated dark-mellowing sweet spot (alcohol interacting w/ cocoa – in all likelihood Araguani), & finally stringent tannin passage; phenomenal equilibrium of great holding power & poise
French Milk - instant caramel roll waxes out at the back thanks to Jivara Lait (signaling once more that Valrhona has a hard time getting its milk on) then saves itself w/ a chemical isomalt-like hit
Pretzel-covered Sea-Salted Caramel - a mouthful in name & game; sounds like throwing in the kitchen sink, cupboards, & tool box because... well, it does; hand-built then all mashed up by biting into a crunchy-munchy gooey-oozy-good salted-chocolate subway & the conductor suffers an accident & has to relieve himself by getting off at the last station that was just past... “watch the closing doors”... meanwhile this heads on for a train-wreck – prepare for impact
Reviewed February 2010
South Hampton - bounce & gravitas / power & finesse... apricot bleeding thru the wall, quickly meets up w/ streamline Black Ceylon tea to race across cream framed in a bouyant Valrhona couverture; instant lotto jackpot
Strawberry Balsamic- brash & imbalanced; a triple play of the berry, the grape, & the seed that converge on one another & stack nearly in unison w/ too little off-set as even the couverture (possibly Valrhona’s Caraïbe) follows in too close an alignment
Cognac - whether Grande or Petite champagne grapes, this is all massive-nitro; cream-collapse around fruit shards (truffle shell fragments); initial bright red scope, then concentrated dark-mellowing sweet spot (alcohol interacting w/ cocoa – in all likelihood Araguani), & finally stringent tannin passage; phenomenal equilibrium of great holding power & poise
French Milk - instant caramel roll waxes out at the back thanks to Jivara Lait (signaling once more that Valrhona has a hard time getting its milk on) then saves itself w/ a chemical isomalt-like hit
Pretzel-covered Sea-Salted Caramel - a mouthful in name & game; sounds like throwing in the kitchen sink, cupboards, & tool box because... well, it does; hand-built then all mashed up by biting into a crunchy-munchy gooey-oozy-good salted-chocolate subway & the conductor suffers an accident & has to relieve himself by getting off at the last station that was just past... “watch the closing doors”... meanwhile this heads on for a train-wreck – prepare for impact
Reviewed February 2010