Chubby Chipmunk
Impact
Family-style dining in the form of a truffle. From the territory of the Badlands comes some dead end chocolate gulch with mass appeal, including neon food coloring (red chocolate shavings??). The proprietess, Ms. Chip Tautkus, is the Calamity Jane of cacáo. Overpowering... combines shockingly loud flavor with sheer size that adds to the impact of being hit on the noggin with an iron skillet. Overall syrupy-sweet sensibility geared towards those raised on sugar-frosted cereal that turns milk blue. Otherwise, rather non-descript, straight-forward flavors burst out then quickly fade. The pattern: a chocolate-teaser barely strips before infusions knock your socks off & your eyeballs out.
Presentation 3.6 / 5
huge pieces too large to navigate solo; evokes simply by looking at it; visually enticing w/ homey hand-dipped feel & sprinkled toppings further the main street FX
Aromas 2.7 / 5
artifice
Textures/Melt 8.7 / 10
| Shells: | medium thick |
| Centers: | very smooth, creamy silk; good technique |
Flavor 36.2 / 50
imbalanced; chocolate as a white or brown manila envelope - bland & flat; infusions strong, even jarring, cloyingly sweet - too much sugar usually an attempt to mask low quality couverture that lacks depth of flavor (in defiance of Guittard’s usual reputation)
Quality 21.1 / 30
Loud + large = quantity > quality
Selections
| Couverture: | Guittard; Valice |
Key Lime - White Chocolate coating, decorated in screeching green(!) chocolate shavings, filled w/ even brighter green(!!!), & stronger (s)lime flavored crème; blaring, vile, & tooth-achingly sweet
Deadwood Toffee – White shell w/ crushed toffee & Milk Choc drizzle on top, filled w/ thicker toffee & maple crème; sugar cardboard
Hot Mamma – heavily peppered Dark ganache coated in Dark Choc, accented w/ red chocolate shards; pepper heat virtually obliterates an already-vanishing chocolate
Milk Turtle – sugary sweet Milk-on-Milk w/ overwhelming chopped pecans that conceals almost all chocolate as butter toffee caramel blasts thru
Dark Coconut - best of the set; well-set coconut flavor against a Dark-on-Dark canvas
Hazelnut Toffee - is what it is: strong toffee & sugar crystals, neither of which completely detract from the ultra creamy, melt-in-your-mind ganache
Dark Signature – brushed in shimmering, iridescent glaze; bling is a good thing but if it does nothing for taste, it’s just a waste; crude, undeveloped, & 1 dimensional... the sugar dimension
Raspberry Cream - medicinal yet counter-indicated from what the doctor ordered; glaring & distinctly artificial
NY Cheesecake – White Choc ala vanilla cream-cheese frosting w/ a touch amaretto, topped by crushed graham crackers; captures that deli dessert-carousel essence
Double Chubby – Dark Choc rolled in mini Dark Choc chips filled w/ yet more Dark Choc ganache... & still little chocolate flavor... fades into light tobacco undertones
Maple Nut – maple-drenched White Chocolate; basically syrup & butter on something flat as an IHOP pancake
Moose – mild caramel; pleasant pap for teddy bear
Deadwood Toffee – White shell w/ crushed toffee & Milk Choc drizzle on top, filled w/ thicker toffee & maple crème; sugar cardboard
Hot Mamma – heavily peppered Dark ganache coated in Dark Choc, accented w/ red chocolate shards; pepper heat virtually obliterates an already-vanishing chocolate
Milk Turtle – sugary sweet Milk-on-Milk w/ overwhelming chopped pecans that conceals almost all chocolate as butter toffee caramel blasts thru
Dark Coconut - best of the set; well-set coconut flavor against a Dark-on-Dark canvas
Hazelnut Toffee - is what it is: strong toffee & sugar crystals, neither of which completely detract from the ultra creamy, melt-in-your-mind ganache
Dark Signature – brushed in shimmering, iridescent glaze; bling is a good thing but if it does nothing for taste, it’s just a waste; crude, undeveloped, & 1 dimensional... the sugar dimension
Raspberry Cream - medicinal yet counter-indicated from what the doctor ordered; glaring & distinctly artificial
NY Cheesecake – White Choc ala vanilla cream-cheese frosting w/ a touch amaretto, topped by crushed graham crackers; captures that deli dessert-carousel essence
Double Chubby – Dark Choc rolled in mini Dark Choc chips filled w/ yet more Dark Choc ganache... & still little chocolate flavor... fades into light tobacco undertones
Maple Nut – maple-drenched White Chocolate; basically syrup & butter on something flat as an IHOP pancake
Moose – mild caramel; pleasant pap for teddy bear