Alter Eco – Mint Blackout

I discovered Alter Eco not too long ago, and I found their products to be agreeable. Not just agreeable but enjoyable, so much so that I decided to go all in on them. I’ve been mostly experimenting with their darker variety chocolates, which they have impressed me with so far, so I figured why not continue pushing my luck and seeing where it takes me.

Anyone who knows me probably already knows my love for chocolate mint. As polarizing as that flavour apparently is, I love it. Even sometimes the ones that taste like toothpaste (looking at you Oreo). The combination of a nice dark chocolate and minty freshness just brings comfort to my soul, and a minty tingle to my palate.

I’ve said before that I tend to prefer a bar around 55% to 70% for the purpose of snacking, but because this isn’t just the chocolate, I can go a bit higher. Let’s take a ride on the dark side.

This particular bar is a hefty 90% cacao. There’s also the addition of little peppermint crunch pieces, which are made from can sugar, peppermint oil and cocoa powder. Given that it’s 90%, the flavour is very much a rich dark chocolate flavour, which is very earthy, a little smoky and a little astringent. It’s the kind where after a few pieces it leaves your mouth feeling a bit chalky from eating a few pieces. The peppermint is present the whole ride, but it sits quietly in the back, not trying to distract or detract from the star which is the 90% chocolate. It’s a bigger fella though, so it’s still always there in the back, giving a nice refreshing peppermint sensation on the tongue.

The texture is interesting and a bit unexpected. The peppermint crunch pieces are very well mixed and integrated into the chocolate, so every bite has a bit of that crunch. The chocolate itself is what you would expect from a high percentage bar, and it doesn’t have much dairy or creamy melt to it. Rather, it’s more of a snappy, brittle bar and I find the temptation to munch and chew on these, probably because of the peppermint bits.

As expected, a regular, no frills 90% bar is enjoyable on it’s own, but not something I would opt for too often. But throw some peppermint pieces in their to add some texture and that’s a recipe for a bar that I can get behind often enough for it to be a problem to my wallet and weight. I enjoyed this bar a lot, and I would consider doing a repeat of it.