DARS Chocolate – Premium Pistachio and Cranberry

While I wouldn’t say DARS is bad, I also wouldn’t consider it a premium chocolate under normal circumstances. This one makes it clear it’s supposed to be premium though. I’m not sure if they mean the bar is premium, or the pistachios are premium. Or maybe it’s the cranberries?

Pandars is strewn about the packaging, and I’m not enough of a DARS fan to know what it is but I’d assume its some marketing or seasonal thing they’re trying to promote. It’s cute, but I don’t get the associate with pistachios or cranberries. Kudos to their art department though. I guess Pandas and DARS share three letters so naturally they made the stretch of an association. I’m sure it caught on in some people’s minds, otherwise they wouldn’t be doing it so often.

The pieces are solid as is usual for DARS, and they smell very nutty. Nutty and a hint of berry, very faint though and I wouldn’t be able to guess cranberry. Much like the flavour, it’s distinctly nutty, and the cranberry is barely noticeable. In fact, if you took the cranberry out, I wouldn’t know the difference. Well, maybe a slight texture difference. But there’s a good chance you might think it’s just a stale nut as well. All in all it’s sort of disappointing on the flavour side, but not at all unexpected. In fact, pistachio itself is a fairly mild flavour so I’m kind of impressed they managed to get the nut flavours across so clearly and distinctly.

The chocolate is fairly soft, and the pistachio and cookie go together quite well to provide a crunchy but still soft chewing experience. The cranberries are there because you can get that chewy dried berry texture, but whether it adds much is debatable. Much like in the flavour department, the pistachio is actually quite impressive in comparison, but the cranberries are a bit of a letdown.

I feel like I’m pretty lenient and open minded when it comes to snacks, to the point where some may confuse it for low standards. That’s not actually the case, and I consider myself more of a novelty value shopper – if it’s got novelty value I give it points for that, but I generally try to go for what I consider quality or value for a decent price. These were not cheap, and for the same price I could have easily gotten a nice Ritter Sport bar which would have been quite satisfying and probably more generous on the nuts.

All that to say, it’s hard even for me to recommend these. They do an interesting take on pistachio in chocolate, but the cranberries are basically an afterthought given they don’t contribute much to texture or taste.