Ritter Sport – Dark Whole Hazelnuts
A while back I reviewed the White Whole Hazelnuts flavour of Ritter Sport, and found myself enjoying it quite a bit despite not liking white chocolate in general. I figured if white chocolate and hazelnuts is a winner, surely dark chocolate and hazelnuts must be even better. My logic is infallible…right?! It usually works out in my favour. There’s only a few scenarios where the marriage of two things doesn’t equal greatness. Where the sum is greater than the parts. Like pickles and peanut butters. Just……don’t.
As with all varieties of Ritter Sport, these things come in a very simple package, and have the standard 16 pieces in a nice four by four grid. It may not be a big deal for some people, but consistency across their entire product line and over so many varieties is quite impressive to me. I respect being able to adhere to something like that so vehemently. It’s also why I keep coming back. To be able to keep something so consistent, and yet be so different on the inside. A wise man once told me that restrictions and limitations breed creativity in design. Looking at Ritter Sport as a whole, I would have to agree.
The dark chocolate on this bar smells like the semi-sweet kind, not too dark, not too sugary. It’s very much a snacking dark chocolate, which works well with hazelnuts, I feel. You don’t want anything that would be too bitter or chalky to snack on. The smell of hazelnuts is unmistakable. From the looks of it, it’s essentially a dark chocolate version of the white chocolate hazelnut bar. Not sure anyone was expecting otherwise, but there it is.
As far as flavour goes, this falls squarely in the territory of semi-sweet chocolate. I’d say it’s somewhere in the range of 50% to 60%; it’s dark enough that it’s got only a very slight bitter chocolate taste to it, but not dark enough that it has any smoky taste to it, or leaves a bitter feeling in your mouth. It’s still sweet, but not like milk chocolate, and is overall very pleasant. Along with the hazelnuts, the flavour is mild enough that you could probably finish the bar in one sitting if you’re not careful. Not so with the white chocolate one, as that one is sweeter and you might start feeling sick after half a bar.
The texture of this bar is essentially identical to the white chocolate variety. Really the only difference is the chocolate is ever so slightly more brittle, but again I’m guessing it’s due to lower sugar and fat to chocolate ratio. It’s still very easy to snack on, and still has a great mouth feel to it. While it isn’t as soft or melty as the white chocolate, this one holds together better, but not enough to require much effort to bite into or bite apart. The crunch from the hazelnuts is delightful, and delivers a nice roasted nutty texture with it. Something I noticed is the absence of the crisped rice. While the white chocolate bar had some to give it a little more pop and texture, it’s not in this dark chocolate bar. I can only assume the flavour profile wouldn’t have gone well with the texture, and the crisped rice lends itself better when the chocolate is sweeter and softer. Maybe it helps to cut down that fatty feeling that white chocolate sometimes leaves in your mouth. I think that’s fine, as the chocolate and hazelnut duo works just find. No third required for this tango.
This bar is also part of their standard line up, so you shouldn’t have any trouble finding this. It’s basically everywhere that sells Ritter Sport chocolate bars. Which is a good and bad thing. Good because it means you can get a fix pretty conveniently, but bad because you can get a fix a little too conveniently. I’d recommend going out and grabbing one, but I also don’t want to be blamed for getting people hooked on this either. Proceed with caution.
