This, my friends, is the reigning champion of white chocolate in the entire world. Bar none.  Pun intended.

‘Icoa’ by El Rey.  (Here I go making chocolate sound like fine perfume again…)

Voted the best plain/origin white chocolate bar five times in a row by the International Chocolate Awards and very recently listed as one of the best white chocolates by Saveur, it ended up being a real treat to have this bar in my possession.

Obtaining it wasn’t the piece of cake I thought it was going to be.  Chocolates El Rey is local.  Pop into any large bodegon and there El Rey is.  Which is technically true.  That is, if you’re looking for 41% Caoba.  Or 58.5% Bucare.  Or 61% “Mijao, 70% Gran Saman, or 73.5% Apamate.  (I kid you not with the extra five tenths of a percent. I’m not making them up.)

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Yes, this is still a site wholly dedicated to chocolate.  And no, I haven’t temporarily gone insane and donned wading boots and gotten myself a panning bowl and taken a leave of absence to visit California or the Yukon.  (And, yes, I know I have a very romantic and antiquated view of where actual gold comes from now and how to go about finding it.  I plead the 5th on how many novels I’ve read that were set in the 1800s.)  But if you’re curious about how to strike gold in 2016 when it comes to fine chocolate, look no further than this:

How To Strike Gold in 2016 - Amano Raspberry Rose Dark Chocolate Still Life Photo
This beauty is Amano Raspberry Rose Dark Chocolate.  But with a predominately pink-and-white wrapper and an ingredient list that doesn’t contain any edible gold leaf, you may be wondering, “Where does the gold come in?”

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