{"id":13972,"date":"2019-10-16T17:01:47","date_gmt":"2019-10-17T00:01:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/?p=13972"},"modified":"2024-11-30T15:37:30","modified_gmt":"2024-11-30T23:37:30","slug":"so-whats-new-sonoma-chocolatiers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/local-chocolate\/so-whats-new-sonoma-chocolatiers\/","title":{"rendered":"So what\u2019s new, Sonoma Chocolatiers?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Sonoma
One of the offerings in Sonoma Chocolatiers\u2019 case was the sweetly spicy Spiced Island Caramel<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We don\u2019t usually visit one chocolatier 2x in a year, but we made an exception for Sonoma Chocolatiers<\/strong><\/a> for 2 reasons: 1, we happened to be in the area twice within a few months; and 2, they have a constantly changing variety of truffles and caramels.<\/p>\n

We serendipitously visited in May<\/a>, and discovered that they have over 130 flavors but not all at the same time. So since we were doing a wine country chocolateering adventure in July, we wanted to re-visit Sonoma Chocolatiers to see what new flavors they had to offer. They did not disappoint.<\/p>\n

On this trip they had approximately 25 flavors to choose from, about the same as they had in the case last time. And as before, all the chocolates were dark chocolates because that is all Sonoma Chocolatiers makes.<\/p>\n

Plenty of familiar faces<\/h2>\n

Some flavors were the same, such as PB & Heaven, Salted Caramel, Devout, Cinnamon Rose Caramel,\u00a0Brown Sugar Rum Caramel, Hibiscus Caramel, Indian Coconut, Curry, Lavender Caramel, and vegan choices Balsamic Olive Oil and Lemon Olive Oil.\u00a0But that meant over half were new to us.<\/p>\n

\"California
The still mysterious California Coastal<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Such as the\u00a0California Coastal piece, which the chocolatier said contained herbs from coast, but that was as much as she would describe because the actual ingredient list was \u201csecret.\u201d Intrigued, we had to get one to try. But even after trying it, I still don\u2019t know what\u2019s in it. It started fruity, then got weird, and ended a little acerbic. If I get a chance, I\u2019ll try it again to better describe the experience.<\/p>\n

We also got to meet Sonoma Chocolatiers founding chocolatiers, David & Susan Gambill, on this trip, and had a nice chat and got recommendations while filling a 16-piece box of mostly new pieces. They started Sonoma Chocolatiers in 2008, but David already had a couple of decades of making chocolates for fun before that, and it shows in the conversation. I don\u2019t think you can stump him with any chocolate question you might have.<\/p>\n

Vegan options<\/h2>\n

Healthy chocolate is a big part of the Sonoma Chocolatiers\u2019 mission, so in addition to good-for-your-heart dark chocolate, they also offer a few dairy free, vegan truffles made with olive oil. \u00a0We got 2 of them: The\u00a0Lemon Olive Oil had a good lemon scent and tasted lemony. The ganache was very smooth with a slightly powdery finish. It didn\u2019t have that slippery feeling like other olive oil chocolates I\u2019ve had. Similarly, there is no olive oil taste. I guess the dark chocolate masks it, but with most olive oil chocolate I have had, the slippery texture the oil adds is the appeal, not the taste.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Orange Olive Oil piece had a lighter color ganache (maybe so as not to overpower the orange flavor?). Like the Lemon Olive Oil, it tasted distinctly of its citrus flavor, and was very smooth but not olive oil slippery. These are nice pieces, especially if you can\u2019t eat dairy for health or other reasons.<\/p>\n

Personal favs<\/h2>\n
\"Mojito
I loved both the look and taste of SC\u2019s Mojito<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Three pieces in this round I loved were the Mojito, the Tequila Lime, and Spice Islands Caramel. The Mojito looked like my fav from last time, the Earl Grey Orange Absinthe<\/a>, with its crystalized lime peel peeking out of cracks of the same leaf-shaped shell. It was assertively mojito: It smelled & tasted strongly of lime first, and was crunchy with lime peel. Like a mojito, the combo of lime and mint seemed a little strange, but the flavors balanced, and it was refreshing.<\/p>\n

\"Tequila
The Tequila Lime shell seemed positively subdued, but everything else about it was supremely confident<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Tequila Lime was way more subdued looking \u2014 just a simple square with cracked salt sprinkled over it \u2014 but it was just as flavorful. It smelled boozy, and the first taste was salt, but that faded quickly, replaced by the light lime playing against the chocolate. The lime\/chocolate combo lingered afterwards.<\/p>\n

The Spice Islands Caramel had a taste somewhere between pumpkin pie spice and apple pie spice. The top note was very cinnamony, and the caramel was grainy, which seemed evocative of pie filling.<\/p>\n

Another grainy caramel I liked was the Ginger Cardamom Caramel. It was a dark, soft caramel, with hot ginger the first taste, tempered later by cardamom.<\/p>\n

The Spicy Almond Caramel was not exactly grainy; it had more of a finely chopped almonds texture. In fact, I didn\u2019t really taste almond so much as felt it in this piece. This piece was more about the dark chocolate with a little heat that came up slowly and lingered.<\/p>\n

We tried a couple of floral pieces this time too. The Lavender Caramel was a smooth caramel with lavender buds decorating the top of the piece. It had a strong lavender flavor from start to finish, which danced on the edge of soapiness, but ultimately was balanced by the dark chocolate shell and caramel.<\/p>\n

The other floral we tried, Jasmine Green Tea, was only mildly floral at the end and as more of an aftertaste. I\u2019ve found this to be true a lot of times with jasmine tea flavored chocolate. I think the dark chocolate overpowered the light floral tea flavor.<\/p>\n

That was weird<\/h2>\n
\"Mint
Mint Honey Sesame Seed Caramel had a surprise coating of sesame seeds underneath<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

With so many potential flavors, there had to be one I did not like at all. That was the Mint Honey Sesame Seed Caramel. I can\u2019t describe it beyond very weird and peppermint heavy. One of my fellow tasters described it as \u201cthe ghost of Christmas past.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Toasted
The shaggy shell of SC\u2019s Toasted Coconut<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There were a few more fun pieces for me. Two were coconut based. The Toasted Coconut had a shaggy coating of toasted coconut bits, plus a chewy ganache full of more coconut, but the coconut texture and flavor didn\u2019t overwhelm the chocolate. The piece had a good balance, and was very chocolatey and coconutty.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0Almond Coconut had a dark ganache flavored with coconut and some liqueur I couldn\u2019t place, plus a whole almond on top. It was like an adult version of Almond Joy. It wasn\u2019t labeled vegan, but seems like they could make it vegan since a lot of chocolatiers are using coconut products in their confections to substitute for dairy.<\/p>\n

\"Drambuie\"
Drambuie\u2019s decoration reminded me of Hostess cupcakes<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Beyond cute<\/h2>\n

The other fun piece for me was the Drambuie, maybe because I\u2019ve never had Drambuie before. It had a nice boozy smell, and was sweet and savory, with maybe a touch of smoke.<\/p>\n

While you never know what selection will be available, which is part of the charm,\u00a0Sonoma Chocolatiers\u2019<\/strong> chocolates are available at their Sebastopol store and\u00a0online<\/a>. They also have some of their greatest hits, such as the PB & Heaven, salted caramels, and lavender caramels, at Oliver\u2019s Market<\/a>, a Sonoma County supermarket chain.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A rotating case of 130 flavors means every time there\u2019s something to discover<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":14174,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,884],"tags":[1092,1065,121],"class_list":["post-13972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-chocolate","category-north-bay","tag-olivers-market","tag-sonoma-chocolatiers","tag-vegan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13972","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13972"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13972\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44953,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13972\/revisions\/44953"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13972"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13972"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chocolatebythebay.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13972"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}