Gin and Tonic

Gin and Tonic was researched and developed especially for the 2018 Christmas Boxes, at the request of me (Laura!) I have really got into gin this last year and it is such a zeitgeist beverage these days it seemed illogical not to feature it in this year’s boxes. Richard loves a challenge but this one, at times, was a little testing. You’re dealing with some very delicate flavour profiles here and there were many fails along the way. The ganache was being flavoured with all the herbs and berries to give the botanical notes of gin, but Richard felt something was still missing.

After 2 weeks of R&D it HAPPENED, and we did a happy dance! He eventually decided to make a sugar syrup using tonic water and lemon which helped liven up the delicate botanicals on the palate, so the layers of flavour in the ganache became more pronounced. We believe you can taste all the botanical notes: juniper, all spice, coriander, camomile and bay. We used all real herbs and spices to infuse the chocolate, so it doesn’t have an artificial taste, as some do. The botanicals are left lingering on the palate after the hit of tonic and lemon has released them from their chocolate housing.

Richard says even though he is not a gin drinker, he is very pleased with this one. He dipped this one in white chocolate as the juniper berry can be quite bitter so the white chocolate offsets this and adds creaminess. He did not want it to taste medicinal as some do. It’s all about the balance.

This story was first published on our Facebook page in 2018 as part of our ‘The 12 Days of Chocolate’ flavour story series. But I think the story of flavour creation is interesting to read all year round – so they are finding a second home on our new blog and website!