Chocolate pairings are spreading, but recently, Charles Chocolates, Chocolatea, Keiko Tea, Torn Ranch and The Tea Room all have upped the craze with chocolates that include tea.
Joan Freeman, Chocolatea’s owner and chef, sometimes uses tea as a “functional ingredient,” but feels the most successful tea chocolates taste like “true tea in true chocolate.”
She added that teas with strong flavors are easier to blend. This may be because, as Yu put it, chocolate is “overpowering” and masks subtler flavors.
Yu partnered with Chuck Seigel, owner of Charles Chocolates, to make tea truffles that go beyond Earl Grey. Seigel said, “The notes in the chocolates match the notes in the teas, such as robust chocolate with charcoal-fired oolong.”
Yu added that, when it comes to discerning tea and chocolate tastes, “Customers really get it.”
This was an incredibly fun and challenging article to write. It was fun because I got to try some great sweets and learn some amazing things, but challenging because I was trying to compress 5000 words of notes into a 750-word article! You can read the final result, Sugar on the Side, on World Tea News. I'll be posting more about some of the amazing tea sweets I got to try soon. Yum!
Tea sweets from Amai in NYC
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