70% - 80% - 90%: but what are we talking about?
Of course, we're talking about the cocoa percentage in your chocolate bar.
Or rather, cocoa solids. Whether it's cocoa beans, paste, or added cocoa butter. It's generally accepted that a cocoa bean contains approximately 50% dry matter and 50% naturally occurring fat, which is cocoa butter (not to be confused with added cocoa butter).
This famous "added butter" is, in 99.9% of cases, deodorized. Therefore, only the cocoa bean gives its flavor to chocolate. This is not insignificant in a recipe.
At La Manu, we press our cocoa liquor to produce our own original, natural, and non-deodorized added butter (except for our milk chocolate), as well as our natural, non-alkalized cocoa powder. The former enhances the taste of our bars, while the latter gives our chocolate spread its unique character. Enjoy its beautiful golden hue!
Let's recall the regulations: to be classified as "dark chocolate," a product must have a cocoa dry matter content greater than 43%, of which at least 26% is cocoa butter.
Let's take the example of a 70% dark chocolate.
70% = 65% (cocoa paste or beans) + 5% added cocoa butter
But also:
70% = 43% (cocoa paste or beans) + 27% added cocoa butter
And therein lies the trick: depending on the recipes, the chocolate maker will add more or less deodorized cocoa butter to gain fluidity, but also productivity and profitability.
In our second case, we are consuming 30% sugar (100-70), 27% added fat (deodorized cocoa butter), and 21.5% (43/2) natural fat (cocoa butter included in the paste, which has flavor).
So, 30% sugar and 48.5% fat.
Cocoa butter, the fat, is good: it gives creaminess, fluidity, and coats the mouth. Chocolate is easier to work with.
But be careful not to have too much.
So, beware of the label!