Amella’s cocoa butter caramels. From top: Black Forest Caramel, Carrot Cake Caramel and Passion Fruit Caramel. Photography by Hannah Kaminsky | THE NIBBLE.

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July 2009

Product Reviews / Main Nibbles / Candy

Amella Cocoa Butter Caramels

Page 2: Gourmet Caramel Flavors

This is Page 2 of a two-page article on gourmet caramels. Click on the black link below to visit Page 1.

• Page 1: Overview
• Page 2: Flavors of Amella Cocoa Butter Caramels
• Page 2: Buy Amella Cocoa Butter Caramels Online

Flavors of Amella Cocoa Butter Caramels

• Black Forest Caramel. One too many a dull supermarket Black Forest cake (learn about real Black Forest cake) had us eyeing this one somewhat warily—but we were pleasantly surprised by the subtle flavor of the chunks of Amarelle cherries, a type of cherry with pale red skin and clear juice that is often used in desserts because of its tartness. The other main component of the Black Forest caramel is, of course, chocolate. Amella uses 70% cacao dark chocolate in this caramel, which, combined with the cocoa butter, made for a chocolatey and slightly fudgy caramel that allowed us to see the light of what was once a dark view of Black Forest. The “icing” is white chocolate.
• Carrot Cake Caramel. We don’t know about you, but we hate it when we come across a carrot cake that’s overly spiced to the point where it doesn’t even taste like carrots. Well, we certainly didn’t have that problem with these carrot cake caramels, which contain real carrots and pecans that lend a chunky contrast against the smoothness of the cocoa butter caramel base. Replete with walnuts and cinnamon, this is just about the best carrot cake (O.K., carrot cake caramel) you’ll ever lay lips on. Topped with white chocolate to resemble the traditional cream cheese frosting, this caramel is adorable, and the most petit-four-like of the three varieties. Our only nit is that it could have benefited from even more pecans, and perhaps a touch less cinnamon. However, we predict that it will be a favorite among those who are carrot cake fans—now they can be carrot cake caramel fans, too.
  From bottom: Black Forest Caramel, Passion Fruit Caramel and Carrot Cake Caramel.
• Passion Fruit Caramel. We admit that we were slightly skeptical before tasting this flavor: How much can passion fruit and caramel really get along, after all? (We have never tasted the legendary Pierre Marcolini passion fruit caramel our editor pointed out to us, after reading our draft.) Yet the contrasting flavors manage to reconcile readily against the taste buds. While we can see the other two varieties becoming instant hits, we picture more of a slow but steady rise in popularity for the passion fruit caramels. Like a late bloomer, this one took a while to grow on us—but boy, did it grow on us. We like the tartness and unique flavor of the passion fruit, which might appear to counter everything that’s essentially caramel—the neutral, comforting flavors of vanilla, cream, sugar and unsalted butter seem like they could easily be upstaged by the punchy passion fruit, but the milk chocolate topping helps soften the bold passion fruit flavor. The use of real passion fruit makes this variety fruitier than any of the others; as a result, it displays a fresh, bright taste that’s less rich than the other two flavors of the triad.

Caramel lovers who want to see what a cocoa butter caramel tastes like will be richly rewarded with Amella’s imaginative flavors. There’s no way to choose—you simply have to try all three flavors—or all three pieces in the box.