It’s another 18 months away and “strictly top secret” but the new ruby chocolate is set to rock the chocolate world.
So says Leura chocolate maker Jodie Van Der Velden who was one of the first in Australia on Wednesday to experience the chocolate that is being talked about since it was revealed by Swiss chocolate maker Barry Callebaut last week.
“I was very fortunate to be one of the first in Australia to see what they have made out of the bean,” she told the Gazette.
“I’d beenat the Fine Food show in Sydney and as I was work closely with Callebaut, I was offered the opportunity to see and smell the new Ruby chocolate. This is the first sample in Australia, so it was very exciting.”
It’s the first new natural colour for chocolate since Nestle started making white chocolate more than 80 years ago.
The Ruby chocolate was created after more than ten years of testing.
“It’s a really exciting innovation. It’s the fourth type of chocolate – after milk, dark and white.
“It’s a very large and competitive industry and the first major innovation in such a long time, so the world’s gone crazy about it. But it’s very tight lipped and secret in terms of the recipe.”
Ms Van Der Velden said she is not sure what to mix with the product when it hits her shelves in 2019, or whether it will be strong enough to stand on its own.
“My understanding is it may not even be going to taste like chocolate as we know it, it’s not bitter, it has a sourness to it and it’s not overly sweet, the berry notes are at the forefront of the flavour.”
The product has been created by Callebaut. “We already use a lot of Callebaut and I’m off to Ghana with them next month visiting cacao plantations.”
Ms Van der Velden is the mistress of reinvention. In the past fortnight she has introduced two new chocolate products – a smooth hazelnut praline spread (without palm oil) and the other is a hazelnut hot chocolate to make at home – which include delicious regionally grown hazelnuts.
“About seven years ago I did volunteer work with the Department of Primary Industries and encouraged farmers locally that there was a market for local hazelnuts. Now we are getting this in from Mudgee and Orange at their farm gate,” she said displaying the local hazelnuts.
Ms Van der Velden recently closed her Sydney store to focus on her Mountains businesses, sourcing the best fair trade beans in the world and inventing new recipes and is soon to introduce patisserie items in the Leura store. She has a recipe website for the home baker at: www.luxechocolaterecipes.com.
