Chapter Twenty-Nine: La India Mexican Style Sweet Chocolate

We are rounding out our hot chocolate series this week with a bar sold by a company Gaby is connected to. Don't worry! We are still consuming chocolate bars often; if you missed our first post about hot chocolate, we suggest reading it to understand our tasting methods, ingredients, and tools. You can find Chapter 26 here.

Our selection this week is from La India Packing Company, a spice and herb packer and distributor located in South Texas. It is owned and operated by Gaby's stepmother, whose grandparents opened for business in 1924. A specialty of La India is their Mexican Style Sweet Chocolate, and we have been eager to try it. It was one of the first products sold by La India, when the original owner would grind the cacao by hand. The recipe for this chocolate has been unchanged since then. We're not sure of the cacao content, but there was already sugar in the bar and a few spices that were not mentioned on the package. 

Tasting No. :27

La India Mexican Style Sweet Chocolate

Left: Guittard Base Cocoa Right: La India Mexican Style Sweet Chocolate

Guittard Base Cocoa

La India Mexican Style Sweet Chocolate

Initial Impressions:
This chocolate had an instant complexity which we both loved. There was an explosion of flavor present from the first sip. It's almost difficult to compare to the base chocolate because they differ so much. The Guittard has mega chocolate flavor. The Mexican Style chocolate is almost like a spiced and sweetened milk because the chocolate flavor is much more mild. This is most likely due from the addition of spices and sugar to the Mexican chocolate. The sweetness level was excellent and we came across  a lot of cinnamon and vanilla in this chocolate. The color of this chocolate prepared and in solid form was much lighter than the base. There were visible sugar crystals in the bar. We concluded that this chocolate was reminiscent of Cinnamon Toast Crunch! Near the end of our first mug, we added some vanilla bean paste (we used Neilsen-Massey) and it was not a great addition; it made the chocolate too sweet and didn't add any extra complexity.

Texture:

In comparison to the base cocoa which was thick and smooth, the La India was thinner and was more textured with bits from the cinnamon (already in the bar) and the grinding process of the chocolate. This made the chocolate bitey and enjoyable to drink as it seemed remarkably rustic and true to form in Latin American drinking chocolates. Read our posts on Taza's Cacao Puro and the Dominican Republic Raw Cacao for more information on this. 

For a bit of fun, we made ourselves a second cup and mixed the two to try to highlight what we liked from each chocolate: the chocolatey flavor of the Guittard and the complex spiciness of the La India. It was delicious! The intensity of the Guittard's chocolate flavor was amplified by the complex flavor profile of La India.  We highly recommend trying this mixture.

Overall:

We thoroughly enjoyed this cup of cocoa, the chocolate was not as highlighted as we would have liked but the spiciness and delicious combination of flavors left us sated and happy.  We definitely recommend giving it a try if you can find it in a store near you.

Rating: 7.5/10 

*Notes:

This bar was gifted to us but is available for purchase at select HEBs and Walmart in Texas as well as online orders.
Price: $4.25

Next week, we'll start ringing in the holiday season with a new series for the month of December.  Curious what it will be?  Check back for the big reveal!

For now savor: "Chemically speaking, chocolate really is the world's perfect food." - Michael Levine