Let's talk chocolate

[PandemoniumWines]

I ended up with a little more strawberry wine than I had planned on... so I'm figuring, why not use the extra to play with chocolate?

I've read everything from using "dutched" cocoa powder, to roasted cocoa nibs, to breaking up a lindt bar.

Well, what's best? I'd like a little more than "hints" of chocolate. My first thought is to make a neapolitan sort of wine, strawberry, chocolate, vanilla.... What's going to give me the most bang and not be a nightmare to clear?

 

[dralarms]

What I did was take a whole 100 chocolate bar (no sugar) and break it up in the fermenter and let it do its thing. Came out fantastic.

 

[Julie]

I use lindt's 85% dark chocolate and the flavor comes thru very nice and there is no clearing issues. There were some who used cocoa powder and they had some serious clearing issues.

 

[BernardSmith]

I think you want to add vanilla to help bring more forward any chocolate notes. I agree with Julie - I have made mead using the Lindt chocolate bar and it came out really well. Roasted nibs are also excellent but the flavor is more nutty than in your face chocolate. I suspect what carries the "chocolate" in chocolate bars is the fat and that is something that you won't want in your wine..
Not sure if this will work with strawberry wine - but it might: think about using chocolate malt (as in brewing). Those grains don't ferment (to the best of my knowledge) but they do add color and a very distinct chocolate flavor. (perhaps 4 oz per gallon) In mead making the use of added grains makes for what is called a braggot but I don't know that winemakers have any term for a fruit-grain hybrid...

 

[PandemoniumWines]

Well the consensus seems to be chocolate bar, so that's what I will try then.

Thanks all!

 

[pete1325]

Okay, if I open a bottle, pour the wine in a bowl, break up a chocolate bar and add it to wine, let it sit until the bar is diluted that will do it? Or are we talking about adding chocolate during the ferment stage?

 

[BernardSmith]

I tend to add chocolate to the secondary and let the alcohol extract the flavor but you could add chocolate (or cocoa ) to the primary and let the flavors infuse the must then wine. Not sure I would adopt your method, pete1325 - It's gonna take a little while (several weeks at least, IMO) for the wine to extract enough flavor and in a bowl I would expect the wine to oxidize and so spoil. What you might do is add the chocolate to some (inexpensive?) rum or vodka and seal that up in a mason jar. After a few weeks the alcohol will have extracted the flavors and color and you will have chocolate extract which you could simply add (quantities by experimentation) to a wine or mead just before bottling. Using vodka or rum (perhaps even scotch) is how one makes extracts (vanilla, lemon, almond, hazelnut - chocolate...)