Dulce-de-Lectable: Bissinger's Dulce De Leche Chocolate Bar

Photo courtesy of Bissinger's

As Reviewed by Tom and Stephanie

We first encountered Bissinger's line of premium chocolate bars at the 2014 Summer Fancy Food Show in New York City.  Always on the look out for new and different flavor combinations in premium chocolate, their line gave us exactly what we were looking for--excellent chocolate paired with ingredients in ways we hadn't seen before or didn't already carry in our store in other lines.  The packaging was attractive and the price point was equally alluring, so we brought in the entire line of twelve bars.

We haven't worked our way through every bar yet, but what we've had, we've liked.  The Dulce de Leche bar was an easy favorite of some of our Dickinson College student customers, so we thought we'd give it a try.  Described as a 38% cacao milk chocolate bar with "creamy caramel, cinnamon, and a touch of smoked fleur de sel," we eagerly ripped open the box and tore the foil wrapper.

Tom:  When you open the bar, you push your finger into a tab and pull it up to reveal a foil wrapper.  The wrapper is hard to open, which was astonishing to me.  By the time I opened the wrapper, I had broken a piece of the chocolate bar.  Inside I found a big bar that was segmented and had a fancy B on the front of each section.  When I bit it, I was surprised by it having filling.  The bar has a chocolate exterior with caramel inside and salt on the bottom.  The chocolate is decent, but as with most fancy bars, the chocolate is not really the point of the bar.  The bar tastes of a sweet caramel flavor battling with cinnamon.  The biggest flavor, however, is the salt on the bottom.  It takes you by the hand and throws you into the ocean and sometimes masks all of the other flavors.  Overall, this is a Tom Gilbert recommended bar and something you should try.

A peek inside a chocolate pocket,
revealing the caramel center.

Stephanie:  My first impression of this bar is it's a handsome piece of chocolate with a lovely brown hue that is exactly the color one would expect of milk chocolate.  The bar is segmented into squares with an embossed "B" on each section, and each section is actually a pocket containing the caramel filling instead of the filling being incorporated throughout the chocolate bar, which makes sense for a bar containing a dulce de leche type caramel because it tends to be thinner.  The caramel is very liquid, so if you're going to bite into a square instead of popping the entire thing in your mouth, make sure you have a napkin!  The caramel is very lovely--a rich, buttery caramel that coats your tongue but doesn't require chewing, and it's infused with a mild hint of cinnamon, which you can definitely taste, that helps temper the richness of the caramel.  The salt here acts as an enhancer, bringing out the sweetness of the caramel without overpowering it.  As you swallow, you really taste the butter in the caramel, and you are left with a pleasant after taste.  The chocolate, while obviously necessary as the vehicle in which the caramel is delivered, really takes a backseat.  Its milky taste is just right for this bar, as it doesn't overshadow the featured ingredient or deliver an overly rich or bitter taste that would compete with the caramel.  With some premium bars, the chocolate and other ingredients can be so rich that you simply can't eat more than a square or two at a time, but that really isn't the case here.  Although you'll definitely savor each bite, you could eat an entire bar in one sitting.

Overall, the Bissinger's Dulce de Leche bar is dulce-de-lectable and definitely a bar you'll want to try.