Vanilla Dark Chocolate Bar — 70% Peruvian Cacao, Madagascar Vanilla

Vanilla dark chocolate bar, 70% Peruvian Criollo cacao, whole-pod Madagascar bourbon vanilla, caramelised coconut cream on the fat side. This is a dark bar first — not white chocolate, not a milk chocolate with vanilla stirred in. The cacao carries the bar; the vanilla is the aromatic thread running through it. Two ounces, twelve squares, Berkeley kitchen, small-batch.

If you have only ever met vanilla in white chocolate or vanilla in ice cream, this bar will read differently. The vanilla here does not sit on top of dairy; it sits inside cacao. The result is warmer than a plain 70%, less sweet than a milk bar, and — thanks to the caramelised coconut — has a raisin-and-butterscotch echo on the finish that keeps people breaking off a second square.

A 70% vanilla dark chocolate bar, reimagined for plant-based lovers

Why dark, not white

Most vanilla-flavoured chocolate on the shelf is white chocolate, and most white chocolate is cocoa butter plus milk powder plus sugar plus vanillin. It is a fine format, but it has nothing to do with cacao mass. We built this vanilla dark chocolate bar as the opposite — a dark bar where the cacao is loud and the vanilla is the aromatic overlay. That means real cocoa solids (70% of the bar, in fact), real bourbon vanilla (whole pod, scraped, seeds included), and no milk anywhere near the tempering machine.

The Peruvian Criollo base

The dairy substitution is the interesting part. Instead of milk powder or oat powder or almond flour, we slow-caramelise fresh coconut cream on a wide pan until the sugars brown and the water is driven off. What is left is a fudgy, buttery paste that carries into cacao butter without breaking. It gives the bar the round, creamy mouthfeel most 70% bars lack — without any of the “coconutty” edge that undercuts the vanilla. If you did not know it was in there, you would guess brown butter.

Tasting notes — top, mid, finish

Top: coconut cream + floral vanilla

The first note is soft — warm cream, then the floral top of Madagascar bourbon vanilla, a note that reads almost like ripe fig.

Mid: raisin + caramel

The caramelised coconut opens up as the bar warms — dark raisin, wet-brown-sugar, the edge of a well-done crème brûlée.

Finish: dry cacao + salt whisper

The 70% cacao closes the bar with a clean, dry pull. There is no salt on the label, but there is a mineral edge from the Peruvian bean that reads salt-adjacent.

Ingredients — 5 organic, fair-trade elements

Peruvian Criollo cacao

• Cacao*† — Peruvian Criollo-hybrid via the Acopagro cooperative, San Martín region, fair-trade certified.

Madagascar Bourbon vanilla

• Vanilla* — whole-pod Madagascar bourbon vanilla, hand-scraped, seeds and inner pod.

Caramelized coconut cream

• Caramelised Coconut† — fresh coconut cream reduced over low heat until brown.

Cacao butter & coconut sugar

• Cacao Butter† — cold-pressed from the same Acopagro lot, undeodorised.
• Coconut Sugar*† — low-glycemic, unrefined coconut blossom nectar.

*Organic. †Fair Trade Certified™. Five ingredients. Nothing else — no lecithin, no gum, no natural flavour.

Vanilla dark chocolate vs vanilla white chocolate

The question comes up every time we send this bar out: is this like the vanilla chocolate I remember? The honest answer depends on which vanilla chocolate you remember.

Vanilla white chocolate is cocoa butter + milk + sugar + vanilla — no cocoa solids, no dark colour, no bittersweet edge. It reads sweet and creamy on the palate, and vanilla is often the dominant flavour because there is nothing else competing.

Vanilla dark chocolate — this bar — is cocoa mass + cocoa butter + coconut sugar + caramelised coconut + vanilla. The vanilla is layered on a dark chocolate base, not standing alone. You get the bittersweet cacao body first, and vanilla arrives as an aromatic thread — warmer and more grown-up than a white bar, less sweet by a considerable margin, and considerably more complex on the finish. If you want the vanilla to be the whole show, buy a white bar. If you want vanilla and cacao having a conversation, this is the bar.

Pairing guide — coffee, red wine, berries, cheese

Ethiopian coffee

Ethiopian Yirgacheffe coffee — the citrus-and-jasmine profile of Yirgacheffe echoes the floral top of the vanilla, and the medium body keeps up with the 70% cacao.

Pinot Noir

Pinot Noir — a lighter Willamette Valley or Burgundian Pinot; the red-fruit acidity brightens the caramelised coconut into full crème brûlée territory.

Fresh raspberries

Fresh raspberries — a small handful of berries with a square of this bar is essentially raspberries and vanilla ice cream in cacao form.

Aged Manchego

Aged Manchego — the nutty, buttery age on a 12-month Manchego meets the caramelised coconut like two old friends. Trust it once.

Sourcing — Acopagro cooperative Peru; Madagascar vanilla farmers

The cacao comes from Acopagro, a farmer cooperative of roughly two thousand small-holders in the San Martín region of northern Peru. Acopagro is the reason the Huallaga Valley is not still growing coca — a fair-trade cacao replant program on the scale of an entire region. We buy from them because the quality is world-class and because our money buys stability for growers who have already earned it.

The vanilla is bourbon Vanilla planifolia from the Sava region of northeastern Madagascar — the same coast that supplies most of the world's high-grade bourbon vanilla. We buy whole pods (not extract, not paste), which means our vanilla farmers are paid for the full curing chain rather than the shortcut. The coconut is from small-holder farms in Southeast Asia, worked into caramelised cream in our Berkeley kitchen.

Wellness & nutrition

Cacao carries natural flavanols — the plant compounds studied for their role in cardiovascular support. There is no dairy in this bar, no soy lecithin, no refined cane sugar, no gluten, no GMOs. Coconut sugar sits lower on the glycemic index than table sugar. We do not make health claims for chocolate — chocolate is not medicine — but the ingredient list is clean enough that this bar has a place in a lot of “usually I do not eat chocolate” pantries.

Nutrition facts & allergens

Per serving (20 g / ~4 squares)	Amount
Calories	~110
Total fat	~8 g
Total carbohydrate	~9 g
Sugars (coconut sugar)	~6 g
Protein	~1 g

Values approximate; per 20 g serving. Placeholder pending final lab panel.

Allergens & free-from: vegan, dairy-free, soy-free, gluten-free, refined-sugar-free, GMO-free. Contains coconut. Made in a facility that also handles tree nuts.

Frequently asked questions

What does vanilla chocolate taste like?

See the tasting notes above — top note is creamy coconut and floral vanilla, mid-palate opens into raisin and caramel from the caramelised coconut, finish is a clean dry pull from the 70% Peruvian cacao. Warmer than a plain 70% bar, less sweet than a milk bar, more complex than a white bar.

Is vanilla chocolate the same as white chocolate?

No. White chocolate has no cocoa solids — it is cocoa butter plus milk plus sugar plus vanilla. This is dark chocolate with vanilla: cocoa mass is 70% of the bar, and the vanilla is the aromatic overlay rather than the base flavour.

Is it vegan, dairy-free, soy-free?

Yes to all three. No milk, no whey, no butterfat. No soy lecithin. Certified organic. The creamy mouthfeel comes from caramelised coconut cream and cacao butter, not dairy.

What is Madagascar Bourbon vanilla?

Vanilla planifolia grown in Madagascar's northeastern Sava region — the same coast (formerly called the Bourbon coast) that has supplied the world's premium vanilla for over a century. It is the gold standard for creamy, warm, floral vanilla character — the profile most people picture when they imagine “real vanilla.” We use whole pods, hand-scraped, seeds and inner pod both. No vanillin. No extract.

Shipping, storage & gifting

Ships flat-rate from Berkeley. In warm months every bar goes out with a cold pack. Store below 68°F, away from direct light. Handwritten gift note at checkout.

Vegan | 70% Cacao | Organic | Fair-Trade | Soy-Free | Gluten-Free | Berkeley small-batch