Millennium Extra Brut 80% Dark Chocolate

                                   

About: This Ukrainian chocolate, manufactured only since 1999, was a pleasant and unexpected surprise. It's made in Dnipropetrovsk and has become one of the biggest brands in Ukraine. The website seems to reflect a passion for chocolate, though the model wearing a chef's hat smiling at you (the model, not the chef's hat) doesn't seem to be a devoted chocolatier but just some guy. They have a catalog filled with filled chocolates, dark chocolate and all the stuff you'd expect, including Disney branded chocolate. For me, this takes away some of the focus on premium chocolateering; if you're buying the chocolate because it's a big brown Mickey, you may not care how it tastes. But I was happy with this bar.

Flavor:Sometimes I find addition of vanilla to a bar of chocolate to be dilutive - the vanilla takes away from the chocolate (or is perhaps used to make up for weaknesses in the flavor). But I found this bar, with its strong vanilla flavor, to be well balanced and pleasant. Every bite elicited a "oooh.. nice" (no worried - I used my inner voice). The chocolate itself, at 80% is not too sweet - I loved that - and the flavor was full enough, though definitely dominated (gagged and bound) by the vanilla.

That said, the chocolate is also full flavored with slight hints of raisins. It's a very good bar. 

Texture: Very nicely smooth.

My rating:  A nice upper 7. I just liked this bar for its low sweetness and the pleasant vanilla.

Rating Value	Meaning
1	Really bad chocolate. There's something just really really wrong here in almost every imaginable respect.
2	A bar with this rating has at least two drawbacks.
3	A bar where something is starting to get seriously wrong.... for example, really weak flavor with an otherwise acceptable texture.
4	This bar is below average, but just slightly. Mostly it's not worth eating again. Something isn't quite up to par, for example a poor texture but fine flavor.
5	This is an average good bar that's worth eating. There's nothing really wrong with it, but also nothing particularly spectacular. Or, perhaps it has a good characteristic that's evenly counter-weighted by something weak.
6	A solidly good bar with one characteristic that's above par, for example a great texture.
7	An solidly good chocolate that has two above par characteristics, but nothing mind-blowing. Good, above average flavor, but nothing to die for.
8	An excellent bar with no weaknesses and at least one characteristic that's super.
9	An awesome bar to die for with amazing texture and flavor.
10	You have been touched by God.

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