Foodies prefer Blondies: When a "Blond" Chocolate Becomes a Food Trend

Dulcey is a new chocolate bar from Valrhona, and it is "Blond". Nothing like no other chocolate you've tasted, Valrhona - in fact - describes its Dulcey bar as having the aroma of "roasted Breton shortbread". The Valrhona's partner Starbucks has triumphed with its Blonde coffee roast, and perhaps were watching a new market category emerging. Note to Ben & Jerry: Blond Coffee Ice Cream with Blond Chocolate Chips would be quite divine, no? You could call it Marilyn.

Dulcey Bar Chocolate: a new food trend for Chocolate Lovers

Hmmm. How to describe it? Tasting nothing like plain milk chocolate, and unlike dark chocolate, which requires some serious chewing, butterscotch-hued Dulcey melts voluptuously in your mouth. It is at once caramel-ly and uber-creamy with a lovely creamy aftertaste. 

But to me, this new bar tastes like a shockingly creamy dulce de leche, which is an insanely favourite dessert in Latin America. You make it by slowly cooking sweetened condensed milk until it caramelises and turns the irresistible colour of butterscotch. 

You can try this at home by standing an unopened can of sweetened condensed milk in a pot of water and then boiling it for several hours, which is a perilous thing to do since the can explode, covering your kitchen, and you, with molten liquid. 

But I've done it several times, and can safely confirm that Valrhona's blond chocolate is a dead ringer for dulce de leche, only better. 

The "Blond" Chocolate by Valhrona: how to Make a New Food Trend 

Dulcey Chocolate Bar is a random invention, and the unexpected surprise is that was invented by mistake! Frédéric Bau, director of Valrhona's chocolate school, Ecole du Grand Chocolat, inadvertently left a bowl of molten white chocolate on top of a bain-marie and let it cook for hours until it morphed into a brand new category. 

The company is careful to say that Dulcey is not, however, roasted white chocolate but is, instead, a distinct shelf-stable product due to its "unique production process and ingredients." 

The "Blond" Chocolate meets Chocolate Lovers

Everyone is going Crazy for Dulcey. I've heard that serious pastry chefs are experimenting with this new flavour profile, and others are flocking. These are some names of  eminent pastry chefs that, coast-to-coast, are experimenting with it now:

• Ghaya Oliveira at Boulud Sud in New York City has created "Cremoso", a pannacotta made with dulcet, hazelnut paste, napped with sumac cream and garnished with chocolate hazelnut crunch; 

• Colleen Grapes, the pastry chef at The Harrison in NY (just love her name);

• Elwyn Boyles, pastry chef at Per Se; 

• Michael Aguilar of Wolfgang Puck's WP24 in Los Angeles; 

• Kelly Fields of John Besh's August restaurant in New Orleans;

• Dana Cree of Blackbird in Chicago. 

I'm so intrigued how they're using it, and I should try to create something unique, maybe likes my mother's confections "Blondies".

Dulcey is the "Blond" Chocolate that you've never tasted 

The first time I've bitten Ducey Chocolate Bar from Valrhona, the dessert that surprised me when I was youngster come to mind. 

One evening, my mother amazed the family by setting upon our dinner table a platter of what, by tradition and consensus, should have been brownies, but weren't. "They're blondies," she exclaimed. "I just found the recipe in Wednesday's food section." There were glum faces all around, especially mine ... until I bit into one of these unique confections, and then we had a new dessert favourite around the house. 

All this came to mind recently when I bit into a new chocolate bar from Valrhona called Dulcey Chocolate Bar. It is a "blond" chocolate, and it is like no other chocolate you've tasted. I expect there will be numerous copycats pretty soon. The blondies my mother made reminded me of those shortbread cookies that came in fancy cans from gourmet stores. 

Valrhona, in fact, describes its Dulcey bar as having the aroma of "roasted Breton shortbread." I, too, am eager to try tucking Dulcey into dessert somewhere between a brownie and the blondie that my mother made for dinner all those years ago.

Dulcey Bar Chocolate, a real new trend for Food Lovers?

Is a new marketing category emerging? Between Starbucks and Valrhona, perhaps we're watching a new market category emerging. After all, Americans also are abandoning dark colas in droves, shifting to "lighter" juice blends and waters. 

Perhaps "blond" or "blonde" (have it your way) is becoming a bit of a trend now that Starbucks has triumphed with its Blonde coffee roast, aimed at people who haven't quite figured out why anyone likes their ultra dark roasts, or what diehard Dunkin' Donuts drinkers call "Charbucks." 

Note to Ben & Jerry: Blond Coffee Ice Cream with Blond Chocolate Chips would be quite divine, no? You could call it Marilyn.