Indulge in Rich Flavors: The Best Dark Chocolate Brands of the Year
Dark chocolate has become a beloved treat for many people around the world. Not only is it delicious, but it's also packed with antioxidants that can have various health benefits. However, with so many different brands and varieties available, it can be challenging to know which ones are worth trying. That's why we've put together a list of the best dark chocolate brands of the year. From velvety smooth textures to intense cocoa flavors, these brands have it all.
Akesson's Organic Chocolate
Akesson's Organic Chocolate is the first "Tree to Bar" chocolate maker. The Akesson family started with a single plantation in Madagascar. Today, Bertil Akesson has expanded the company's cacao network with plantations in Madagascar, Brazil, and Indonesia. If you tried craft chocolate or world-famous chocolatier chocolate, it is likely that it came from one of Akesson's cacao plantations. Akesson's Organic Chocolate bars have won a multitude of awards and is regarded as one of the best craft chocolate bars on the market.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Akesson's Brazil Forastero 75%
Grown on a historical Brazilian plantation, Forastero cacao's astonishing warm aroma is balanced with tart notes of the native pitanga fruit in 75% dark chocolate. The Pitanga fruit, also known as the 'Brazilian cherry', looks like a small pumpkin and has a sharp and sweet taste. Parasinho's Forestero cacao is the only variety grown on this Fazenda Sempre Firme plantation. Grown amid a forest with the highest biodiversity on earth, this exceptional cacao is distinctly Brazilian.
Tasting notes: Earthy, Tobacco, Brazilian Pitanga Fruit, Tart, Autumn Spices
OmNom Chocolate Reykjavík
OmNom is a small-batch, craft chocolate maker based in Reykjavík, Iceland. The company started as an experiment to see if the two friends could master how to make chocolate. From the start, they received positive tasting feedback. After receiving positive feedback, they set up a small chocolate-making lab inside a converted gas station and launched. OmNom's mission is to make the best chocolate possible using the highest quality of ingredients.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
A pure dark single-origin bar from Tanzania cocoa. It features a dominance of stone fruits and roasted hazelnuts with hints of raisins and ripe apricots.
Tasting notes: Fruity & Nutty
Marou, Faiseurs de Chocolat
Marou was one of the first bean to bar makers in Asia. When Vincent Mourou left his advertising career in San Francisco, he moved to Vietnam to find himself. This is when Vincent met Samuel Maruta, a banker from France living in Saigon with his wife and two kids. The two had nothing but a blender, an oven, cake tins, and Sam's kitchen. Samuel and Vincent continue to work with a tight network of small farmers who they buy the best quality beans from.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Marou Wallpaper Tien Giang 80%
This chocolate bar is high in spice, tobacco, and nutty flavours that showcases Marou’s dedication to exceptional design as recognized by London’s Wallpaper* magazine.
Tasting notes: Spice, Tobacco & Nutty
Blanxart
It was in April of 1954 when the master chocolatier Francesc Agrás embarked on a long journey through the best patisseries and confectioneries in Europe. His passion for excellence in artisan confectionery was the seed that led to the founding of one of the most renowned Catalan chocolate factories: Bombons Blanxart. It all started in a modest workshop in the neighborhood of Les Corts (Barcelona) and feeding a dream: bringing the best cocoa beans from Ghana, Congo, and Guayaquil to chocolate.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Blanxart Nicaragua Eco-Organic 85%
There has got to be a law against chocolate this good. Intense smoke and coffee flavor permeates the palate leaving its delectable mark on the unwary taste-traveler.
Tasting notes: Smokey & Coffee
Dick Taylor Craft Chocolate
Adam Dick and Dustin Taylor have always loved crafting. With a background in woodworking and boat building, they have always worked with their hands. Craft is a guiding principle in their lives. After hearing about the craft chocolate movement in the late '00s, they saw similarities in woodworking and craft chocolate making. They became fascinated with the idea of the chocolate experience and in 2010 bought their first chocolate-making equipment. Their chocolate captures and highlights the subtle flavour nuances in the cacao they source from around the world, with the goal to make an enjoyable chocolate experience for us.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Dick Taylor Black Fig Chocolate 72%
Starting with their fruity 72% Malagasy origin chocolate, Dick Taylor adds in chewy bits of dark, rich California black mission figs. The combination makes for unforgettably bright chocolate, rife with notes of dried fruit and deep cacao, and textured with locally-sourced figs.
Tasting notes: Dried Fruit, Deep Cacao, Fig
Raaka
Raaka is devoted to making uncommonly delicious chocolate that captures the brighter, bolder, and fruitier side of cacao. They make every bar from scratch with unroasted cacao beans, sourced from growers they trust and admire. The unique flavour of their unroasted chocolate is part place, part process. They craft their bars in celebration of each cacao origin's unique character. Their chocolate making process values the community of growers, producers, and makers whose livelihoods depend on cacao and chocolate. All of their chocolate is made from scratch, bean-to-bar, in Red Hook, Brooklyn.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Raaka crafts this bar with perfectly ripe bananas, fruity Peruvian cacao, house caramelized sugar, and vanilla bean. Our tribute to the iconic New Orleans dessert.
Tasting notes: Ripe Banana & Fruity
Ranger Chocolate
Based on family recipes and named for founder George Domurot’s niece, a National Park Service Forest Ranger, Ranger Chocolate Company carefully handles each cacao bean to unlock nuance, regionality, and terroir-driven flavors in their chocolate.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Ranger's Espresso Chocolate Bar strikes a balance between two of our most beloved items on the planet, chocolate, and espresso. They collaborated with some of the best coffee roasters in Portland to produce a warm and welcoming bar. They work with Trailhead Coffee Roasters to pair their Classic Espresso Blend with a 50/50 blend of their cacao from the Tumaco region in Colombia and a new bean they've been working with from forest edge communities surrounding the Gola Rainforest National Park in Sierra Leone.
Tasting notes: Cream & Carmel
Amedei Chocolate
Amedei’s journey starts with foundress Cecilia Tessieri’s small artisanal laboratory and her commitment to excellence. A search that gradually developed through study, passion, and the rediscovery of ancient processing techniques. The raw cocoa pods selected by Amedei from plantations are harvested and sent directly to Tuscany, to be turned into true art pieces by their chocolatiers, who masterfully dose and hand-process a small number of selected ingredients.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Amedei challenges its philosophy and wisdom by creating a 95% dark chocolate with a strong and sweet taste. The absolute innovation of this product is the substitution of cane sugar with maple sugar, a precious ingredient with a sweetly refined taste obtained from the sap extracted from the Canadian maple plant.
Tasting notes: Maple
Goodio Chocolate
Founded in 2015, Goodio is a food pioneer with a big heart. The story started with a question: “What if there was a food brand you could trust?”. Goodio was created on the principles of sustainability, well-being, and transparency. It's a vision to bring Nordic-inspired flavors to a chocolate brand for the global consumer.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Goodio Nordic Flavours, Metsä (Forest) 70%
Metsä (forest) is a bar of dark chocolate topped with forest crystals and dried birch leaves. This flavor features some of the building blocks of the Nordic forest landscape: birch and spruce.
Tasting notes: Woody
Original Beans
Since 2008, Original Beans has ventured into remote rainforests to source the world’s rarest cacao beans and transform the cultures of chocolate, food, and luxury. Original Beans founder, Philipp Kauffmann, represents the 7th generation in a family of recognized nature explorers and conservationists who coined the term “sustainability”. Philipp gave up his job at the United Nations in New York to grow Original Beans as a leading brand for a world in which we regenerate what we consume. For each bar purchased, Original Beans plants a tree with their initiative, One Bar One Tree.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Original Beans Arhuaco Businchari 82%
Heights of sweet spice, licorice, and sesame rise gently in this ultra-rare chocolate made according to ancient Arhuaco tribal traditions that are designed to maintain the world's natural harmony.
Tasting notes: Sweet Spice, Licorice, and Sesame
Taza Chocolate
Taza Chocolate makes stone-ground chocolate. Cacao is so complex in flavor that they want to let it shout loud and proud. That is why they do less to bring us more. They stone grind organic cacao beans into perfectly unrefined, minimally processed chocolate with bold flavor and texture, unlike anything you have ever tasted.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Taza Chocolate Mexicano Sea Salt 70%
Stoneground, organic 70% dark Mexican-style chocolate discs with a sprinkle of sea salt stirred in, for the perfect sweet & salty balance. These rustic, minimally processed discs let you experience chocolate with true grit! Two discs in each package, perfect for sharing.
Tasting notes: Bold & Salty
Cacaosuyo
“The best-kept secret of the Incas,” made at origin in Peru. Cacaosuyo are chocolate geeks’ elite rockstars. Minimally processed chocolate bars express each Peruvian cacao strain’s genetics in crystal clear surround sound. Their unrivalled attention to detail and direct trade practices are key in improving the lives of producers and preserving rare varietals that would otherwise be lost to more industrial, “productive” strains.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Mild and flavorful cacao native to Cuzco yields an 80% bar naturally sweeter than most. Slight fruitiness slowly fades into a lingering fresh, herbal finish. This Criollo cacao is harvested in a jungle located in the lower parts of the Cuzco region, an area that houses many native cacao varieties.
Tasting notes: Fruity, Naturally Sweet, Fresh-Tasting & Lingering Herbal Finish
Beyond Good
Beyond Good is a Brooklyn-based chocolate and vanilla company established in 2006 by two Peace Corps volunteers who served in Madagascar. The company sells a range of single-origin chocolate bars and vanilla products, sourced from Madagascar, and Uganda. All of the cocoa is certified direct trade and is sourced directly from Madagascan and Ugandan cocoa farmers.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Chocolate and citrus have been working well together for over a century, but their rich Uganda base chocolate paired with sweet bites of orange zest may be their best collaboration yet.
Tasting Notes: Bright, fresh bites of sweet citrus with a long bittersweet cocoa finish.
Chocolate Conspiracy
Despite the importance of the raw market segment, for a long time, we felt that everything we tasted from a whole bunch of leading raw chocolate brands tasted and felt like, well, burnt mud. AJ Wentworth, a holistic health counselor, felt the same way, and so he set out to create raw chocolate that would live up to high standards. He produces in tiny batches using raw local honey in place of sugar, and we feel his bars are the best raw chocolate in the industry.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Chocolate Conspiracy Wild Spice Bar 74%
This raw chocolate is blended with cayenne pepper, cinnamon, black peppercorns, nutmeg, raw maca root, raw vanilla bean, and black lava salt.
Tasting notes: Earthy & Fruity
Ritual Chocolate
Ritual Chocolate produces small-batch, bean-to-bar chocolate using classic European methods and premium cacao from select sources. Founded in 2010 by Robbie Stout and Anna Davies, their mission is to produce exceptional quality chocolate while celebrating the complexity of the cacao bean. At their small chocolate factory in Park City, Utah, they are involved with the entire chocolate-making process to ensure their values for the highest achievable quality are present every step of the way.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Caramelized sugar and graham cracker crumbs in dark chocolate mimic the irresistible, toasted smores qualities in craft chocolate for a no-fuss, less-sweet treat. A part of Ritual's Mountain Line, this bar is perfect to take along on a journey for a twist on classic smores.
Tasting Notes: Marshmallow, Graham Cracker, Caramelized Sugar & Fudgy Chocolate
Valrhona
Valrhona is a French chocolate company founded in 1922. The company produces a wide range of high-quality chocolates, including dark, milk, and white chocolate, as well as chocolate bars, pastries, and other confections. Valrhona's chocolate is known for its rich, intense flavor and is used by many professional pastry chefs and chocolatiers around the world. The company is based in the small town of Tain l'Hermitage in the Rhône-Alpes region of France.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Valrhona Grand Cru Guanaja 70%
This bar develops extraordinary bitterness, revealing a whole aromatic range of warm notes while unveiling flowery notes and an intense flavor that is exceptionally long-lingering.
Tasting Notes: Flowery
Crow & Moss
Crow & Moss started in a basement and was born out of owner Mike Davies' sudden desire to learn how to make craft chocolate while driving home from work. With his initial setup, he began his journey and never looked back. Now, the company produces artisan chocolate in 100-pound batches at their 2000-square-foot factory in Petoskey Michigan, aiming to bring unique and authentic flavor experiences to chocolate lovers worldwide.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Vanilla Smoke Dark Chocolate Bar 69%
For this inclusion bar, they've taken whole Madagascar vanilla beans and paired them with a hint of hickory smoked cacao and a touch of salt to create a fruity, floral twist with a nostalgic campfire finish.
Tasting Notes: Smokey
Cuna de Piedra
Cunda de Piedra Comalcalco is a group of Mexicans who are passionate about cacao. Its mission is to raise the quality of life of everyone involved in the process, from those who grow and harvest the land, to those who consume their bars. Cuna de Piedra is a homage to Mexican cacao. Each one of their chocolates is a reflection of the best lesson Mother Nature has taught us: good things take time, but they are worth waiting for.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Cuna De Piedra Soconusco Chiapas 85%
Cuna de Piedra sources their Soconusco, Chiapas cacao from a cooperative in the Raymundo Enríquez ejido, composed of 28 members who own 50 hectares of orchards, where cacao is grown alongside other fruits such as lemons, coconuts, mangoes, mamey, and pineapples, as well as tropical flowers. Harvest after harvest, the co-op ensures consistency across all seasons by sourcing beans only from their own members and compensating for the genetic diversity of their plants by knowing exactly which lots to ferment in the same batch.
Tasting notes: Earthy
Amano Artisan Chocolate
Amano Artisan Chocolate is a small-batch craft chocolate maker based in Orem, Utah. Amano is an award-winning maker, they make all their chocolate on vintage equipment. Their small batch process allows Amano to control and observe flavor development, making each batch of chocolate not only delicious but unique.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
This is one of their newest single-origin bars. Made with beans from the Dominican Republic this bar has hints of apricot, caramel, brown sugar, and cream all held together with a rich earthy chocolate base.
Tasting notes: Apricot, Caramel, Brown Sugar & Cream
Manoa Chocolate Hawaii
Manoa is a Hawaiin based chocolate maker. Hawaii is the only state in the USA to grow cacao. The story of this maker began in the labs at the University of Hawaii in 2010 studying cacao as a crop for the state. Manoa started as college students with no money and bootstrapped their business with ingenuity and determination.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
Tasting notes: Banana, Passion Fruit & Coconut
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LetterPress Chocolate
Based in Los Angeles, California, LetterPress Chocolate was founded by high school friends David and Corey. Their passion for cacao began in 2011 when they visited a plantation in St. Lucia and tasted the pulp from cacao pods. They started making their own chocolate after running a chocolate blog called Little Brown Squares, sourcing the best cacao from around the world and carefully roasting and stone grinding each batch to bring out its unique flavors. Today, they even offer tours of their factory.
Explore their entire chocolate collection here.
Recommended bar:
LetterPress Peru Tingo Maria 70%
Ucayali River Cacao sources from several areas in the Peruvian state of Ucayali. Having won numerous awards for their Private Reserve Ucayali bar, Letterpress wanted to explore some of the other fantastic cacao in the region which URC also ferments. Tingo María is a city on the Huallaga River in central Peru, set between Andean highlands and Amazonian jungle. It's the gateway to the biodiverse Tingo María National Park, known for Sleeping Beauty, a mountain shaped like a reclining woman.
Tasting notes: Caramel, Mocha & Berries
You can shop our entire collection of dark chocolate collection here.
To get started with craft chocolate, start with our Kekao Box. We search the world for the finest chocolate bars and bring them right to your doorstep monthly. From rich dark Peruvian chocolate bars to new start-up chocolate bars on the come-up, you never know what you'll get inside the box! Each month we will curate 4 to 5 premium specialty crafted chocolate bars.
If you want to just try a couple of bars, check out our online chocolate store.
If you have any questions regarding this blog, our Kekao Box, or premium specialty crafted chocolate bars, feel free to contact us! Keep up with us by subscribing to our newsletter or following us on Twitter, and Instagram.
