Like most of Domori’s bars, this one isn’t particularly attractive, having never escaped the limitations of the company’s low impact processing. Nonetheless, the color looks great; it’s a medium brown with a purplish magenta shade, but the aroma needs some time to breathe due to its cheesy quality. It has a medium body and is redolent of clove, papaya, and grapes, an overall scheme that may seem just a bit too light for a Carenero.

As usual, the flavor commences on a raw and fermented tone that Domori loves to project. Bleu cheese is the main flavor here, distinct and pungent, it's a curious but wonderful note that complements the subtle chocolatiness of the profile, while spice, figs, and meager tropical notes convey a sense of refinement that the overall rawness seems to resent.

Texture is near perfect, melting without any problem whatsoever, and also for what seems to be an eternity. The chocolate seems to melt forever! A typical, yet not so typical Carenero rendition, only permissible (and possible) by the mind behind Domori. The processing subdues the characteristic tropical fruits and seems to favor a spicier flair embellished with a pungent dose of bleu cheese, which although is common for Domori, seems especially pronounced here. Again, not a problem, since it works well, so much so, that Domori has one of the strangest and more interesting Carenero interpretations on the market.

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For many years, Domori only made this chocolate in small 8 g sample squares which were frustrating for tasting. Now, thankfully, it comes in a much more realistic 75g bar - although there's still one packaging quibble - the plastic inner wrapper. Its appearance is excellent - a medium red-brick brown very typical of Carenero beans. However, obvious surface bubbling and underside rippling do testify to hasty moulding. It's best to air the bar out because otherwise it retains a plasticky taste from the packaging.

The aroma itself is astonishingly exotic, spicy and with elements of tea. One feels transported to somewhere in India or Morocco. Indeed, the aroma is reminiscent of that famous Moroccan spice combination, Ras al Hanout. The flavour is completely consistent with this aroma, again, a wonderfully exotic, complex spicy mix with strong components of nutmeg and clove. Also remarkable is a distinct lack of bitterness, not simply no harshness, but a specifically assertive un-bitterness that makes the chocolate really quite special. Length goes on and on - the chocolate lingers in your mouth seemingly for hours.

Texture is every bit up to the Domori standards - that is to say, silken and creamy. Domori is one of the textural leaders and it's clear that the finish is superb. It's a chocolate that leaves you struggling for things to criticise. It's not exactly representative of its bean - most Careneros have an exotic tropical-fruitiness to them - and this could be a quibble, although bean characteristics are always highly variable. Domori has here taken an outstanding bean with a strong personality and added its own strong personality on top to make for a bar that stands out from the crowd.

Postscript: A recent tasting demonstrated Domori's now well-known mercurial variability. The new bar demonstrated excellent strawberry notes not present in older batches but also an alarming peaty earthiness. On the whole it must be said that it wasn't quite as good as the earlier chocolates. Nonetheless we have seen Domori recover quickly from "off" batches so this probably isn't a troubling development for the future.

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