Yes, I have to admit it. I loved chocolate first. It was legal to consume, therefore chocolate had to trump wine in my youth, and what kid doesn’t adore chocolate?  As soon as I could legally drink, I found that chocolate and wine, especially red wine, created beautiful music together. Pick up any issue of Wine Spectator and you will find some wine description that includes cocoa, mocha or chocolate. Creating a line of chocolates to pair specifically with wine is genius, and to use a name like “Brix,” which refers to the sugar content in wine, as well as the brick-like shape of the chocolate bars, is pretty darn clever. It makes sense that ABC Fine Wine and Spirits would want to carry the whole line, and we do in our larger stores. As they say on the label, “Brix Chocolates are specially formulated to complement wine.”

 At $10 per 8oz. brick (I say brick, since bars tend to be so much smaller in our mind’s eye, though a bar of gold is certainly in the shape of a brick) these are not inexpensive chocolates. Right on the box, Brix lauds their special blend from Ghana’s best chocolate plantations, and terroir matters with chocolate just as much as with wine. Chocolate tastes different from different locales, period. I’ve featured Brix bars at private wine tastings, using some of the pairing suggestions right on the box, and expanding with some of my own ideas. Not everyone loved the pairings as much as I did, but everyone found it instructional, since the pairing made us reassess our perceptions of both wine and chocolate. Most people loved it.

 The Brix Milk Chocolate bar has 40% cocoa solids, which is more than a typical Hershey’s bar, so it’s not as milk as you might think. They recommend “Port, Icewine, Rosé, Pinot Noir and Red Burgundy” (which is made of Pinot Noir, so perhaps a little redundant). This is the softest and creamiest of the confections and works with a sweet white like Icewine, Sauternes, or a dessert Muscat, though that is not the typical first choice. Perhaps the Abbaye Muscat at $11 or the Buller Aged Muscat at $15 would be my ABC picks, since they have a sweet richness with just enough acidity. The Mission Hill Riesling Icewine at $20 from Canada’s Okanagan Valley would be an excellent Icewine option.

 The idea of pairing a Rosé wine with chocolate is pretty innovative for me. A ripe and rich Rosé like the Bunan Bandol 2010 for $18 or the Carterese Tavel for $16 would be excellent choices, since they have deeper flavors. Almost any Port, from Ruby, to Vintage, to Tawny to Late Bottled Vintage would work fine, though the Buller Victoria Tawny Port at $13 would be ideal. With the milk chocolate I might look to a New World Pinot Noir, over a French Burgundy, and California’s Fog Bank at $11 or New Zealand’s Young Meg at $14 would pair quite well.

To be continued Monday...

Guest blogger Daniel Eddy is a wine consultant at our Newberry Road store in Gainesville. You can catch more of his pairings and reviews at Examiner.dom, where he's the Wine Pairing Examiner for Examiner.com in Gainesville. http://www.examiner.com/wine-pairing-in-gainesville/daniel-eddy