A box of pralines from Max Brenner, Chocolate By The Bald Man, is delectable, artistic, and kosher-certified.

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October 2006
Updated January 2007

Product Reviews / Kosher Nibbles / Kosher Candy

Questions About Kosher Chocolate

Why Is Dark Chocolate “Dairy?”

Chocolate is made from ingredients that are inherently kosher, like cacao beans, sugar and vanilla beans. Other ingredients, like soy lecithin, an emulsifier that adds smoothness to the bar, and extra cocoa butter, which is added for better mouthfeel, must be kosher-certified.

That’s easy enough. On to step two. With some producers, the chocolate is manufactured in one facility and packaged elsewhere. Both facilities must be certified.

Here’s the part that confuses many people: Milk chocolate contains milk, which means that it is not pareve. That understandably gets a dairy certification. But semisweet and bittersweet chocolates have no milk: they’re pareve. So why do some dark chocolate bars have a dairy certification?

It’s because the equipment some companies use to mold and wrap their dark bars is also used to mold and wrap the milk chocolate. Mystery solved!

Top Kosher Chocolates

Of course, the most important thing for readers of THE NIBBLE is not that chocolate is certified, but that great chocolate is certified. Here, we’re in luck.

Two of the greatest American chocolate producers are kosher-certified: Guittard (Orthodox Union) and Scharffen Berger (formerly KSA, now Orthodox Union following its acquisition by OU-certified Hershey’s). Both companies make serious bars in a range of cacao percentages. Guittard has a line of origin cacaos as well as delicious nonpareils, mints and other candies. Both make baking chips for top-quality chocolate chip cookies and other delights. Eureka!
Newly-available in America, Israel’s Max Brenner, Chocolate by the Bald Man is certified by Nazareth Rabbinate. With a broad selection that spans fun and witty novelty gifts, sophisticated chocolates for connoisseurs and drinking chocolate, these treats are not yet online but are available by phoning the flagship New York store, 1.212.388.0030. If you’re in New York, visit the store in Union Square, 841 Broadway at 13th Street, or 141 Second Avenue at 9th Street.
French chocolate producer Bonnat makes a very fine line of single origin bittersweet bars, “dark milk chocolate bars,” and a 100% cacao bars (no sugar added), all under Federation KF kosher supervision (some dairy, some parve). You can find a broad selection on Chocosphere.com. Read our overview of Bonnat chocolate.
Barry Callebaut, Belgium’s largest chocolate producer, is certified by the OK. While they don’t make consumer chocolates for sale in the U.S., their couvertures are used by fine chocolatiers and pastry chefs.
Chocolate Santander, made of fine Colombian cacao, is certified kosher-dairy by the Medellin Rabbinate. Bars from 36% milk to 70% bittersweet, including choices with coffee bits, pineapple bits, passion fruit bits and espresso, can keep chocolate-lovers satisfied every day of the week. There are also mini-bars, chocolate-covered coffee beans and cacao nibs, and blocks of dark, milk and white couverture for those who want to make their own chocolates and baked goods. Chocosphere.com carries a wide selection. Read our overview of Santander chocolate. (Photo above: a gift package of different-percentage cacao Santander bars.)
Dagoba is both kosher and organic: the first American chocolate company to make its own organic chocolate. The company has bars, cocoa, chocolate chips, chocolate syrup and other tasty products.

Each of these companies makes its own couverture, i.e., roasts its own beans and produces the large blocks of base chocolate from which all other chocolate products are made. Most of the American chocolatiers who make kosher chocolate products use couverture from Barry Callebaut (a merger of two giants, Cocoa Barry and Callebaut), Guittard or Scharffen Berger. Lake Champlain Chocolates (Star K), one of our favorite kosher chocolate lines, with an extensive selection of bars, bonbons and novelties, uses Callebaut couverture. They also have a few organic items. Chocolove (Tablet K) specializes in chocolate bars, with a variety of delicious flavors.

If you’re buying from an artisanal chocolatier, ask which couverture (COO-ver-tyoor) he or she uses. Each producers has a very distinctive flavor profile. You’ll learn whether you have a preference for Callebaut, Guittard or Scharffen Berger (or other producer), and it can guide your future purchases.

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