Dove Chocolate

Dove chocolates are made by the M&M*Mars company, a division of Mars, Inc. Mars is, of course, known for their wide selection of candy bars. Apparantly, they decided that they couldn't be credible in the plain chocolate market under the name "Mars," so they invented a new name. They have a web site, but it's password locked and I couldn't see what was there.

Dove is kind of expensive, too. The small sized bars break into five little chocolate squares, which total 1.3 oz. (36.9 g.). I get the impression that Mars, Inc. is trying to create the appearance of a gourmet chocolate without actually going to the effort of making a true gourmet chocolate lover's chocolate. But the actual chocolate isn't bad, so who's to complain?

Dove Dark Chocolate

I have mixed feelings about this chocolate. On the one hand, it tastes pretty good. On the other hand, I have to question its claim to being a true "dark chocolate" since it has milk in it. Here's the ingredient list: sugar, chocolate dutch processed with alkali, cocoa butter, chocolate, milkfat, soy lecithin, artificial and natural flavors, milk. Notice that there are two milk related ingredients, as well as two chocolate ingredients. Weird.

It's certainly not a bad chocolate to eat, though. It's very smooth, almost unnaturally so. It doesn't feel smooth in the same way that my favorite chocolates do, but in a way that suggests they put something in it which makes it feel smooth. Maybe I'm being overly suspicious of Corporate America. Unlike their milk chocolate, I can definitely taste the alkali part, which is a good thing. This is pretty sweet as dark chocolates go, but it has a good, solid, chocolate flavor to it; definitely better than Hershey's Special Dark.

Dove Milk Chocolate

It's ok. It's pretty sweet. It's a bit better than the old Hershey's standby, but not a heck of a lot. The ingredient list is sugar, cocoa butter, skim milk, chocolate, milkfat, chocolate processed with alkali, lactose, soy lecithin, vanilla extract, and natural flavors. The interesting bit in that is that chocolate is listed twice, in different forms. To be frank, I can't taste the alkali part, but I guess that's what they mean by "New! Richer Flavor" on the label.

Overall, not bad. A bit too sweet, and tends to cause throat-burn if you eat it too fast or without anything to wash it down with. Tough call between 2.5 and 2.0.