Review: Woodford x Compartes Limited Edition Chocolate Collection
Review: Woodford x Compartes Limited Edition Chocolate Collection
Whiskey companies love to collaborate with chocolatiers, and we’re not about to suggest they stop. The latest to hit our doorstep is a collab between Woodford Reserve and gourmet chocolate brand Compartés, with a four-piece chocolate collection build around Woodford Reserve Double Oaked Bourbon.
Compartés chocolatier Jonathan Grahm teamed up with Woodford Reserve Master Distiller Elizabeth McCall to create unique chocolate designed to pair seamlessly with Double Oaked. Handcrafted by a small team of chocolatiers in Los Angeles, each of the four truffle flavors complements the Double Oaked sweet aromatic flavor profile.
“Jonathan Grahm is a true genius and artist,” McCall said. “The tasting notes of wood, spice, and florals found in the chocolates align perfectly with the flavors found in Woodford Reserve Double Oaked.”
Compartés x Woodford Reserve chocolates are handcrafted with a beautiful gold design and include four unique flavors that accentuate specific characteristics of Double Oaked:
• Butterscotch chocolate compliments the sweet aromatic flavors in Double Oaked, enhancing the butterscotch notes and bringing out the roasted coffee flavor. The combination of the bourbon and butterscotch chocolate tastes like chocolate-covered espresso beans.
• Pear Nutmeg chocolate highlights Double Oaked’s fruit, floral, and spice flavors. It brings out the sharp cedar, pepper spice and the dark raisin character of the bourbon.
• Oak Smoked Salt Caramel chocolate pairs with the wood, spice, and sweet aromatic flavors of Double Oaked. The smoked salt makes the mouth water, followed by herbal tea and tobacco notes and a dry cocoa finish.
• Maple Pecan chocolate complements Double Oaked’s grain, wood, and sweet aromatic notes. The chocolate highlights sweet brown sugar and maple notes, as well as the sweet oak and nutty pecan, almond, and walnut flavors of the bourbon.
The four-piece collection, available exclusively at ReserveBar and at the distillery, costs $86 — but you get a bottle of Double Oaked to sip alongside it, so the price isn’t all that bad.
We got the kit (though we had to supply our own whiskey). Thoughts follow.
First thoughts: Wow, four chocolates isn’t very much. It took all of five minutes to consume these — even doing so thoughtfully — and sipping some standard Woodford Reserve alongside. (No Double Oaked was on hand for the occasion, alas.) The Oak Smoked Salt Caramel was easily my favorite thanks to its exuberant, slightly smoky and quite salty-sweet flavor, followed by the Maple Pecan, which was arguably the best pairing with bourbon, all its southern flavors on display. The Pear Nutmeg was a fun twist — there are tiny chunks of candied pear inside, giving it some heft — while the Butterscotch chocolate was the only real miss; I didn’t get any butterscotch flavor from it at all; had I been asked to guess, I would have pegged it as based on coconut or nougat.
Either way, the four-pack was a delicious little dessert that was easy to share with my wife on a weekday evening. Get it while you can!
A- / $86 (with a bottle of Woodford) / [BUY IT NOW FROM RESERVEBAR]
Woodford x Compartes Limited Edition Chocolate Collection
$86
