From the company that brought us such savory goods as Cheerios, Nescafe (and Nespresso), Dibs, Drumstick, Haagen-Dazs, San Pellegrino, and of course our ultimate favorites, baby food Gerber and cat food Friskies.
Their chocolate commodities are to die for: Smarties, 100 Grand Bar, Baby Ruth, Butterfingers, Raisinets, Oh Henry!, Crunch, Toll House Cookies, and every Wonka product from Nerds and Pixtie Stix to Fun Dip and Laffy Taffy. (As a side note Halloween candy is on sale).
With their huge success as a brand of all sorts of food besides candy, it’s no wonder that they’re finally sending over one of their best products from Switzerland, their Cailler chocolate brand. In a press event at the Vanderbilt Hall in Grand Central Terminal on Tuesday, Nestle spokesmen warmly boasted about the chocolate’s premiere in the United States and just why everyone should try it.
Speaking with Alessandro Rigoni, the Business Executive Manager of Chocolate & Confectionery products at Nestle, he said that the American market is a “very big market, and we try to bring our famous Swiss chocolate to the Americans and we think that this is an interesting move because what we have faced so far in the feedback from consumers is that they love to taste new things, they love to have very premium chocolate, and they love to hear the story we have about our milk chocolate which is part of our founders. So Daniel Peter, the son in law of Francois-Louis Cailler, who you see on the brand, has invented the milk chocolate worldwide, close to 200 years ago. And that’s why our milk story is so strong. So we have 1800 cows that are grazing 20 miles around the factory. We know them by name– my favorite one is Gwendoline. She’s very nice with me. But what is important is that after four days after the collection of the milk, it turns into our chocolate. So we make it into our chocolate within four days. Normally, others use milk powder, which can have six months to one year whatever; we’re the only ones that takes fresh milk into chocolate. And this is quite a difficult move because of the liquidity of the milk and the watery content to mix into the cocoa liquor. It’s quite tough to do that and we manage it so it’s good to taste the chocolate and this is what you have to do afterwards: you can really smell the milky taste in the chocolate. And of course we have dark chocolate.”
As a side note, I have a terrible sense of smell but that milk chocolate sure did smell like milk– and taste amazing.
Rigoni continued that, “I think we brought the best we have out of Switzerland to you, to Americans and also we have brought it to other parts of the world. So we go international with this brand, which was so far only dedicated to Swiss consumers. And we bring it with the very best we have and a selection that is quite premium, and this is brought to Germany, UK, United States, and also to China.”
Cailler has eight different boxes of pralines with different tastes, like dark chocolate, milk chocolate, mint, and so on. They have a wide variety of tablets and big and small boxes, and the best part is that each box, as well as gift boxes, come with a hand cut “paper cut” design (below) that shows a different story of the company and a scene back home. Nonetheless, Cailler is truly a fresh company, with their caramel crafted in house and mostly everything they use.
“We control everything that comes in so we master the process of doing chocolate, so we make the beans to the bars. Everything is done in house, roasting, also the caramel, the milk story I told you before. We have certified cocoa so everything is Nestle cocoa and UTZ certified, so we control the things from the crop to the final product and we can trace this quite nicely. And freshness will be key because here we go through the Amazon so we have a direct shipment because chocolate made quick and fresh is the best you can get.”
And his favorite? “Dark with hazelnut and fruits and almonds.”
You can check out Cailler and it’s products here and don’t forget to go out and get some chocolate!
