What is white chocolate, anyway?

Aug 14, 2024

White Chocolate on Plate

White Chocolate

Is it actually chocolate??

 

by Lindsay Tarnoff

white chocolate bark with goji berries below gloved hand dropping candied ginger

The White Chocolate Question

It’s one of the questions we hear most frequently: “what is white chocolate, anyway?” Occasionally, it’s preceded by a sheepish grin: “I love white chocolate, but I’ve heard it isn’t really chocolate. Is that true?” Or the more cynical version: “white chocolate is too sweet for me, but I know the truth – it isn’t really chocolate anyway.”

coffee squares on a tray

The Truth About White Chocolate

The question about white chocolate is a valid question. Whether you love it or hate it, there’s no question that white chocolate is sweet and usually smooth, often leaving a coating on your tongue after you swallow. The short answer is actually, yes, white chocolate – veritable white chocolate – is actually chocolate. For proof, try our coffee squares or marble swirl bark – or a personal favorite, our berries and cream bar. But let’s back up a little so that we are sharing the full story.

First of all, it’s important to understand who defines chocolate – and in the U.S., as with other consumables, the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) regulates chocolate.

While here at Laughing Gull Chocolates, we’v grown to love our milk and white chocolate (more on this coming soon – plus check out one of our first blog posts by my now husband guest blogger!) Laughing Gull Chocolates started with primarily dark chocolate for a variety of reasons. This dark chocolate made up our truffles and our chocolate sauces – our very first products – and were all made with a 70% chocolate.

Dark chocolate bark with specks of white chocolate sprinkled on it depicting night sky<br />

Chocolate Regulations

And here’s the answer to another common question in our classes and workshops: what does that percentage mean? The simple answer is that it indicates how much of that piece of chocolate is made from cacao. In our case of those truffles, our chocolate is about 70% cacao, and the rest is made up of sugar. Like all of our chocolate that is transparently sourced and also clean, our original chocolate  only had a couple ingredients in it, with no unnecessary additives.

The FDA, however, only requires that 15% of what is labeled as dark chocolate is cacao. This means that a dark chocolate bar may in fact have more sugar and/or milk in it and still be labeled as bittersweet chocolate! Are you as confused as I was when I first learned that?

Cacao beans sit on a traditional metate

Nibs, Beans and Cocoa Butter

Where was I? Ah, yes, White chocolate! 
By definition, bittersweet chocolate has a minimum amount of cocoa, or cacao. Milk chocolate, according to the FDA, is required to have even less cacao in it, or 10% chocolate and no less than 3.39% milk powder, and of course it may have other ingredients added to it. 
What makes chocolate, chocolate? Take a look at rhe cacao bean pictured above. It’s brown – reddish or purplish brown. It doesn’t look like it would melt in your mouth, and it wouldn’t – each cacao bean is crunchy. Yet, every cacao bean is made up of about 50% of fat. And that fat is called cocoa butter, yes, the very same cocoa butter commonly found in skin products. (The beans are ground into a paste, or a liquor, and then pressed to separate the fat). The other 50% is known as cocoa solids, and that is what gives chocolate its color and its unforgettable flavor. The cocoa butter, when pressed and left natural, is an off white color with a lovely, subtle chocolate flavor. Cocoa butter is magic. It contains the molecules that help to temper chocolate so it is shiny and smooth and so that it snaps. It is almost white, and can be colored (in our case with natural colors) so we can make things like rainbow bark. 
 
And that cocoa butter, friends, is what is thy email ingredient in white chocolate. According to the FDA, white chocolate must have a minimum of 20% cocoa fat, or cocoa butter in it. It also must contain no less than 3.5% milkfat, no less than 14% milk solids, and no more than 55% carbohydrate sweeteners.
White Chocolate on Plate

Marketing, Semantics and Chocolate

Here’s where things get complicated and why we always encourage consumers to look at ingredients. Much of what you can find at the grocery store is not actually white chocolate. Look closely at the marketing. There’s a popular chocolate maker that makes “classic white chips” that contains no cocoa butter at all, but does appear as if it is white chocolate.

And so to answer that critical, ever so common question if white chocolate is chocolate – yes! it is.

However, it’s only white chocolate if upon closer inspection, the label says white chocolate and the ingredients include cocoa butter.

At Laughing Gull Chocolates, you will not be surprised to hear that cocoa butter is actually the first ingredient listed in our white chocolate. Not only that, but we source our white chocolate from our partner chocolate maker Moka Origins, who sources their cacao transparently from a coop Ghana, and makes this white chocolate with only three ingredients: cocoa butter, sugar and milk powder.

We use this clean transparent white chocolate for a variety of products, and are proud of the flavor and quality.

Think you don’t like white chocolate? It may be sweeter than you are used to, but give it a try – this white chocolate is good!

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