What is best cocoa powder
Our Taste Test to Find the Best Cocoa Powder
ask a dedicated Baker whether they
prefer natural or Dutch process cocoa
you're gonna get a serious answer
because there's a lot to consider about
this product Jax here and he's gonna
tell us which cocoa powder is best for
us baker's jack
yeah it's controversial mm-hmm people
who bake love cocoa powder because it
has the most chocolate flavor absolutely
anything
so cocoa powder is unsweetened chocolate
that they've removed a lot of the fat
from what's left cocoa solids the thing
that gives you the UM it's the cocoa
it's the cocoa so why don't you start
tasting we did this tasting a lot of
different ways this is a chocolate sugar
cookie some of these are Dutch t'
some of them are natural terms of ducted
cocoa this was actually a process
invented by a Dutch chemist and
chocolatier in the 19th century where
they add an alkali to the cocoa to raise
its pH make it less acidic so basically
what you're doing is those astringent
notes kind of get hidden so you can
bring out the full chocolate flavor so a
lot of Baker's really prefer Dutch
process cocoa because it has a they
believe of rounder fuller flavor it also
changes the color so the cocoa powder
itself goes from what I would call light
brown or tawny to deep dark brown
devilish devilish if you add enough of
the alkali you almost get black cocoa
and that will translate over to baked
goods to things that we liked we like
dutching we also like fat so remember I
said that cocoa butter they're taking
out a fair amount of the fat but if they
take out too much fat you get a lot of
starch and the reason why starch is so
important is because starch can absorb
100% of its weight in moisture and that
of course will make a very dry cookie or
a dry crumbly cake our favorite Coco's
were Dutch high fat cocoa powders
touched high fat cocoa powder now of
course that's not labeled we sent them
all out to labs had them analyzed and
the difference was pretty substantial
the top Coco's had 20 to 22 percent fat
content the lower rated ones were more
like 11 or 12 percent so basically twice
as much fat and so I have a little
experiment to bring this to life so
these are equal amounts of cocoa powder
equal amounts of water heated to 180
Cree's and then cooled this is our top
rated high fat low starch cocoa powder
you see it's very liquidy and it's going
to make a fudgy cake or a chewy cookie
this is a low rated one with a lot of
starch and very little fat and it's
basically well that's a brick so I've
given you way too much information the
whole point of all that information was
to confuse you mm-hmm have I done that
indubitably absolutely you have first of
all I want to thank you they're all
cookies made of chocolate so I'm
enjoying myself definitely my favorite
is this one because I love the chewiness
the moisture in there and it has a very
very beautiful deep flavor so this is my
favorite okay come back in 20 minutes
I'll tell you about my second favorite
is I will say that although we found
very significant differences there
wasn't anything was bad no this one's a
little milky it's lighter in flavor okay
it's not bad but if this wasn't nearby
you know I'd still eat it these two I
could take our leave I would say the
only definitive thing I can say is this
is my favorite let's start with what you
are positive about all right my favorite
and the tasting panels favorite this is
Droste it's a Dutch cocoa that is
actually from the Netherlands high fat
low starch and absolutely delicious I've
used that for years it's perfect every
single time all right I want to see what
this one is so this was the runner-up an
American company
guitard it's also Dutch also high fat
thought it made very good cookies and
cake really nice deep layer I'm gonna go
all the way to the other end here this
is called it milky mild it's sort of
familiar among the natural cocoa powders
it was our favorite although it was not
in the top all the top Coco's were
touched right right that is a familiar
flavor and this one equal exchange was
the one Dutch cocoa powder that our
tasters didn't like you weren't really
wild about it the problem here is it's a
very low fat cocoa powder so it's got a
lot of that starch the drying effect
that cookie is much more crumbly rather
than the chewier cookies you're what
there you go if you want to bake a lot
of chocolate cookies or maybe take some
home with you or cakes or anything made
of chocolate you're gonna
need a good cocoa so why not buy the
winner it's just cocoa and it's $9.99
for eight point eight ounces
thanks for watching America's Test
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