…and its name is Jõcalat1.
Yes, you read that correctly. Jõcalat. Lärabar Jõcalat, to be precise.
The odd spelling should have tipped me off. So should the designation “organic” since, as I experienced at the Organic Expo, good organic chocolate is brutally outnumbered by horrid organic chocolate. So should the pretentious diacritics (one of which I haven’t even been able to duplicate here – the first “o” has an upside-down U shape over it. I’ve approximated it with a tilde). This alone should have alerted me to pay closer attention to the label, but the words “pure” and “chocolate” were so seductive that I didn’t read the rest of the phrase: “food bar”. That’s like “orange fruit drink” and we all know what resemblance to good old OJ that bears.
There was something about the heft of the bar in my hand that did make me feel some trepidation when unwrapping it, so I can’t say I was completely unprepared for the horror, although I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a smell so pungent in association with something I’m expecting to be a delicious treat.
After this bite, it was into the bin
As you can see, it looks as though a wombat had been subsisting on a diet of nuts and berries, and had suffered somewhat as they passed through. In fact, the appearance combined with the smell sent me back to the label to check that I hadn’t accidentally picked up some sort of animal laxative.
Organic. No added sugar. 90% raw. Non-GMO. Gluten free. Dairy free. Soy free. Vegan. Kosher.
Note: it doesn’t say that it’s not a laxative designed for medium-to-large dogs. I took a (tentative) bite. It was hideous. HID. E. OUS. Even if it had been crafted by the soft hands of Masterchef’s Andre, I could not have brought myself to swallow.
According to the label ,
Chocolate has been celebrated throughout time as a food of joy and enlightenment and now the makers of LÄRABAR® pass on the gift of JÕCALAT® to you.
See what they did there? They talk about chocolate in terms of “joy” and “enlightenment”… but give us Jõcalat! Classic bait’n'switch. Consumer Affairs would be able to do nothing for me.
Please, FoodWorks (if that’s even your real name), bring back the Whittaker’s Peanut Slab!
Choose this one!
NOT this one.
1. In fact “pure brown” – with apologies to Blackadder’s Lord Percy – would be the only honest way Lärabar could market this elementally nasty product. Using any variation on the word “chocolate” is just mean.
