Tempus Fugit Crème de Cacao. Crème de Cacao might conjure up thoughts of sugary, sickly sweet cocktails…some type of liquified candy bar…or some artificially scented “chocolate” flavoring…well, this bottle couldn’t be further from all that.

This is the pinnacle of cacao sophistication. It’s like eating a 70% cacao dark chocolate bar when all you’ve ever tasted before were Snickers bars. Tempus Fugit Spirits focuses on recreating historic liqueurs, and have made this based on a 19th century recipe. The base spirit is distilled with raw cacao, and it’s then infused with more cacao and aromatic vanilla beans.

The flavor is rich and velvety sweet, and the color is naturally amber (from the infusion with real ingredients). It does not scream “chocolate,” but is very distinctly cacao with deep almost bitter/spicy-like complexity. If you’ve ever had cacao nibs and compared it to chocolate chips, that’s what I mean between chocolate and cacao.

Because the flavor is so cacao-like (as opposed to chocolate-like), it makes it a very versatile ingredient in many cocktails to add depth. I avoided crème de cacao for years after early days owning too much of the crappy cheap stuff, and am thoroughly happy to now have this in my collection.

(ps if anyone ever wondered about the difference b/w cacao and cocoa…basically cacao is a less heat-processed form of cocoa, both made from cacao seeds).

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