Monday, January 14, 2013

Limited Edition Ritter Sport Amarena Cherry

Ritter Sport Limited Edition Amarena CherryRitter Sport, the German chocolate company, has really stepped up its game in North America. Not only do we get a large array of their inventive and good quality bars, they’re also delivering some of the fun limited editions that were once just for their European consumers.

For winter this year they presented the Limited Edition Ritter Sport Amarena Cherry. The bar features Milk chocolate filled with cherry flavored cream and wafer pieces. The wrapper shows a vanilla and cherry ripple ice cream cone and a couple of ripe cherries next to it.

I’ve recently become more familiar with preserved cherries, as I’ve been introduced to Luxardo Maraschino Cherries. They’re quite good and don’t resemble those strange, translucent pink things that come on top of cheap ice cream Sundaes in the United States. These are tiny little nearly black balls of syrup saturated cherries. They taste like fruit, they taste like sugar and there’s a little alcoholic bite to them (well, that could be because I usually find them at the bottom of a Mahnattan). They’ve changed my mind about preserved cherries and even the origin of the fake cherry flavor.

Ritter Sport Amarena Cherry

While that’s all delightful fun, the reality was a bit less than enticing. The first ingredient is sugar (not chocolate) which is okay when there’s a lot of filling. But the second ingredient is palm oil. Somewhere down near the bottom of the list is real morello cherry puree and morello cherry juice concentrate, which is comforting.

The actual construction of the bar is rather like the ice cream on the wrapper - it’s a firm cream center that has a light cherry flavor to it and then some little freeze dried cherry bits (that are a bit tangy) and the wafer bits which are like a crumbled up wafer cone.

Ritter Sport Amarena Cherry

The bar smells an awful lot like cherry flavor. Good cherry flavor, but still ... not very chocolatey. The milk chocolate shell is smooth and creamy but very sweet. The cream center is less sweet, less smooth but much more cherry. The high point are the little crunchies, which might be the freeze dried fruit or the wafer. Either one is good.

The entire thing is just not for me. Too sweet, too much fat without feeling like it was creamy. Instead it was too cherry. If you’re looking for a very cherry bar, well, this might be yours. I’ll go back to my Espresso bar, which I also bought on the same trip.

Ritter Sport sources their cacao almost exclusively from Central and South America and has several initiatives regarding sustainability for their ingredients and energy usage in manufacturing. The bar itself may contain traces of peanuts and tree nuts and contains soy, wheat and dairy.

Related Candies

  1. Christopher’s Big Cherry - Dark
  2. Ritter Sport 100th Anniversary Edel-Nuss Mix + Bonus Previews
  3. Limited Edition Ritter Sport Winter Kreation + Factory Store
  4. Ritter Sport Milk Chocolate with Strawberry Creme
  5. Nestle Cherry Raisinets
  6. Ritter Sport White Chocolate with Hazelnuts
  7. 3 Musketeers Cherry & Raspberry
  8. Cherry Cordial Creme Kisses


Name: Amarena Cherry Milk Chocolate Bar
    RATING:
  • SUPERB
  • YUMMY
  • TASTY
  • WORTH IT
  • TEMPTING
  • PLEASANT
  • BENIGN
  • UNAPPEALING
  • APPALLING
  • INEDIBLE
Brand: Ritter Sport
Place Purchased: Target (Eagle Rock)
Price: $2.09
Size: 3.5 ounces
Calories per ounce: 164
Categories: All Natural, Candy, Ritter Sport, Chocolate, Cookie, Limited Edition, 6-Tempting, Germany, Target

POSTED BY Cybele AT 3:47 pm Tracker Pixel for Entry     All NaturalCandyReviewRitter SportChocolateCookieLimited Edition6-TemptingGermanyTarget

Comments
  1. I was really disappointed with this bar. I could barely pick up any cherry flavor. Now, the Milka cherry creme bar… that’s incredible.

    Comment by Lauren on 1/14/13 at 4:20 pm #
  2. You are a bit late, this was one of the summer bars for 2012 wink In winter, there were the flavours “Kokosmakrone”, “Gebrannte Mandeln” and “Dunkle Nugatcreme”. By now, they have realesd the spring bars.

    Comment by Jenny on 1/14/13 at 9:13 pm #
  3. Ritter pulled out of a major project in Nicaragua so the sourcing seems to be in a state of flux.

    Comment by Jason on 1/15/13 at 8:00 am #
  4. Cybele's avatar

    Jenny - yes, as I mentioned, Ritter is releasing them in the US with American labeling. We can sometimes get the Summer flavors at import shops. I covered more about that last summer when Ritter made the announcement. I’m sure the German market will always have the best flavors.

    Jason - thanks for the heads up. Their website is rather vague at the moment. Their German version is a bit more detailed, but it takes me more time to read it and understand it. I know that they don’t source in Africa, so there are fewer issues of slavery.

    Lauren - I haven’t seen the Milka bar, but I haven’t found a shop that has a good selection.

    Comment by Cybele on 1/15/13 at 8:13 am #
  5. Yep, ISM fair here soon! 27-30 january. Are you going there?
    cheers.

    Comment by J.L. on 1/15/13 at 8:22 am #
  6. Atomic Fire Balls rule no matter what!

    Comment by Bob Gibson on 1/24/13 at 11:45 am #
  7. Have you seen the new Rittersport flavor that has only three squares across? I got mine today without noticing and was quite disappointed when I opened the package. The squares are larger and I don’t think the bar is any less but I find that the fourths are a nicer portion than the thirds…
    http://www.rittersport.co.uk/#/en_GB/100g_cocoa_mousse/on_stage

    Comment by Rose on 3/08/13 at 8:26 am #
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