Hand-scatteredOrigin: France
L'Impériale

Dark chocolate with almonds, pistachios and dried apricots

€18,00
€18,00
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Almonds from Iraq, pistachios from Iran and apricots from Armenia meet on a Valrhona dark chocolate in a generous creation, imagined as an Oriental reinterpretation of the famous French ‘mendiant’.

Net weight: 100 g

1000 IN STOCK
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Description

Composition & Ingrédients

Utilisation & Conservation

Nutrition & Allergènes

L'Impériale – tablette et étui
L'Impériale – texture
L'Impériale – étui
  • L'Impériale – tablette et étui
  • L'Impériale – texture
  • L'Impériale – étui
L'Impériale – tablette et étui
L'Impériale – texture
L'Impériale – étui

Our craftsmanship

The selection

three fruits, three terroirs: almonds from Iraq, pistachios from Iran and dried apricots from Armenia, selected for how their flavours complement one another.

The pour

the 70% dark chocolate is poured into bars to achieve a smooth, glossy texture and a clean snap once crystallised.

The scattering

before the chocolate sets, almonds, pistachios and pieces of apricot are scattered by hand over each bar. The fruit makes up nearly a fifth of the recipe, giving every square a generous mosaic of colours, flavours and textures.

The creation

imagined by Artisans du Levant with the expertise of Valrhona's chocolatiers, L'Impériale reinterprets the traditional French mendiant through the emblematic fruits of three lands of the Orient.

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A profusion of flavours

L'Impériale lives up to its name. Inspired by the richness of the ancient lands of the Orient, it brings together on a single chocolate a generous mosaic of fruit: almonds from Iraq, pistachios from Iran and apricots from Armenia. In every square, the crunch of the almonds and pistachios meets the soft, lightly tangy apricot, on a dark chocolate made from cocoa beans from Brazil and Ghana. Nearly a fifth of the bar is devoted to fruit and nuts: a generosity that is visible before it is even tasted.

The mendiant takes the road to the Orient

L'Impériale revisits the traditional French mendiant, that treat where nuts and candied fruit are set upon chocolate. Artisans du Levant has imagined an interpretation from afar: the fruits change, the terroirs meet, and the mendiant takes the road to the Orient. A way of bringing together, in a single square, several lands, several harvests and several stories.

An Artisans du Levant × Valrhona creation

Developed with the expertise of Valrhona's chocolatiers, the recipe was designed so that every ingredient keeps its own personality. The dark chocolate, intense yet balanced, becomes the connecting thread of the tasting: it sets off the nuts, complements the apricot's natural acidity, and ties the different textures together without ever masking them.

Tasting notes

An intense, well-balanced dark chocolate. The crunch of almonds and pistachios. The soft, lightly tangy apricot. A tasting rich in textures, where the intensity of the cacao meets the full generosity of the fruits of the Orient.

Did you know?

In France, chocolatiers call these small chocolate discs studded with nuts and dried fruit ‘mendiants’. Their name is said to reference the four great mendicant orders of the Middle Ages, the colour of their robes having been linked to that of the four traditional toppings: almond for the Carmelites, raisin for the Dominicans, hazelnut for the Augustinians, and dried fig for the Franciscans. L'Impériale reinvents this tradition by taking the road to the Orient: in place of the classic mendiant's fruit come almonds from Iraq, pistachios from Iran and apricots from Armenia. A great classic of French chocolate-making that, for the length of a bar, travels to the Levant.

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