Usumoegi 50% is a bean-to-bar milk chocolate produced by Rico Kagurazaka, designed to highlight a balanced relationship between cacao intensity and creamy dairy notes. With 50% cacao content, the chocolate offers a smooth, velvety texture and moderate sweetness while still allowing the character of the cacao to remain present.
Its flavor profile combines gentle cocoa bitterness with soft milky tones and subtle hints of nuts and light fruit, creating a rounded and approachable taste. The chocolate is crafted through a bean-to-bar process, meaning that the cacao beans are processed in-house from roasting to the finished bar in order to preserve the natural aroma of the cacao.
Rico sources cacao from farms that avoid herbicides, pesticides, and chemical fertilizers, reflecting the company’s emphasis on clean ingredients and responsible sourcing.
Producer
Rico Kagurazaka is a small artisanal chocolate and pastry shop located in Tokyo’s Kagurazaka district, led by pastry chef Riko Onuki. The concept of the shop is centered on producing chocolate and confections in small batches, with a strong focus on the quality of cacao beans and minimal use of additives.
A key element of their philosophy is the bean-to-bar approach, in which chocolate is crafted entirely from cacao beans to the finished bar, allowing the natural aromas and complexity of cacao to be preserved. The cacao used is sourced from farms that avoid herbicides, pesticides, and chemical fertilizers, with some beans coming from Taiwan and recognized among high-quality cacao selections.
In addition to chocolate bars, the shop also offers baked sweets such as canelés, financiers, sablé cookies, and orangettes, prepared with carefully selected ingredients including organic Japanese flour and unrefined sugar. One of their central product lines is the “Cacao Impression” series, designed to highlight different flavor profiles of cacao through varying cacao percentages.
The style of the products reflects a Japanese aesthetic of simplicity and precision, focusing on clean flavors and a balanced expression of sweetness, bitterness, and subtle fruity cacao notes.