The Perfect Vegan Milk Chocolate Bar

Raaka’s smooth, rich, milky chocolate for vegans is a huge hit.

When Red Hook, Brooklyn’s Raaka Chocolate first released their coconut milk bar in 2014, they gave it the name “Vegan Mylk.” But it didn’t stick. “We quickly learned that was a pretty unappetizing name for it,” brand manager William Mullan tells me, “so it was named ‘Coconut Milk’ later that year.”

That name has proven to be a hit, and it is — in my opinion — the best vegan milk chocolate bar on the market. The smooth, single-origin Dominican cacao from Zorzal that Raaka uses goes unroasted, like all their chocolate, which shows off notes of berry in its terroir. The company calls it a “dark milk chocolate,” because of its 60 percent cacao, but it has a smooth, rich, and milky flavor.

It was among the first of its kind on the market, too. “At the time, there really wasn’t much vegan milk-style chocolate out there, and we’re pretty sure there were none using coconut,” says Mullan. “Most importantly, there wasn’t a vegan milk-style chocolate that could compete with the rich mouthful of dairy milk chocolate and still be of interest to folks who wanted something with the complexity of a darker bar as well.”

The balance of milkiness and deep chocolate flavor has consistently made it one of their top three…