I am such a big fan of Quartz! Check out all of the variations of black at Silestone. They also have a great article about Quartz vs. Granite. Here's the link. Quartz vs. Granite (Silestone) Good luck with you project & hope this info is helpful!

Amanda, there have been some threads reporting problems with the Quartz matte finishes. I don't think they were the MSI brand though. I also recall someone installing one but I don't think we heard back about how it's holding up.

From what I've read on this forum for a couple years, there is no advantage to quartz over granite per se, across the board, in terms of durability or maintenance. Also, I don't recall any complaints from people with leathered finish granite. They seem to love it. I had polished granite installed two years ago and it hasn't required resealing yet. Totally easy to maintain.

I think you're safe getting granite, if that's what you prefer.

Have you considered black soapstone? It's so beautiful and looks great lathered. I personally am not a fan of quartz, so I would go with the granite.

Don't know about any of those products, but I have leathered steel grey granite in my kitchen and I adore it! It may not be black enough for what you want, but I like how sometimes it looks really dark charcoal and other times it looks medium grey.
I really do love the feel of leathered granite though, and it's super easy to clean and to keep looking clean... doesn't show fingerprints but you can still see crumbs easily to wipe them up. (I couldn't easily see crumbs with my previous granite counter, you'd wipe and think it was clean until you ran your bare hand across it and got all grossed out by what was left behind...)
Here's a before/after photo montage of our remodeled kitchen.

Skmom, everytime I see you post I fall more in love with your kitchen! You and your hubs did such a beautiful job!

Thank you SO much dtrivino!! It's truly my dream kitchen now!

I have honed Steel Gray granite. Love it! I don't see fingerprints or have any of the issues people report having with honed Absolute Black granite. I haven's seen any reports of similar problems with leathered AB so that's definitely the better choice of the two.

DH and I looked at several leathered black/dark gray stones. Cambrian Black is really nice and a blacker stone than Steel Gray. Ditto for Black Pearl in a leathered or honed finish. Dark stones are very dense so are generally considered bullet proof.

We also considered honed quartz but, as barncatz posted, people reported issues with honed quartz (wasn't as stain resistant, showed finger prints). No idea if that's still the case. Pentalquartz has a softer appearance than other quartz brands so we considered one of their choices but in the end, DH and I liked honed Steel Gray the best.

We had it sealed (DuPont 15 yr sealer) but an unsealed sample was very stain resistant during my testing.

We did not want a solid looking black stone so our choice may not be right for you but we're very happy with it.

black shows everything, i have it in a spare bathroom, if i could do it again i would get something else. white also shows everything, we have them at my office and they are terrible. u might want to get something with a little pattern.

In reference to “showing everything” I had a counter with a pattern to “hide” crumbs and dust and HATED it because I really never knew when it was clean...I would obsessively wipe it down. So I think it’s really personal preference on that front

We had matte black Richlite in our previous house, and it was really black and really matte, if that is what you are after.