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Next week I'll be in Paris for a day. It'll be my first time, and I'm skipping the landmarks and museums in favor of chocolate shops. Any advice from those familiar with the scene would be appreciated. I'm currently planning to visit Patrick Roger, Jacques Genin, Jean-Paul Hevin and Michel Chaudun. I might stop at Maison if I pass one, but I can always find them in NY.

Any other places I should include? For those with more than one shop, is there a particular location I should visit? Is it feasible to walk the whole way or should I plan on taking the Metro? Helpful chocolate vocabulary? Thanks!

So, I went to Max Brenner in Philly for the first time, today. I decided I'm going to try to review what I have their. That way I can keep track (have something new every time), learn about chocolate, and feel like I have a good excuse to spend that much money on food.

I ordered an italian thick hot chocolate. It comes in one of their hug mugs (that doesn't have a handle, and is more wedge-shaped than round). I expected it to be really thick, like sipping chocolate (basically a melted chocolate bar), but it wasn't. It was thicker than regular hot chocolate, but I think that was due more to the cream in it.

I got the milk chocolate (other choices were dark, and white). It came very hot, but I was able to sip it with my spoon. Very smooth, warm flavor, that reminded me of chocolate pudding cake straight from the oven. Know how chocolate baked goods have that different flavor when they're hot enough to give you a severe burn? It had that quality, which I enjoy thoroughly.

But I was so excited to try using the hug mug for what it was designed for. After being burnt once or twice (I have a lower tolerance for heat than most people), it was finally cool enough that I didn't have to hold it on the wedge-shaped plate it came on. So, I sipped the warm, creamy drink, and was happy with the result.

Though it wasn't the most chocolaty drink, I thought it was very pleasantly flavored. If I try the italian thick hot chocolate again, I'll go for the dark, to see if it has stronger flavor.

For about $6 plus tip, I thought it was worth the try.

What next? Maybe the truffle, I'm not certain yet.

Has anyone else had this? What did you think about it? Is there something out there that's like this, only better? Share your thoughts! Blogs are no fun without comments!

Two days ago, I attempted to make chocolate from home grown beans.
I live in the tropics - Trinidad - where some of the world's best cocoa beans allegedly come from and have quite a bit of cacao trees on the land left from a time that Cadbury owned the entire area. My husband and I decided that it was time to rehabilitate the existing trees and replant new ones and we ended up with quite a bit of cocoa pods. the seeds were picked, fermented and sun-dried in our good, HOT and dry weather that we are experiencing now and we ended up with about 100 lbs for the first set.
I decided to try a home made batch. I roasted the beans on my stove top and shelled them after finding a recipe on line for 80% dark chocolate. It was fairly simple - put 8 pts beans and 2 pts sugar in a grinder and grind. Well, I used my Magic Bullet, but it seems to be on the way out (and now I think it's dead). I added some mexican vanilla, cardamom, a pinch of nutmeg, and some cinnamon and tried to "mortar and pestle" it. The end result was quite good - a chocolate with a nutty flavour and not too bitter. It formed a good bar that was pretty tasty! But all in all, better for making hot drinking chocolate.
Now I need some proper equipment for my next try. Any suggestions for me?

I am working on a project for Conservacion y Desarollo (CyD) here in Ecuador. The project is related to physical, chemical and organoleptic analysis of Ecuadorian cacao. There are 11 growers associations from various regions of Ecuador participating in the project. INIAP (instituto nacional de investigaciones agro-pecuarios) is also involved in the project and we are using their cacao laboratory in Quevedo. INIAP is akin to the dept. of agriculture.

My first assignment was to head to Guayaquil to a presentation of cacao processing machinery put on through the Italian embassy on the 16th of December 2009. It was in some ways disappointing. Basically the presentation was a sales pitch for large industrial Italian machines complete with various bank representatives who would eagerly provide financing. Most of the equipment was for large scale industrial enterprises and out of the reach of most of the growers associations. There is a lack of availability of machines for smaller scale processing. This is an opportunity that equipment manufacturers are overlooking. At any rate the event was worthwhile and I did meet some interesting people.

After the event I visited some farms and centros de acopia (collection centers where fermentation and drying take place) and spent a few days discussing post harvest techniques and cacao in Ecuador in general.
I then spent the last week and a half of 2009 travelling up the coast of Ecuador visiting small beach towns before getting back to work in January.

I was happy to have had the chance to meet Jeff from Aequare Chocolates in Quito, Ecuador. We came in contact with eachother through Thechocolatelife, arranged to meet up at his shop and spent an afternoon sampling his delicious creations and discussing cacao, chocolate and Ecuador. Since then he has been helpful with advice and putting me in contact with other people in the cacao world here in Ecuador. I hope to visit with him again when I go back to Quito and am also sending him samples of the different batches of cacao licor that we are making in the cacao lab.

Next I was sent to spend a week with a growers association in Vinces, Ecuador. The association, APOV (associacion de productores organicos de Vinces), is one of the smaller associations involved in the project. There are approximatly 250 member producers, the majority of which have less than 10 hectares under cultivation. APOV is working in unison with the Universidad de Guayaquil and there are several students doing cacao related studies with them. I spent the week getting to know the people involved and helping to improve their fermentation and drying processes. APOV faces several obstacles including a shortage of resources to invest in infrastructure. Also, they are at peak harvest time in terms of quantity and are working hard. We did several tests batches of fermentation, experimenting with various influencing factors such as time, quantity, and technique. The samples from those tests are drying as I type this and Im looking forward to analysing the results.

After my time with APOV I returned to Quevedo and experimental farms and cacao laboratory at the INIAP center. INIAP has recently renovated and refurbished the cacao laboratory.

February 2010 has been a busy month thus far and I have been visiting growers associations in the Bolivar, Orellana and Sucumbios provinces of Ecuador. At each association I meet with the administrative staff and visit centros de acopio where the post harvest processes (fermentation, drying, sorting by size and storage) are carried out.

This month Ive visited the associations CORAGRICACE, UCOCS, and San Carlos. The associations are at differing levels of development. Some have good infrastructure and good post harvest processes in place (fermentation, drying, traceability). Fermentation is one of the key post harvest processes we are looking at and providing consultation and capacity building, helping to implement good fermentation techniques.

Some of the associations have certification as organic, fairtrade, and/or Rainforest Alliance while others have no certifications or are in the process of getting certifications. There is a wide range of feeling about certification programs among the growers associations and the burden of payment for certification and annual recertification.

I am currently writing association profiles that associations can use to promote themselves and find markets for their cacao and/or other products. The associations involved in this project are:

-APOV. (Asociacion de Productores Organicos de Vinces) in the Los Rios province.

-Buena Suerte. Guayas Province.

-Fedecade. (Federacion Nacional de Productores de Cacao del Ecuador). Guayas Province.

-UCOCS. (Union Cantonal de Organizaciones de Participacion por la Justicia del Canton las Naves) Bolivar province.

-San Carlos. Orellana Province.

-Miss Ecuador. Sucumbios Province.

-Forteleza del Valle. Manabi Province.

-COCPE. Esmeraldas Province.

-APROCA (Asociacion de Productores de Cacao Organico del Canton Atacames.) Esmeraldas Province.

-Eloy Alfaro. Esmeraldas Province.

-CORAGRICACE

These associations represent a large geographical area of Ecuador. As I continue to get to know the associations and the people involved I will add to the profiles I am writing. If anyone is interested in learning more and/or getting in contact with the associations I will send you the profiles and help connect you directly.

We are still in the early stages of this project and are doing analysis of cacao, later this summer we will be processing the beans and making chocolate which the individual growers associations will then use to promote their product and seek markets.

I made impish chocolate cupcakes with a black current balsalmic ganache and since, Ive kind of had it with the snow and decided to get away for the weekendsort ofIm going to be at TheStockton Market. Featured on Bucks County Taste , you can see whats there, is amazing. Have you been there yet? Its like a European Market as you wander through the aisle and appreciate the Artisanal quality goods of local business. Its warm with the lighting filtering in from the outside and the variety of things to buy is growing each
weekend. When youre done shopping you can go through to the River Arts Gallery and see what brings a lot of people to the area-inspiration and the creative spirit channeled into art of all kinds. Its easy to imagine that youre
somewhere else when youre in the Market, because it buzzes with energy and life.

So The Chocolate Bar and The Chocolate Muse are getting away...

At The Chocolate Experience in Mexico City I was presented what has to be the most unusual cacao pod I have ever seen. This pod was on the stand of CACEP, a co-operative in the Tabasco area of Chiapas and was described to me as "cacao prehispanico." Or, a type of cacao pod that existed before the Spanish arrived in Mesoamerica. The person who showed this to me is the manager of marketing and eco-tourism for CACEP and he explained that the pod came from the Hacienda Jesus Maria (in Tabasco), and is quite common.

So, I was reading a little about how to describe flavors of chocolate. It makes a lot of sense. I think I could do pretty well with chocolate if I tried. (Well, for a beginner, anyway.)

But it got me to thinking about flavors that I have trouble describing. They're not usually in chocolate, but I thought maybe you might know something about it. No one ever knows what I'm talking about and they deny these flavors exist, but I'll give it a shot anyway.

There's one thing in particular that I'm thinking of right now. It's a flavor in yogurt and cheesecake. It lingers on the back of my tongue. I don't like it. Some people try to tell me it's tang, I'm just not certain. Maybe I'm confusing tang with tart, because when I think tang, I think fruit flavors. It's almost something I would describe as acidic. Whatever it is, I find it unpleasant enough to be unable to eat those foods.

And I just remembered another. There's a very distinct flavor associated with anything I've eaten that comes from the sea. It tastes the way the fish section in the grocery store smells. But when I tell people that a particular fish is fishy, they tell me I'm crazy. Apparently they can't taste something that I can't get past. Does that happen? Do I have some sort of extra strong tastebuds, or does no one else pay that much attention to what they're eating. I just can't change it. I try so hard to eat fishy or yogurty foods because I want to fit in with everyone, but I just can't stomach it. It actually does make social gatherings challenging.

Anyway, I'm trying to learn more about this sort of thing. Thanks for reading!

Edit:

I remembered another. Mushrooms have a very distinctive flavor that I can't describe. Some say 'earthy', but I don't think that's it. It's relatively subtle - almost undetectable - in the beginning, then it finishes strong with this flavor. If you cook with mushrooms, this flavor does not get transfered to the rest of the food. Sorry, that's the best I can do right now. Maybe if I taste more kinds of food, I'll get a better feel for it.

All this snow and these blizzards have me wondering...

What's the best chocolate ice cream?

One of my favorites (though not too fancy) is Bryers Vanilla Fudge Swirl. But I haven't been able to find it lately.

How about the best hot chocolate?

You can make a difference with your pocket book. I recommend choosing Valentine's Day gifts that are made responsibly and sustainably. Of course I am going to offer up our delicious Rich Rainforest Dark Gourmet Fudge from Earth's Sweet Pleasures , but I would also like to add two gift companies that carry all natural, organic and fair-trade products: It's Only Natural Gifts and Kate's Caring Gifts . There are also many organizations and charities that you can donate to in honor of your loved one. For example, support The Rainforest Alliance , an organization that helps to keep our rainforests alive, and this is where the cacao farmers are. Also, if you are concerned about human welfare, Mercy Corps is one of the best organizations I've found. They are on the ground in Haiti right now. You can also plant a tree for your loved one. Visit the Arbor Day Foundation . The lists go on and on, but these are three of my favorites. You can visit my blog Chocolate Fudge Cafe for more ideas.

I am wondering if any of you can shed some light on this new company:

http://www.originalbeans.com/

I recently purchased a few bars to taste and consider using at chocolate tastings that we host and I am unable to determine basic things about the bars, like where they are made?! Very surprisingly this information is nowhere to be found on their packaging.

I am hoping some of you might be able to shed some light on this company, their tree planting feature, who the people behind the company are... anything!

Thanks!

Sunita de Tourreil
co-Founder Chocolate Dividends
www.chocolatedividends.org/