tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-44255352598140415182024-02-02T14:09:11.167-08:00Mostly About Chocolatedocofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.comBlogger30125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-35651381415821459872013-06-01T21:41:00.002-07:002013-06-01T21:41:08.153-07:00Mott Green, the first of the chocolate artisans<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Many people in the chocolate world will have many things to
say about <a href="http://www.businessgrenada.com/mott.html" target="_blank">Mott Green</a> in these coming days I am sure, but I wanted to say some
of my own.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Every time I get up in front of a group of people—one of
my own classes, or a talk at a chocolate shop, or a crowd at the festival—and
say anything about artisanal chocolate in the US today, my story always starts
with Mott.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">“There was this guy, Mott Green,” I say, “and he was buying these
old machines, and figuring out how to make chocolate with them, all by himself,
before anyone else had even thought of it. Mott was the first.”</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">And
then my
story goes on, and I talk about how this industry has flourished and how
we
live in an extraordinary moment in the history of chocolate. About how
the growing
numbers of chocolate artisans today are people who dreamed something
wild—to make
chocolate, with their hands, maybe even in a garage or a backyard at
first—who have the courage to bring their creation into the world so we
can really taste
this fruit. Somewhere in all that, whether the maker knew him or not,
Mott
was part of the inspiration. He dreamed it, and did it, and it seemed
like it
made him really happy. Mott was the person who actually up and went to
live on
a tropical island to make chocolate bars. Who among us would dare to
live so well?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I just emailed him the other day. He was looking forward to
coming back for the NW Chocolate Festival in September, but surely not as much
as Brian and I were looking forward to having him here again. We loved Mott,
and getting to spend time with him outside the madness of the festival was one
of the best parts of doing the thing. The moment I remember most fondly from
last fall was stealing into the lecture hall where we were screening the
documentary <a href="http://nothinglikechocolate.com/" target="_blank"><i>Nothing Like Chocolate</i>,</a> to sit in the back of the room next to Mott
and watch him watch himself on the big screen. The film shows him making
chocolate, but also just being himself, having a life and friends and loves in
Grenada. Whenever something personal was about to come up, he’d warn me
first—“Ok, this part is really about me . . . I don’t know why people would
want to see this, but Kum-Kum [the filmmaker] said it had to be in there,” and
he’d look shy and embarrassed.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">But really the whole thing was about Mott—the chocolate, and
the people who were part of his work in Grenada, and the factory, and the boat
that sailed his chocolate to people like me who ate it, happily, all the time.
All of that was Mott’s own dream come to life. I am grateful to have celebrated
that with him, but right now filled with grief that such a tragic accident took
him out of our world.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Thank you, Mott, for friendship and chocolate.</span></span></div>
docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-68576892605215204982012-11-05T21:25:00.000-08:002012-11-05T21:25:35.168-08:00Divine Chocolate: Ads with a VisionWhen I was on my year of doctoral fieldwork, after eight months on the cocoa farms of Asia-Pacific and Ghana, I traveled to London to study the consumer end of the chocolate trade. Having done some work with <a href="http://www.kuapakokoo.com/" target="_blank">Kuapa Kokoo</a> cooperative in Ghana, which owns nearly half shares in <a href="http://www.divinechocolate.com/siteselect.aspx" target="_blank">Divine Chocolate</a> in Britain, I arranged to meet with Sophi Tranchell, Divine's Managing Director.<br />
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We met in the conference room for our interview. Around the room, tacked up on the walls and resting on easels, were the most intriguing photographs of cocoa farmers I had ever seen. Quite unlike typical portrayals of farmers in Britain or the US, which show poor but hardworking men and women growing cocoa, the women gracing Divine's conference room walls were attractive fashionistas, wearing glamorous outfits and standing confidently in sassy poses. In their hands, they were holding pieces of chocolate.<br />
<br />
My eyes locked on these images. Never before had I seen a cocoa farmer - much less a <i>female</i> cocoa farmer - depicted as a sophisticated cosmopolitan, enjoying a luxurious piece of chocolate. In Western media, it is the norm to portray African farmers as people in need of <i>help</i>, whose material poverty seems like their single enduring, defining feature. Not so with these images.<br />
<br />
I asked Sophi where the posters had come from, and she explained that they were a part of an advertising campaign that had, at the time, just begun in British newspapers, including <i>The</i> <i>Guardian</i>, and women's magazines, such as <i>Elle</i> and <i>OK!</i> In Ghana, I had seen that West African women are highly regarded for their fashion sensibility, business acumen, and market prominence. I welcomed these ads, which showed that reality. Right away, I wanted to take the posters home, to explore and analyze this representation of African farmers as luxury consumers and fashionable business owners.<br />
<br />
Sophi did send me back to my flat with a stack of the ads, and for many months afterwards I pored over them, crafting a chapter of my dissertation based on their intrigue. Then I defended, stowed my dissertation away, and did not look at the images, my favorite data from my fieldwork, for some time.<br />
<br />
Just last week, my latest thoughts on these images were published in the <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/action/showAxaArticles?journalCode=cjac20" target="_blank"><i>Journal of African Cultural Studies</i></a>, in an article entitled: <i>"</i>Cosmopolitan cocoa farmers: Refashioning Africa in Divine Chocolate advertisements." The abstract is below. It was a joy to see this work in print! I hope you will take a moment to check it out. The wonderful images -- and all that they represent about the women of Ghana's cocoa industry -- are thought-provoking indeed.<br />
<br />
Journal of African Cultural Studies<br />
<a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/action/showAxaArticles?journalCode=cjac20">http://www.tandfonline.com/action/showAxaArticles?journalCode=cjac20</a> <br />
<br />
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Abstract<br />
This article concerns a beguiling set of advertisements for Divine Chocolate that feature women<br />cocoa farmers from Ghana, which recently appeared in British magazines and newspapers. In<br />contrast to representations of African women as exotic icons of ‘traditional’ cultures or leaders<br />of progressive development schemes, the Divine advertisements depict farmers as<br />cosmopolitan consumers of luxury goods and owners of the chocolate company. By<br />representing these Ghanaian women as glamorous business owners, the images invite<br />viewers to see them as potent actors in transnational exchanges of cocoa and chocolate, and<br />as beneficiaries of these exchanges, in contrast to analyses that focus on market exploitation<br />by the nation state or corporate actors. The images pose a challenge to narratives that cast<br />Africa as continually on the losing side of harmful binaries – primitive/civilized, traditional/<br />modern – and in an eternal developmental lag. Instead, they offer an alluring female figure<br />that envisions and promotes Africa’s roles in industrial production and luxury consumption.<br />Through a complex rendering of Ghanaian women farmers as attractive, socially mobile<br />beneficiaries of their own development efforts, the adverts invite connections among people<br />who grow, sell, and consume luxuries like chocolate, across a visual gulf that is often too<br />vast to bridge.<br />
----------docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-33668107516903797592012-04-02T16:10:00.000-07:002012-04-02T16:10:25.380-07:00First attempt at mendiants, partial successI have had it in my plans for some time now to make a batch of homemade mendiants, to give away to my friends and thus increase their earthly joy.<br />
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First, I commissioned the vessels. My friend Ken made them by hand from single pieces of scrap wood.<br />
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Then, I decided which friends would get chocolates. Obviously Kerry now knows that she is among the fortunate.<br />
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I stopped in Lake Forest Park on my way home from teaching in Bothell one afternoon, and picked up decorations from my friend Bill Fredericks, the <a href="http://www.chocolateman.com/" target="_blank">Chocolate Man</a>.<br />
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Mendiants (French for "beggar") have pretty little bits of edible decor on them. I got white chocolate curls, cocoa nibs, Crispearls (by Callebaut), crumbled biscuit flakes, and Himalayan pink salt. Also dried cranberries and mango, which I thought would add nice color. Then I chose the chocolate.<br />
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<br />
I used some of my supply of Fortunato #4, the lost chocolate of Peru, sourced by my friend Dan Pearson at <a href="http://www.maranonchocolate.com/" target="_blank">Maranon Chocolate</a>. It's a 68%, delicately flavored, fragile dark.<br />
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Many weeks passed. First I was going to make Valentine's chocolates, but then I had to move into a new apartment. Then I thought I would make vernal equinox chocolates, but I had to unpack all my boxes in the new apartment. Over the weekend I suddenly realized that I had two waking hours not sailing/running/climbing/diving/teaching/bus-riding/writing, and I thought, aha! It's time to make the chocolates.<br />
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It was my first attempt outside the Callebaut Chocolate Academy to make such marvels, unaided. I tempered the chocolate, using Callebaut's revolutionary crystallized cocoa butter, <a href="http://www.mycryo.com/" target="_blank">Mycryo</a> (awkward word for what is actually an attractive, handy product), so that my mendiants would be nice and shiny. I did my parchment test - et voila, it set nicely! Then I filled a piping bag with the tempered chocolate and began piping out my circles.<br />
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The first few came out looking almost like mendiants.<br />
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They were nearly circular, and the decorations vaguely representative of the artful designs I had imagined for my creations.<br />
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Then I began to realize that making mendiants at the Callebaut Academy, where I had expensive warming pans (to keep the tempered chocolate in temper), all necessary supplies, and a partner to help if need be, resulted in somewhat more attractive formations than those I could achieve by myself in my railroad-style kitchen with almost no professional gear. My mendiants became increasingly blob-like and misshapen.<br />
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I also recalled at this point that mendiants set extremely quickly, so piping even half a dozen in a row meant that the first ones were already starting to get solid by the time I got around to decorating them, so my pretty little bits starting rolling right off. Realizing this, I tried to smash handfuls of decor onto those that were setting most quickly.<br />
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Also, the tip of the piping bag became increasingly blocked with chocolate, which was thickening apace.<br />
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Desperate, I piped the remaining, setting chocolate out of the bag onto the parchment paper, never mind that it looked like brown toothpaste. I even decorated the alien-like blobs.<br />
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In the end, I've had to layer the moderately attractive chocolates on top of the hideous ones, but at least the handmade bowls are full. And they taste nice too (the chocolates, not the bowls).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyJXV_CcuHdlFAzXRSLZuae93JhyphenhyphenxymdGu0mIxfb8o5U6Ox1AnQ4xBcLmhUWTPD2NiNduY6wtMFqq0iMDYbFQiWKCi9hHarDqOyc-evPF_o2HEA3iEpFp9oW3B9iob-7LGUNHA18ff2g8/s1600/filled+dish.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyJXV_CcuHdlFAzXRSLZuae93JhyphenhyphenxymdGu0mIxfb8o5U6Ox1AnQ4xBcLmhUWTPD2NiNduY6wtMFqq0iMDYbFQiWKCi9hHarDqOyc-evPF_o2HEA3iEpFp9oW3B9iob-7LGUNHA18ff2g8/s320/filled+dish.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Check in again on Wednesday, April 4, when I'll be conversing about chocolate on the <a href="http://www.blogtalkradio.com/thehallicasserjayneshow/2012/04/04/our-love-affair-with-chocolate" target="_blank">Halli Casser Jayne show</a>, 3-4pm ET.docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-41456348061823726402012-03-08T21:28:00.000-08:002012-03-08T21:28:00.754-08:00Success at the UW Bothell Chocolate Festival!Every year at UW Bothell, I teach a class called Chocolate: A Global Inquiry. It's the only undergraduate class devoted to chocolate, and I use this food as a focus for teaching everything from global political economy to history to business management and advertising. Normally, I end the class with a fifty-question multiple-choice final examination, but this year I decided to do something different: a chocolate festival.<br />
<br />
My 38 students prepared for the entire 10-week quarter, learning about this industry and its trade. We studied industrial history, manufacture, issues of slave labor, chocolate advertisements, and even literature and film -- and by the end, I had 38 chocolate experts who were ready to be ambassadors for this food.<br />
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To prepare for the festival, each student found a single-origin chocolate and created a full flavor profile, an advertisement, and a poster. They brought all these things to our classroom yesterday morning and we set up the room festival-style, with colorful posters on display and sample trays. The UW Bothell photographer arrived with his camera. We put on a CD called Music from the Chocolate Lands by Putamayo, pushed play on a slideshow of cocoa-farm-to-chocolate-factory photos, and then we opened our doors.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW8eI1gJuOQD1k6zrcsKxR2idCKMB4zDTORSxLlrJwtOxU4c9-wanTb2DbDvYUkL-gRmrNSacQ0k4fuWLW3AgJs4dsmY53coIBPGrjk_JDoBLuuPI2UbPFHEhtIHQLIdACPyEABPSptHM/s1600/colombia+poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgW8eI1gJuOQD1k6zrcsKxR2idCKMB4zDTORSxLlrJwtOxU4c9-wanTb2DbDvYUkL-gRmrNSacQ0k4fuWLW3AgJs4dsmY53coIBPGrjk_JDoBLuuPI2UbPFHEhtIHQLIdACPyEABPSptHM/s320/colombia+poster.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Poster for Dandelion Colombia 70%</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
I really did not know what to expect after that. I had never held a chocolate festival as part of my class, and our advertising was limited to a poster created by one of my students and a few emails to the campus listserv. We also started at the early hour of 9am (typically by this time of day I have already eaten a handful of chocolate, but I realize that not everybody does this). I was nervous: What if there wasn't enough chocolate? What if there was too much chocolate? What if nobody came, and my students sat there by themselves, awkwardly, behind their lonely tables for the entire class period?<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_XY4lSpZbWuqaG8C6zeAkZ3MTBxPD-6Lz_U0WBZQ5ErMayiB2laPmkT1tmBK1g_rv9G4pEMVouX3EixD5rZwk966K7Noz3ZBDXBqV_ZIk952CJL1yRiLra7RaYxHhERFeOBBkJ3Eb5Zc/s1600/ghana+poster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_XY4lSpZbWuqaG8C6zeAkZ3MTBxPD-6Lz_U0WBZQ5ErMayiB2laPmkT1tmBK1g_rv9G4pEMVouX3EixD5rZwk966K7Noz3ZBDXBqV_ZIk952CJL1yRiLra7RaYxHhERFeOBBkJ3Eb5Zc/s320/ghana+poster.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">My favorite poster</td></tr>
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Well. As soon as we opened the doors, they came. Faculty, staff, students, librarians, friends -- everybody. Within moments the room was packed, and visitors kept pouring in. I stayed by the door, greeting new arrivals and pointing out the different world regions on display. We'd arranged the room by bean origin -- Africa, Asia-Pacific, Central America and the Caribbean, and South America. Over 40 chocolates in all, representing all the major growing regions.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1WOoIBJp_6CHtlNqgB05zuzKL_lyEIG_2NixQUjWnM4PHA7jHkRiCqkKSq8uVxDDDtoknIo5ITlUrcVwmWF3ocxgsb86qgFguFpB-9Tcrbic0LcvIl2Igppg8JXkBmKU3c89UqDEH7oQ/s1600/full+festival.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1WOoIBJp_6CHtlNqgB05zuzKL_lyEIG_2NixQUjWnM4PHA7jHkRiCqkKSq8uVxDDDtoknIo5ITlUrcVwmWF3ocxgsb86qgFguFpB-9Tcrbic0LcvIl2Igppg8JXkBmKU3c89UqDEH7oQ/s320/full+festival.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Full festival</td></tr>
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Unknown to my students, I had set up a basket near the door with different chocolate questions on little slips of paper, and encouraged festival-goers to take one and ask the question to the students. I thought it would encourage visitors and students to interact beyond the sampling, and bring an educational component to the festival in line with the class itself.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSn0y0U3b_htNpZxZLeLbp2q_LGVIYUD5GKKF8GGMe57_quUw7vYxuBWAcnlodv-zdSl0Fx8483hGNAtG-zKX0qSVwoO63BUHJgEKcK3H-YzANtXSH1lYUo_oMxH7JVz6pao23qkHeWmg/s1600/mayan+temple.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSn0y0U3b_htNpZxZLeLbp2q_LGVIYUD5GKKF8GGMe57_quUw7vYxuBWAcnlodv-zdSl0Fx8483hGNAtG-zKX0qSVwoO63BUHJgEKcK3H-YzANtXSH1lYUo_oMxH7JVz6pao23qkHeWmg/s320/mayan+temple.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Mayan temple with Mexico chocolate</td></tr>
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Let me say, I have never been more proud of a class! Dozens of people stopped to tell me that every student had expertly answered the questions, and that they learned so much about chocolate. Students led visitors like true connoisseurs through the flavor profiles of their bars ("This chocolate will give you hints of cinnamon and coconut"; "And wait for the notes of banana at the finish!") and explained everything from slave labor to the difference between white, milk, and dark. Festival-goers left with huge smiles and handfuls of samples for colleagues who could not leave their desks or classrooms.<br />
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As I ushered out the last visitors, just in time for the next class (on computer science, I think) to come in, we had a well deserved round of applause and packed up the little leftover chocolate. I don't think I have ever been so gratified by a final project. All of my students in this class are first years, and they showed themselves to be chocolate experts and enthusiasts of the highest caliber. My thanks to them for making the first annual UW Bothell Chocolate Festival a smashing success. Look for us again in 2013!<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj95Jm2r9zPmcudBtXaIv_dHCuLZC2Yn47dzOiKIhLLZ50rY4PTOTN125l_Xvmoc5svLuF5Y5Jw6In9_PZmPZgewuzGRgu5d-IjRNR9MhVwNmF31zN59jJ_JP5oPfJEZ86vxpUwhtTolYo/s1600/model+cocoa+tree.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj95Jm2r9zPmcudBtXaIv_dHCuLZC2Yn47dzOiKIhLLZ50rY4PTOTN125l_Xvmoc5svLuF5Y5Jw6In9_PZmPZgewuzGRgu5d-IjRNR9MhVwNmF31zN59jJ_JP5oPfJEZ86vxpUwhtTolYo/s320/model+cocoa+tree.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Model cocoa tree with Amano chocolate</td></tr>
</tbody></table>docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-50650296393333203812012-02-10T10:11:00.000-08:002012-02-10T10:11:11.155-08:00(Dr.) Chocolate in the newsValentine's Day approaches, so chocolate is in the news more than usual. Impeccable UW news reporter Molly McElroy has written an article about my chocolate work. Check it out!<br />
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<a href="http://www.washington.edu/news/articles/2018dr.-chocolate2019-seeks-world2019s-best-chocolate" target="_blank">'Dr. Chocolate' seeks world's best chocolate</a><br />
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And of course do your Valentine's shopping this weekend with the artisans who are making a difference in this chocolate world. My favorites, as always, include <a href="https://www.amanochocolate.com/" target="_blank">Amano</a>, <a href="http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/" target="_blank">Dandelion</a>, <a href="http://frescochocolate.com/default.aspx" target="_blank">Fresco</a>, and <a href="http://www.roguechocolatier.com/" target="_blank">Rogue</a>, and you can order from all of them online. You will be SO HAPPY you did -- and so will the lucky loved ones who get to eat your Valentine's Day presents!<br />
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<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-53765887405712408112012-01-21T07:41:00.000-08:002012-01-21T07:41:45.271-08:00Making chocolate at Callebaut<br />
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From Antarctica, to New York, Seattle, and now Chicago! I have traveled many miles in the last few weeks, but this most recent stop has been one of my favorites. For the past few days here in the Windy City, I've gotten to do something that I hardly ever get to do: make chocolate.</div>
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I've been at the Callebaut Chocolate Academy, where I created many chocolate wonders.<br />
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The first day felt like I was on Iron Chef. We table-tempered chocolate by hand, and then had to keep it crystallized all day while doing other projects. It was a lot of running back and forth, heating up the chocolate, stirring, panicking, and re-crystallizing (three times!) when it went out of temper. Stressful!<br />
<br />Most of the bonbons took several days to prepare, so one day it was measuring out ingredients, another it was pouring chocolate into the molds and making ganache, another filling and sealing and decorating. So much work goes into making one little truffle - I now have a much better understanding of why the things can cost several dollars apiece.<br />
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I also ate a lot less chocolate than I thought I would. There's just no time! Temptation abounds, but not a moment to spare for tasting. Here's some of what I did:<br />
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<img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGRb3ZA7stcPuQq52cdQ302XkhnTA0ng9guZdmuhbwDeLK4SGyUEXtv9lbr0KfjChPV9HUVAR4y0Lm6soC11viRLbhj1Ku6eW0o3n2VGjlqWW48anxEyHrutqNrNEerO1JYF1DobEwk-0/s320/01+dark+chocolate+in+melter.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="240" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Pouring crystallized dark chocolate<br />into the melter - a wonderful invention that<br />keeps the chocolate in temper for hours </span></td></tr>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuR-p6hlERijuq8qjMt6LKSx-MPi0kDPt6ToWSe7DvS-wAelTh7WY42dSYND6IDoCSHesJmr0cxCCLF0LpWpQbagp-HZa9ZLZoOStzt3rtpGpp38wNq72NsBLXZQQDBcK5axBSEe84c7U/s1600/02+test+strips.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjuR-p6hlERijuq8qjMt6LKSx-MPi0kDPt6ToWSe7DvS-wAelTh7WY42dSYND6IDoCSHesJmr0cxCCLF0LpWpQbagp-HZa9ZLZoOStzt3rtpGpp38wNq72NsBLXZQQDBcK5axBSEe84c7U/s320/02+test+strips.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Test strips. If the chocolate sets within a few minutes<br /> and develops a nice shine, it's properly crystallized</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBZlrJ7YyMADPsySBSE7-ZHwkvfKc29FZ4Zjzdax7Njy6QCmDR72WqVLTllK5U821eWtR7JtBl1S_R-bN7Nx81KqTCEvFeDb1z9rN04vjgNS6YEQmdcDhcTV7F0vsQTYhuMK0N1Ml6QqA/s1600/03+filled+pod+molds.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgBZlrJ7YyMADPsySBSE7-ZHwkvfKc29FZ4Zjzdax7Njy6QCmDR72WqVLTllK5U821eWtR7JtBl1S_R-bN7Nx81KqTCEvFeDb1z9rN04vjgNS6YEQmdcDhcTV7F0vsQTYhuMK0N1Ml6QqA/s320/03+filled+pod+molds.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Cocoa-pod molds filled with dark chocolate</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEuH0ak5rjfdjfccoJsLUy3JmsXH7NDwTkXsJ1A2VeNYVGBGKQ1slr-QtbOKljUUWjmYe7_7g2qoNhndrQKx3_yH6NRO5qCuAj94Fu_P3jtBILWs8hqi-w9-IT8oCloyU6RMtYShvvsPk/s1600/04+bloomed+pod.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEuH0ak5rjfdjfccoJsLUy3JmsXH7NDwTkXsJ1A2VeNYVGBGKQ1slr-QtbOKljUUWjmYe7_7g2qoNhndrQKx3_yH6NRO5qCuAj94Fu_P3jtBILWs8hqi-w9-IT8oCloyU6RMtYShvvsPk/s320/04+bloomed+pod.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Horror! Fat bloom on the chocolate cocoa pod. I<br />thought it looked very realistic, the bloom mimicking<br />the diseased pods I have seen on trees around the world.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJwciEaebrw47yU5FtyRk5rKu2xYOQMc3DqlmLcPkMzZfG8k4eFJ28fFW-33cpUuUy9rXxK3dJkVbQYeBaIQ1BmZt8CPNGhHkr3DJ0N5UmWTJd5QrOglOenpD37gWoprb7LHZK3xkdWws/s1600/05+guitar+slicing+crakine+ganache.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJwciEaebrw47yU5FtyRk5rKu2xYOQMc3DqlmLcPkMzZfG8k4eFJ28fFW-33cpUuUy9rXxK3dJkVbQYeBaIQ1BmZt8CPNGhHkr3DJ0N5UmWTJd5QrOglOenpD37gWoprb7LHZK3xkdWws/s320/05+guitar+slicing+crakine+ganache.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Callebaut's Crakine ganache in the guitar,<br />which slices it up into squares</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhksj22YnIiVxAs3KYeKO4RoWRhMOotJuPvJ_B_5PS_474YsyfA_EIXARyLdPAqjZTtX4r1jVZRh1Amam2YUEUzZc_fIzoNK7rDCWQAEp53w5EVxQTJkEqJaHeQkiZEFLugJmJhnSZrExM/s1600/06+dipping+crakine+squares.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhksj22YnIiVxAs3KYeKO4RoWRhMOotJuPvJ_B_5PS_474YsyfA_EIXARyLdPAqjZTtX4r1jVZRh1Amam2YUEUzZc_fIzoNK7rDCWQAEp53w5EVxQTJkEqJaHeQkiZEFLugJmJhnSZrExM/s320/06+dipping+crakine+squares.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Squares of ganache ready for dipping</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBh6FNhGP92NgNbpOVmzandkXVZZF88a_FHXL2LU_DeH3Z91qal9ShIlfM1WLnzmBXUn64uE2dma21WfqYZ9JA1nq1nMkxx0W6dfKcqLXxEd28-3L4KQaxOkQ-FZxPIzljHml-3wDlq9s/s1600/07+piping+whiskey+ganache.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBh6FNhGP92NgNbpOVmzandkXVZZF88a_FHXL2LU_DeH3Z91qal9ShIlfM1WLnzmBXUn64uE2dma21WfqYZ9JA1nq1nMkxx0W6dfKcqLXxEd28-3L4KQaxOkQ-FZxPIzljHml-3wDlq9s/s320/07+piping+whiskey+ganache.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Piped dark chocolate and whiskey ganache. You<br />can see from the blobby shapes that not everyone<br /> had the piping quite down.</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3Zlv49gBYC9wTIi_deGLCNcz1EwjSkeDM-_sh_27ANlXhdznjghnVs0L7gMpQnAIsdQtSeSATpwx5IfN0MO66bqWhjkb05Sf_sVxHpZiHZeOA1wDEczxqgP57Q4ZMqfiYCSh3cs0vnyw/s1600/08+whiskey+truffles.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj3Zlv49gBYC9wTIi_deGLCNcz1EwjSkeDM-_sh_27ANlXhdznjghnVs0L7gMpQnAIsdQtSeSATpwx5IfN0MO66bqWhjkb05Sf_sVxHpZiHZeOA1wDEczxqgP57Q4ZMqfiYCSh3cs0vnyw/s320/08+whiskey+truffles.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Whiskey truffles, dusted in cocoa powder</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCyb5A8xduAEiv2YQqF8eOAGR7r9MeNyjDdRdZWm6_c6VSJAOPT2u0hLvDRq-7qmONrb3iwTm85KG1xlU4C9QcDmVkbWta8YAgUgx1CVvK_Y7ZvYkfvjJq6GW7N9xR7nHXSQEhyDj4ugw/s1600/09+white+chocolate+passionfruit2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjCyb5A8xduAEiv2YQqF8eOAGR7r9MeNyjDdRdZWm6_c6VSJAOPT2u0hLvDRq-7qmONrb3iwTm85KG1xlU4C9QcDmVkbWta8YAgUgx1CVvK_Y7ZvYkfvjJq6GW7N9xR7nHXSQEhyDj4ugw/s320/09+white+chocolate+passionfruit2.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Passionfruit ganache in white chocolate shells</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjU-PgRFxir2FRxKzikjUrIn-3qeBYxF86yXhetkEn3tdYrj3gRwTiweXFhSHzOcQLIE8VHXXpPlKXFRS14LvwmSxJ-hQGJfPugULiNQ2ebiwAwxlOeLB9jT9PmyAP3nnuxlKQKSy_jv8g/s1600/11+sealing+truffles.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjU-PgRFxir2FRxKzikjUrIn-3qeBYxF86yXhetkEn3tdYrj3gRwTiweXFhSHzOcQLIE8VHXXpPlKXFRS14LvwmSxJ-hQGJfPugULiNQ2ebiwAwxlOeLB9jT9PmyAP3nnuxlKQKSy_jv8g/s320/11+sealing+truffles.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Melted white chocolate, poured on to make a seal</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKWdXozN_N8jCvic6e3JU1a7qHNBr40PgCDaJ5sL6M4RRxhhNx2MaUqYcgqqlMn6D7W7k3XW0rvT812XPU1ChmxiSTHhD9q7Kyp_MuIvGPwvL_GOKzDKRJb4iho3tWuaDy2pKsW5M0NRM/s1600/13+lollipops%2521.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiKWdXozN_N8jCvic6e3JU1a7qHNBr40PgCDaJ5sL6M4RRxhhNx2MaUqYcgqqlMn6D7W7k3XW0rvT812XPU1ChmxiSTHhD9q7Kyp_MuIvGPwvL_GOKzDKRJb4iho3tWuaDy2pKsW5M0NRM/s320/13+lollipops%2521.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Chocolate lollipops!</span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbkEqqwNLm6KicJTA3lbMhyphenhyphen3KVwlkDqWz_xYf12yayYDUq9oaskSJsJoOUrsapggyXCWa5ll5eAfNZoGxoYPfw8myaGAWDOFWLfybVgjyzFeIERuffrnqqGaVvJAueFfpAWgnSRHLuGxo/s1600/16+shiny+pod+and+bars.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbkEqqwNLm6KicJTA3lbMhyphenhyphen3KVwlkDqWz_xYf12yayYDUq9oaskSJsJoOUrsapggyXCWa5ll5eAfNZoGxoYPfw8myaGAWDOFWLfybVgjyzFeIERuffrnqqGaVvJAueFfpAWgnSRHLuGxo/s320/16+shiny+pod+and+bars.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">My second cocoa pod mold came out perfect<br />and shiny, along with bars and mendiants</span></td></tr>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVsLXyYcznUxBUb-lBMLbKzoFkhWR-_T2auzjAGlV3BS7XRRAJ_5wqI_NYcZtojmfvyEui1z9Ae6610K6W1CzU3OsL3r9fMl1sEdIkKAgCoDJ7mXT3Eax0Oq389WqYL4CgDamRb0tasv4/s1600/14+bonbons.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVsLXyYcznUxBUb-lBMLbKzoFkhWR-_T2auzjAGlV3BS7XRRAJ_5wqI_NYcZtojmfvyEui1z9Ae6610K6W1CzU3OsL3r9fMl1sEdIkKAgCoDJ7mXT3Eax0Oq389WqYL4CgDamRb0tasv4/s320/14+bonbons.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Many bonbons - dark, milk, white</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf8_JMd5idhOEMb3-yy49rqfI0g9r001hq_X2onIK4GglNPXOPCxYRIHDYBeIL3rbyYpYXzx_Xkg5j7BcCiQc21x436ZHCPm7yjMEzqjxCpz1WjiMTWyzCWkKsavQq0W08pBifPveaMbo/s1600/15+mendiants.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgf8_JMd5idhOEMb3-yy49rqfI0g9r001hq_X2onIK4GglNPXOPCxYRIHDYBeIL3rbyYpYXzx_Xkg5j7BcCiQc21x436ZHCPm7yjMEzqjxCpz1WjiMTWyzCWkKsavQq0W08pBifPveaMbo/s320/15+mendiants.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Mendiants and lollipops</span></td></tr>
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</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLU_AkM9aPxT25zNCbYr0kH8pYyrODqBfW_w8oco7iI-WDaFRuzdYCmfKXwnFSwDO5qpmS0DLxTq2mpFZRxzgSV9afgDdAAZebmXAI9miODi3-nYOwjF4IcCwVTI0NQhDeaV4ye1hq2BY/s1600/17+docofchoc+chocolates.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLU_AkM9aPxT25zNCbYr0kH8pYyrODqBfW_w8oco7iI-WDaFRuzdYCmfKXwnFSwDO5qpmS0DLxTq2mpFZRxzgSV9afgDdAAZebmXAI9miODi3-nYOwjF4IcCwVTI0NQhDeaV4ye1hq2BY/s320/17+docofchoc+chocolates.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Dr. Chocolate's Chocolates</span></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTF7sK9P76Z4M7tvCFcHbM0YA8wVEpTEFvYbKZ8OOFob43L4w1etiT0CHqipLjpAttx7VAU49l4vGmMDKdtWGF6JWW2hpZCbOTwvd6EOuk2aiYWtxaUvtoVNCC4hz0V4Axa5QTmm7YQVw/s1600/18+me+and+kurt.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTF7sK9P76Z4M7tvCFcHbM0YA8wVEpTEFvYbKZ8OOFob43L4w1etiT0CHqipLjpAttx7VAU49l4vGmMDKdtWGF6JWW2hpZCbOTwvd6EOuk2aiYWtxaUvtoVNCC4hz0V4Axa5QTmm7YQVw/s320/18+me+and+kurt.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">With Kurt, my kitchen partner</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkRkfHEjal4k3ee4__rl3rv72O3CK9DEa-I4FVrUNLFHZIDYoy6J_r4Zt_dKrA-6di3VZCLWsGTWSsO9ANurpFlK7sYgSNW8IL0V8TX9iM9sBEximxpTxkued1H1Lf1bs468kuBjLP31k/s1600/19+kitchen+team.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkRkfHEjal4k3ee4__rl3rv72O3CK9DEa-I4FVrUNLFHZIDYoy6J_r4Zt_dKrA-6di3VZCLWsGTWSsO9ANurpFlK7sYgSNW8IL0V8TX9iM9sBEximxpTxkued1H1Lf1bs468kuBjLP31k/s320/19+kitchen+team.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">The kitchen team,<br />with Chef Amanda and Chef Celine</span></td></tr>
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<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-9597167670951826172012-01-06T15:15:00.000-08:002012-01-06T15:17:12.454-08:00Continents completeOf course I ate some chocolate at the bottom of the world. I had to bring my own, because there are no retail outlets for chocolate in Antarctica.<br />
<br />
I brought Dandelion's Venezuela bar - one of the best, in my opinion. Check out their blog pic of me and their chocolate:<br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/">http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/</a><br />
<br />
Taken at Port Lockroy, Gentoo penguins in the background.<br />
<br />
I have now eaten chocolate on all seven continents - life goal, check!docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-76274987923505939202011-12-22T15:05:00.000-08:002012-01-02T18:56:30.199-08:00The great chinstrap chaseWhen I left for the Antarctic, my brother, who came here a couple of years ago, told me to expect many wonders, but not to even try to imagine what those wonders would be. He was right, because on the very last day in the Antarctic, our ship was privy to an extraordinary moment that was like National Geographic come to life.<br />
<br />
Everyone on board had been thrilled on our last afternoon when we spotted a pod of orcas; we had, unusually, seen very few whales on our trip. Afterwards, most folks had gone down to dinner, but I was sitting up in the bar with two shipboard friends, Eric and Stephanie. Steph was looking out a window and remarked that the orca pod was back. Eric and I went over to have a look.<br />
<br />
The orcas were moving in and out of the waves nearby, and we marveled as they swam right up close to the boat. Next thing we knew, a little chinstrap penguin flew out of the water, just ahead of the whales. We looked at one another in amazement as we realized what was happening. A great chase had begun.<br />
<br />
We ran outside, not even stopping to put on our parkas, and watched the spectacle unfold. It was the most thrilling event I have <i>ever</i> seen. The pod of whales included two babies, no more than a few months old, and the adults were training them to hunt. Orcas are basically assholes, and will kill for sport as well as food, and they set out to give the poor little chinstrap the fright of a lifetime.<br />
<br />
The penguin, meanwhile, had discovered that it could use the hull of the ship for cover, and was desperately weaving in and out of the whales, trying to get behind or beneath the Sea Spirit. The whole pod had risen to the surface for the chase, not ten feet from us as we leaned over the rail, leaping over one another and twisting spectacularly as they pursued the penguin, who was literally flying for its life. Twice it slammed into the ship's hull, and we covered our faces with our hands, sure that it had knocked itself out, expecting every moment to see blood. But that little penguin recovered like lighting. Each time it surfaced again, we cheered.<br />
<br />
By then other passengers realized what was happening and all came swarming out from the dining room. Soon everyone was rushing back and forth, calling out, "They've gone forward! Go forward! No wait, they're swimming back. Other side, other side!" The Sea Spirit listed from side to side as everyone ran from port to starboard and back again, the expedition staff were knocking passengers out of the way to take their own photos, and even the captain came down from the bridge and was running back and forth with the rest of us.<br />
<br />
It was as thrilling as the Hunger Games, or any lion chasing a zebra on tv. Orcas are skilled hunters, and very deft in the water. Over and over again they lunged at the chinstrap, and the crowd would gasp in horror. But each time the penguin reappeared, flying out of the waves for all it was worth, hurling itself from death's jaws like a champion. The crowd cheered and threw fists in the air, and all around there were cries of¨Go penguin! <i>Go penguin</i>!¨ (From all except the marine biologist, that is, who was rooting for the whales). <br />
<br />
Penguin definitely enjoyed home court advantage. On top of its mighty will to live, I think it was spurred on by all our cheering. It never gave up, never wavered, not even when it crashed into the ship. At long last, the orcas turned and swam away. We watched as the chinstrap made great, flying leaps in the other direction, fast as possible. It is surely a much-decorated hero or heroine now in its colony (difficult to tell the gender, really).<br />
<br />
It was two days before there was any other conversation topic on the ship. Not a single person was left unmoved, and for me at least, I do not think I shall ever see its equal.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgz068it5R59KF1Y3_oNmToOCQfJFIwUGr7Ux19CpAIAC9bEt2fdu9nBypXFx4Nef7XxUSc-Y_f0CZRzL0iquATyKi5BPDlzXxYLAEKMIfFDVefLkvQSztmLHQb0JUX-eaSuurTOf3NEo/s1600/Orca+Chasing+Penguin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="238" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjgz068it5R59KF1Y3_oNmToOCQfJFIwUGr7Ux19CpAIAC9bEt2fdu9nBypXFx4Nef7XxUSc-Y_f0CZRzL0iquATyKi5BPDlzXxYLAEKMIfFDVefLkvQSztmLHQb0JUX-eaSuurTOf3NEo/s320/Orca+Chasing+Penguin.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-29776367299385429352011-12-22T14:48:00.000-08:002011-12-27T07:42:54.877-08:00Penguins (of course)Penguins are the funniest creatures. I have now seen thousands of penguins, and I do not think I could ever tire of watching them. Everything about these birds is silly, until they get in the sea, when they are compact, speedy underwater flyers. But on land, they are comedy.<br />
<br />
Four species of penguin live in the Antarctic -- the Gentoo, Adelie, chinstrap, and macaroni -- and I saw all four.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWk-k8c-DOtRuUwHXYiZpcYXWMzyrbZ6iCgfOGSS4DOybTMnQTZer2JJIFLU5r1WTrF7_DGeOafjF45SvUPg3CJCjDk6Wxk2_ljnlH8CIPLpG-QJnzKtYPJqGglqtt-KiOtzMCccxKz38/s1600/3+penguins.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWk-k8c-DOtRuUwHXYiZpcYXWMzyrbZ6iCgfOGSS4DOybTMnQTZer2JJIFLU5r1WTrF7_DGeOafjF45SvUPg3CJCjDk6Wxk2_ljnlH8CIPLpG-QJnzKtYPJqGglqtt-KiOtzMCccxKz38/s320/3+penguins.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
left-->right: chinstrap, Adelie, Gentoo</div>
<br />
We were extraordinarily lucky on our voyage and made several landings that are not often possible due to weather conditions, including one at a place called Baily Head, the largest chinstrap penguin colony in the Antarctic. With an estimated sixty thousand breeding pairs, plus many more singletons and juveniles, it is literally a penguin city, with a downtown and suburbs and a port and highways in between.<br />
<br />
Penguins make highways everywhere they live, dirty little roads of compact snow streaked with poop, where they walk along alone or in little parades, stepping graciously out of the way of oncoming traffic. The smell is atrocious. Their snow-white bellies are often covered in their own filthy brown crap, their ebony backs streaked with the white stripes of some neighbor's projectile poo. It's actually hard to get a photograph of a nice, clean penguin, unless you catch them right by the sea.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOCcImBvQpoLviUyRCbh-RUZi9ReRvH8WbLC2Bfgqs1hXjkfGbcLX2n5DEK0shLcWdNGJTPaISTHtq1TcfDBT_w1paHWH7bnqyRy7BohGPu5u9jvZzlms0knVO2V2foYvneRsX5blZP14/s1600/baily+head.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOCcImBvQpoLviUyRCbh-RUZi9ReRvH8WbLC2Bfgqs1hXjkfGbcLX2n5DEK0shLcWdNGJTPaISTHtq1TcfDBT_w1paHWH7bnqyRy7BohGPu5u9jvZzlms0knVO2V2foYvneRsX5blZP14/s320/baily+head.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
walking through puddles of poop at Baily Head</div>
<br />
They are the busiest creatures. Penguins have many tasks to do in the course of their day: waddle or toboggan back and forth from their nest to the sea to hunt for food, build and repair the nest, engage in pre-breeding rituals, mate, sit on eggs, feed the young, and ward off predatory skuas, the large brown birds that enjoy eating penguin eggs and young chicks.<br />
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A penguin's most prized resource is the pebble, which the males use to build their nests. Pebbles are pretty much central to the penguin existence, and even their pre-breeding ritual is pebble-based. When a boy and girl penguin like each other, they both reach their necks down to the ground and rise back up again, mimicking the act of picking up a pebble.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiJq2ryLSzR-DZpK9gc-k8AUsyt6u-V3HhZjgkrav6nsoArfnQvcigNwbt4anCYE1-Yu4JZr8DhFBYvO1KNm6Vmf43J6gZhvKaeDMpl9mUOD8R5SEqx7O2fDAEYMFKjvz55flZ8hFiT7Y/s1600/penguin+dating.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiJq2ryLSzR-DZpK9gc-k8AUsyt6u-V3HhZjgkrav6nsoArfnQvcigNwbt4anCYE1-Yu4JZr8DhFBYvO1KNm6Vmf43J6gZhvKaeDMpl9mUOD8R5SEqx7O2fDAEYMFKjvz55flZ8hFiT7Y/s320/penguin+dating.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<br />
Once they mate, the male continues to collect pebbles to fortify the nest, while the female sits on the egg. But the birds build their nests pretty close to each other, so penguin rookeries are one gigantic pebble-stealing fest, with everyone skulking around their neighbor's nest waiting for them to look the other way, or simply grabbing pebbles outright, which results in much squawking and beak-waving.<br />
<br />
The funniest part is watching the young mated males bring pebbles back home. These first-time fathers have worked out that pebbles are important, and that they need to continually make home repairs and improvements, but they often don't understand that they have to drop the pebble within the female´s reach as she sits on the nest -- if she gets up and leaves the egg exposed for more than a few moments, it will freeze. I watched one young Gentoo walk all over the beach, finding the best sorts of pebbles, bring them back home, and drop them about a foot away from the female, who would stretch her neck out in vain while the male walked away to find another. The bird did this about twenty times while I watched, and every time some neighbor would just grab the precious pebble away. Poor young fool.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2gpD4uxm7lRu7XK8ndExPYRtORmoQI-so2-eYwu25djx4ltjrIniHzshNbHLrkPOxD2Dp-hut-Okl14LAXaLCAVR3kvlgxZn54cEoXueNAmli1cCEQzqKDl7jWc0xv0h0LCzLXFtQ0HA/s1600/chicks%2521.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2gpD4uxm7lRu7XK8ndExPYRtORmoQI-so2-eYwu25djx4ltjrIniHzshNbHLrkPOxD2Dp-hut-Okl14LAXaLCAVR3kvlgxZn54cEoXueNAmli1cCEQzqKDl7jWc0xv0h0LCzLXFtQ0HA/s320/chicks%2521.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Chicks! Gentoos lay two eggs each breeding season.</div>
<br />
The thing that impressed me most about penguins is their industriousness. They are constantly on the move, their feet making a sweet little pitter-patter on the snow. They don't mind about humans at all. I could stand practically amongst them, and they would simply go about their penguin business. A few times, a curious one would walk up and stare at me, but mostly they just got on with their lives. It was a privilege and a treasure to be amongst them, and a natural comedy.<br />
<br />
Whales next time, and one more penguin.docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-3524477127546583882011-12-22T07:58:00.000-08:002011-12-22T14:18:31.777-08:00No untouched wildernessThis is the first of several blog posts I
will write about Antarctica, and certainly the most sobering. Along with many
passengers on this ship, I came to Antarctica believing I was visiting a
place that had been relatively untouched by humans – the last great wilderness,
or something like that. But from the very first landing we made, in the South
Shetland Islands just northeast of the Antarctic Peninsula, I learned that this
is very much not the case.<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The human footprint in this part of the
world is large, and marked by an almost
inconceivable violence against nature. We have killed nearly every animal that
makes this part of the world remarkable, except, perhaps, for the krill. One of our early landings was at a place called Whaler's Cove on Deception Island,
where I spent several hours wandering along a beach littered with the remains
of what was once a very productive whaling station. A mudslide destroyed or
crippled most of the buildings some time ago, but we could easily see the
remains of an airplane hanger, living accommodations, and the enormous barrels
used to process whale blubber. The beach was littered with whale bones.</span><br />
<br />
The scale of devastation wrought by whaling in the Antarctic is hard to believe, and as a tourist who prizes any sighting of these animals, I still do not understand how any person, much less the thousands who worked in the industry, could be so brutal and careless of their life. The largest mammal on earth, the blue
whale was the biggest prize, as it yielded the most blubber. Whalers were not
seeking meat, but oil – oil that lit the street lamps
of London before electricity, and supplied power for the early Industrial
Revolution. Blue whales were hunted nearly to extinction, and a single whaling
station could process hundreds of thousands of animals. Today there are fewer
than a thousand blue whales left on earth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
After the blues, whalers hunted fins,
seis, right whales, and humpbacks, all of them also large, reducing populations
of these animals by ninety percent or more. They left only the relatively small minke
whale to its natural course. With its competition decimated, the minke has
actually flourished in the region, and is one of the most often sighted from
the vessels that cruise in these waters.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Though their oil output was meagre,
penguins were not spared the slaughter. Penguins have no natural predators on
land and are easy to capture and kill. Hunters who could not find a place in the whaling industry caught
penguins and threw them live into boiling vats, to sell the scant amounts of
fuel they yielded. Seals they clubbed or skinned alive for
their pelts, driving these populations to near extinction as they became very rich back in the northern latitudes.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Even the contemporary fishing industry continues to decimate seabirds, as the
petrels, shearwaters, and great albatrosses are caught on fishing lines.
Without drastic changes to fishing techniques, the only possible outcome for
some of these birds is extinction.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">I did not expect to learn any of
this on a voyage to Antarctica; I thought I was some kind of intrepid explorer,
headed to vast tracts of untouched wilderness. But there was evidence of human
occupation on nearly every landing we made, from refuge huts to research
equipment to old concrete structures whose purpose was no longer clear.
In the north, we learn that no nation lays claim to Antarctica, that it is a
free continent, populated by a tiny number of benign scientists who want to
preserve the place for posterity. But that's not what I saw.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Britain, Chile, Argentina, and Australia all lay claim to different parts of the continent – indeed, Australia claims the whole eastern third. These countries fly their flags wherever they put up a hut or piece of research equipment. Under the treaty that governs Antarctica, other countries – the US, Russia, China – can ignore these claims and put up their own research stations, but the place is far from free of territorial wrangling.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US">Under the Madrid Protocol to the Antarctic Treaty, commercial industries are prohibited from mining the continent´s mineral resources, but there are surveyors down here all the same. In fact, the great polar resource reserves are concentrated in the Arctic, which is being much more rapidly laid to waste by industry, but rest assured that if there is something of value that can be mined or extracted from Antarctica, someone will find it, and they are looking even now. The environment is protected, but I do not know how strong that protection will be if someone finds a truly valuable resource deposit.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US">And then there are
the tourists – everyone from people on ships like me, to the climbers who come down here to hike unnamed peaks (and then name them after themselves), or
ski or sled to the South Pole. There are people all over this continent, all
looking to take a piece of it, literally or metaphorically, for themselves.</span><br />
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Having said all that, a great deal of
natural beauty remains, and there is enough animal life to keep tourists happy,
at least for now. Global warming is of course affecting this place, and climatological change undoubtedly presents the most significant threat of all to
the continent, far beyond what even the whalers accomplished. I now know enough
about this place to want to come back, but that will most likely be a few years
away, and I dread to see the changes that might take place in even that short
amount of time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US">So that is a bit of a black introduction to
Antarctica. I will write next time of something more cheerful, like penguins.</span></div>docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-19696953155634282032011-12-13T17:12:00.000-08:002011-12-13T17:12:07.316-08:00In the Drake PassageWe are now at latitude 59 degrees south and longitude 62 degrees west, in the middle of the Drake Passage - some of the nastiest waters on earth. A few hours ago, we passed through the Antarctic Convergence, where two oceans meet, and warm(er) waters hit cold, creating conditions for life to flourish beneath the waves. We had birds again! This afternoon I saw many of the iconic ocean birds from this region, including the cape petrels with their lovely speckled black and white wings, the small, fast Antarctic prion, and my favorite - of course - the albatross. We had a few black-browed and brown-headed albatrosses following the boat this afternoon, just after we passed through the convergence, and it was marvelous.<br />
<br />
I am very glad to be out at sea. Ushuaia was a pretty cool city for the end of the world, and I had a good, long four-hour trek along the Beagle Channel during my one day there, but I wanted the sea, and now I have about as much of it as anyone could wish for. The Drake has not been so bad, with 6-8 meter waves to start and less now, but most of the boat has been seasick anyway. This morning at the bird lecture, half the audience looked like corpses and there are some people who just walk around with barf bags. I have been completely fine, so one of my favorite activities is sitting around in the lounge or bar watching everyone else stumble around, getting their sea legs.<br />
<br />
There is a large party on board from China, and I am rooming with two of the women from their group, including the leader. This has been a wonderful opportunity to begin learning Mandarin. So far I have learned the staples - hello, how are you, thank you, and goodbye, but also some nice context-specific vocabulary, including "penguins" and "many penguins." Tomorrow I will learn iceberg, whale, and albatross. I have not yet asked the word for seasickness.<br />
<br />
The one aspect of this trip that I do not yet know how to classify is the eating. After all my first class plane rides and several meals on what is basically a luxury cruise, I feel like a goose being stuffed for foie gras. I sit in confined but humane spaces, and people continually serve me rich meals, and then before I have had a chance to digest, it starts all over again. But my brother told me that as soon as we arrive in the actual Antarctic, my body will want every calorie it can get, so I guess I should just be glad for the chance to stock up now.<br />
<br />
We have made such good time through the Drake, going at or near the boat's maximum speed of 14 knots for most of the journey so far, that the captain is hopeful of reaching the South Shetland Islands tomorrow by lunchtime. It's possible we might be able to make a landing as soon as tomorrow afternoon. It is almost too exciting to even think about, but we could see our first penguins (chinstrap) by tomorrow!<br />
<br />
This blog alone has used up 25% of my alloted megabytes for this journey, so I think pictures will have to wait till I am back on land. But I will send wildlife updates as soon as we have some good ones. Till then, zai jian!<br />
<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-3593257310920444502011-12-10T17:18:00.001-08:002011-12-10T17:44:29.283-08:00Getting to UshuaiaOK, I am on the edge of delirium for not having slept for two days, but before I head back to the hostel and to bed, I want to explain exactly what it took to get here to Ushuaia, Argentina -- the port of embarkation for Antarctica and almost the farthest point on earth from Seattle.<br />
<br />
I left my apartment on Friday morning at 3am, with Shuttle Express to SeaTac. (My friend Shawn Fowler gets a prize for getting up at 3am to send me a bon voyage text!) At 6am, my flight left SeaTac for Dallas.<br />
<br />
Because I booked these flights almost a year ago, all the flight times had changed, leaving me with just 40 minutes in Dallas to make my connection to Miami. Which would have been fine, except the pilot missed our approach to the runway, and we had to fly around for a while and get back in line, which meant by the time we actually landed, I had just 20 minutes to get from one end of ginormous Dallas Fort Worth airport to the other. Two other people were also connecting to the Miami flight, and together we sprinted through the airport, arriving as they were just closing the doors, sweating profusely.<br />
<br />
Then we sat on the plane for two and a half hours, because first they found blue toilet water leaking from the side of the plane, and then coffee. This was mysterious, so they ended up shutting down the entire water system and importing bottled water and moist towelettes for the comfort of passengers en route. Except there were two different supplies for bottled water and moist towelettes at Dallas Fort Worth airport, so we had to negotiate with both and wait a long time. I seized this opportunity to poke my head into the cockpit and smile at the pilots, who invited me in and offered me a jumpseat. We spent a lovely half hour together, and they showed me all the dials and knobs that they use to fly the plane.<br />
<br />
Finally, we took off and flew to Miami, where I boarded a magnificent brand new Boeing 777 for my overnight flight to Buenos Aires. Normally I am an Economy flier just like the rest of the 99%, but this time I had a luxurious Business Class seat. I believe I had more square footage than my last two apartments in Seattle combined, along with a seat that transformed into a bed, a down duvet, personal giant screen television, champagne, gourmet food, and a personal amenity kit that probably cost more than my rent. I watched Cowboys and Aliens from my bed and felt very glad and like I was glimpsing the lifestyle of the 1%.<br />
<br />
In Buenos Aires, I deplaned, changed money for whatever it is they use here in Argentina - I am so tired I have not even figured out the word for the currency yet - and took a one hour shuttle ride across Buenos Aires to the domestic airport, Jorge Newbury. I saw as much of Buenos Aires as I could along the way - cattle ranches, high rise apartment buildings, cobblestone streets with Paris-esque balconies, and many plazas with revolutionary statues. The Argentines are also all phenomenally good looking and appear to have unique intellectual pursuits - among many other places of higher education, I saw (if my translations were correct) an Academy for Perfectionism and Experimentation, and an Institute for Courage and Creativity. Interesting place, Buenos Aires. Hopefully I can go back there one day and take a closer look.<br />
<br />
Jorge Newbury afforded the most interesting sight of all, as it was right across the street from an ocean promenade. I took a walk along the seafront and marveled at the sight of totally opaque, brown waves in every direction as far as my eye could see. I had never seen such a thing before in my life. It looked exactly like chocolate milk, and I am not even saying that because of my own relationship with chocolate. It did not even smell of the sea. But no one seemed to mind, and early rising Argentines were out running along the promenade and sailing on the disgusting, disturbing brown sea, and even fishing in it, I guess for blocks of mud or chocolate fish.<br />
<br />
Then it was a five hour wait for my flight to Ushuaia, and three hours to get here, and here I am, at the end of the world. Tomorrow I trek in the National Park and see the Beagle Channel. Now I go back to the hostel and to bed, because I think I can no longer form words without some sleep. Next post, more coherent!docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-5882000773498443772011-12-08T22:22:00.001-08:002011-12-08T22:53:04.707-08:00The seventh continentAll has been quiet on the chocolate front since the Seattle festival, but it is time now to complete another goal: to eat chocolate on all seven continents. I've already got North America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and Australia. Tomorrow begins the quest for Latin America and Antarctica.<br />
<br />
At 3am, I start a two-day journey to the bottom of the world: the Antarctic continent. To prepare for this - certainly my longest single journey, and quite possibly my shortest trip abroad ever - I have been reading about Antarctica for the past few weeks. My favorite book so far has been Antarctica: A Guide to the Wildlife. It's a slim guide. The chapter called "Terrestrial Plants and Insects" is just one page long, documenting several lichen and some mites. The next chapter is about a single krill. The first page has a sketch of the krill; the next, a different sketch of the same krill, only cooked.<br />
<br />
I'm pretty sure that the krill is about to become the most captivating creature in my world. As the crux of the very short Antarctic food chain - plankton --> krill --> whale - it forms the link between the world's tiniest animal, and its largest mammal. Right now the krill are in season, so the waters are teeming with life.<br />
<br />
Mostly, though, I think the main tourist attraction in Antarctica is ice. This isn't ice as we know it, like ice cubes, or iced tea, or even Snowcones. Antarctic ice appears to be a different breed entirely, powerful in a way that we of the temperate latitudes probably will never understand. Here is a short video to illustrate what I cannot adequately capture in words, mainly because I have to leave at 3am for the airport: <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SM6sDEtgPx0" target="_blank">wondrous Antarctic brinicle.</a><br />
<br />
See what I mean?? Antarctic ice is awesome and terrifying, especially for the poor starfish.<br />
<br />
Anyhow, I'm bringing some chocolate with me, so I can eat it in South America and then on the Antarctic continent itself. I have a nice bar packed in my backpack. I will hope that it does not go out of temper on the journey. More to come from the road, assuming I can find some computers along the way.<br />
<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-22307833939806181552011-10-21T09:45:00.000-07:002011-10-21T09:47:08.459-07:00Saturday lineup: NW Chocolate FestivalJust one day to go now until the festing begins. Tomorrow this time I'll be at the Seattle Center, getting ready for the start of the <a href="http://nwchocolate.com/">Northwest Chocolate Festival</a> -- the largest gathering of bean-to-bar makers, educators, and confectioners in the Pacific Northwest.<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
Buy your tickets now, they're going fast! <a href="http://nwchocolate.com/">http://nwchocolate.com/</a></div>
<br />
As Education Director, I'll be on stage pretty much all day doing talks and other events. Tomorrow's lineup:<br />
<br />
10am - Politics of Single Origins talk, World of Chocolate Room<br />
<br />
11am - Meet the Maker interview with Amano's Art Pollard, a live interview for the volume I am co-editing with Brian Cisneros for UW Press, Chocolate: Turning the Wheels of the Food Revolution<br />
<br />
1pm - Moderating panel, Sin or Saint? Guilty Pleasure or Healthy Treat: The Nature of What Draws us to Chocolate, with fabulous panelists Aaron Barthel of Intrigue, Autumn Martin of Hot Cakes, AJ Wentworth of Chocolate Conspiracy, Audrey McManus of Babeland, and Karlie Markendorf of Aphrodite's Attic.<br />
<br />
5pm - Interview with Colin Gasko of Rogue Chocolate, also for edited volume.<br />
<br />
See you there, come hungry!<br />
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<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-9548367084686263752011-10-19T13:35:00.000-07:002011-10-19T13:35:30.057-07:00Northwest Chocolate Festival - this weekend!One minute I was on top of a mountain in California with the coyotes and bobcats, working on my chocolate book, and the next -- whoosh, back in Seattle, where I am now spending every minute getting ready for the <a href="http://nwchocolate.com/">Northwest Chocolate Festival</a>. Though I had a pretty big stash of chocolate with me in the mountains (over forty different bars that I tasted and rated for a month), it was <i>nothing</i> compared to the choc-normous spread we'll have at Seattle Center this coming weekend:<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
October 22 & 23, 2011</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
10am-6pm</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Seattle Center, Northwest Rooms</div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
Tickets in advance and at the door all weekend</div>
<br />
We have twenty bean to bar makers -- an unprecedented number at any chocolate festival -- as well as confectioners, pastry chefs, dessert makers, sculptors, and more, all of whom will be sampling their chocolate wares. With three thousand tickets already sold, we're set to be yet again the region's largest gathering of chocolate makers and chocolate lovers. <br />
<br />
I am Education Director for this festival, and my job is to work with the craft makers and confectioners to make sure that while our thousands of attendees are eating chocolate, they're also learning about it - where it comes from, how it's made, and why we should care about cocoa trees. Here are some of the highlights at this year's festival:<br />
<br />
- Fresh cacao, straight from the pod, presented by Bill Fredericks, <a href="http://www.chocolateman.com/">The Chocolate Man</a>. This is unique! I'm still amazed myself that we're doing this, because outside of the farms themselvs, which are all in the tropics, you just cannot taste raw cocoa. But you can at NW Chocolate Festival, thanks to Bill, who will be treating us to the taste of this fruit when it's fresh, before fermentation, before drying, before it turns into a chocolate bar.<br />
<br />
- The lost chocolate of Peru, from Dan and Adam Pearson at <a href="http://www.maranonchocolate.com/">Maranon Chocolate</a> -- the very same Fortunato #4 I blogged about a few weeks ago. The Pearsons will discuss their discovery of this rare pure strain of Nacional in Peru, and then Karen Neugebauer of <a href="http://www.fortechocolates.com/">Forte</a> and Aaron Barthel of <a href="http://www.intriguechocolates.com/">Intrigue</a> will treat us to a taste of this delicate chocolate in their confections.<br />
<br />
Happy festival-goers will also<br />
* meet cocoa farmer <span class="il">Leonor</span> Cayapa Tapuy, from <a href="http://www.kallarichocolate.com/">the Kallari cooperative</a> in Ecuador,<br />
* watch the creation of chocolate sculptures,<br />
* learn how to pair chocolate with wine, tea, beer, and gin,<br />
* taste <a href="http://hotcakesconfections.com/">Autumn Martin</a>'s Chocolate Whiskey Milkshake,<br />
* and watch bartenders go head to head at the Chocolate Cocktail Throwdown!<br />
<br />
More to come soon about my talks and panels. For now, if you live in Seattle, <a href="http://nwchocolate.com/index.php/tickets">buy your tickets</a>!<br />
<br />
<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-88665687177971652272011-09-30T22:37:00.000-07:002011-09-30T22:37:07.133-07:00The lost chocolate of PeruToday I had a rare treat. Even when you eat as much of it as I do, it's not every day that you get to taste chocolate made from cocoa beans that have been "lost" for one hundred years. This morning I had my first taste of Fortunato #4, the chocolate made from pure Nacional beans from Peru, "discovered" by Dan Pearson and Brian Horsely of <a href="http://www.maranonchocolate.com/">Maranon Chocolate</a>.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBASctEls1uqy4fZ7QKHeh1bzix9bl4yETxd9EXHoVQLJf-WzOXNNJhO9CEcQA48qygxb1J1AqZIbTUHGGexCTbCcmiM7k-bQewFxmYFyBSUEKakD78XqW_osLmvxHkbCOh8Lq1JScTfU/s1600/fortunato+%25234.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBASctEls1uqy4fZ7QKHeh1bzix9bl4yETxd9EXHoVQLJf-WzOXNNJhO9CEcQA48qygxb1J1AqZIbTUHGGexCTbCcmiM7k-bQewFxmYFyBSUEKakD78XqW_osLmvxHkbCOh8Lq1JScTfU/s320/fortunato+%25234.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">I even got to sample the beans -- which, as you<br />can see above, are unusual in their white color</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
The find was remarkable for several reasons. First, Nacional beans are not normally associated with Peru. Rather, this bean predominates in Ecuador, where it is most often associated with the Arriba strain (see <a href="http://www.thechocolatelife.com/profiles/blogs/the-arriba-nacional-denomination-of-origin-in-ecuador">Jeff Stern's recent post</a> on The Chocolate Life for an excellent discussion of Arriba Nacional). So finding it in Peru was a bit of a surprise.<br />
<br />
Indeed, finding pure Nacional anywhere is cause for celebration. Disease has wiped out much of the Nacional crop over the past century. Cocoa is a fragile tree, susceptible to fungal infections and pests that can devastate entire national agricultural systems, such as happened in Ecuador. To make it more disease- and pest-resistant, cocoa is often hybridized. The result is higher yields, but also loss of purity of strains such as Nacional, whose distinct flavor is eroded when crossed with another kind of bean.<br />
<br />
Thus, the discovery of genetically "pure" Nacional -- and in Peru no less -- <a href="http://www.maranonchocolate.com/new-york-times/">made headlines</a>. I have been anxious to taste it. The cocoa actually arrived to me yesterday (still up here <a href="http://www.djerassi.org/">on the Djerassi mountain</a>), but I forced myself to wait until this morning to try it, when my taste buds were clear.<br />
<br />
The verdict: some of the most delicately flavored chocolate I have sampled, ever. Fortunato #4 was wispy and light as a feather, and so creamy I had to keep reminding myself that it was not a bar of milk -- in fact, it was 68% cocoa solids. Its flavor was so fleeting, I had to keep eating more.<br />
<br />
If you want to taste it yourself, <a href="http://www.maranonchocolate.com/select-chocolatiers/">here's where you can find it.</a> If you do, let me know what you think!<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-65943491182578922992011-09-27T08:54:00.000-07:002011-09-27T08:54:58.950-07:00Does it even need sugar?Yesterday afternoon, while working on my chocolate book, I reached for a piece of what I thought was a bar made from Porcelana Criollo. This type of bean is grown in Venezuela, and it has one of the most delicate flavors of any cocoa variety. It tastes of cream and honey and lying on a blanket in the sunshine, or like someone you love has just given you a soft hug. It's one of my favorites, and I could eat it forever.<br />
<br />
What I got instead was a piece of a bar made from 100% cocoa solids, called Coro Noir Amertume Extreme. "Amertume" is French for "bitterness." Both bars were made by La Maison du Chocolat, and they look pretty similar:<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOD6Qq1x0CyTz-JUSrVwZLD1iO3gO0ASP7NZaCjnrBR7i8aNSCu-0equgpDShnIYUkeFbnZqUWojFgHO0Uq4fGHhY1knu3D3uvk0SAl-1oO-bP3_2qWC09kLskSUpDCGrHbrKgJbmJhJg/s1600/la+maison+bars.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOD6Qq1x0CyTz-JUSrVwZLD1iO3gO0ASP7NZaCjnrBR7i8aNSCu-0equgpDShnIYUkeFbnZqUWojFgHO0Uq4fGHhY1knu3D3uvk0SAl-1oO-bP3_2qWC09kLskSUpDCGrHbrKgJbmJhJg/s320/la+maison+bars.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
Come on, it's close! They're practically the same. And anyhow, my writing area looks like this at the moment, so it's easy to get confused: <br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyUtvaC5E_6MlRew9flOx6MZKQL8fI2iz1xM6EDUp_5O2qURLCIXFKkNqp-ghsSujueYXv0QTxZBy2P4p_BKEKyTYTVfp4lNLUwiMQGmhxTixy8Nhua1AnxdA4tbZt8UuNmH3Yqt_PT_0/s1600/writing+desk.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgyUtvaC5E_6MlRew9flOx6MZKQL8fI2iz1xM6EDUp_5O2qURLCIXFKkNqp-ghsSujueYXv0QTxZBy2P4p_BKEKyTYTVfp4lNLUwiMQGmhxTixy8Nhua1AnxdA4tbZt8UuNmH3Yqt_PT_0/s320/writing+desk.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />
Instead of sunshine, at first I tasted nothing at all. The flavor was quite muted. I let the chocolate sit on my tongue, waiting for it to melt, and then suddenly I tasted pure, dark soil with a slight metallic tang, as if I was eating a piece of earth that had just been struck by lightning. I felt a good deal of surprise and looked back at the bar, realizing my mistake.<br />
<br />
I had really been wanting that hug of Porcelana, but as I ate my way through the 100% Amertume Extreme (btw, I love that name -- makes me feel as if my chocolate writing is an Extreme Sport for which I will win some kind of medal), I decided that the pure taste of cocoa was also comforting, in its own way. It's earthy and bitter and dependable, at least when it is done well. It made me wonder -- does cocoa even need the sugar at all? My bar yesterday did not. It was enough to just taste a solid rock of a cocoa bean.<br />
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What do you think - sugared or not?<br />
<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-21861809545869146942011-09-24T10:52:00.000-07:002011-09-24T10:52:58.903-07:00Garage chocolateYesterday was one of those days when I felt EXTRA glad that my life's work right now is to find the best chocolate in the world.<br />
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I came down from the Djerassi mountain to spend a day in civilization with the folks at <a href="http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/">Dandelion Chocolate</a> in Palo Alto. One thing I liked best about this trip was that it confirmed the legend that the revolutionary companies of Silicon Valley all really do start in a garage.<br />
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Cameron Ring and Todd Masonis, <a href="http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/about-us/">founders of Dandelion</a>, have been running their chocolate taste-tests out of a garage now for a couple of years and, true to the Valley's reputation for start-up brilliance, are making <i>extraordinary</i> chocolate. It's some of the best I have ever eaten -- especially their Madagascar bar, which made me feel as if the cocoa beans themselves were melting in my mouth. There was nothing at all -- no lecithin, no vanilla, no added cocoa butter -- standing between me and that sunshiney, almost lime-flavored Madagascar bean. <br />
<br />If you live in San Francisco, you can <a href="http://www.dandelionchocolate.com/locations/">find Dandelion Chocolate</a> on Thursdays at the Mission Community Market. Their factory and cafe will open soon in the Mission, at 740 Valencia St. Go there and eat their chocolate -- it will be the happiest part of your day.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEdXpHrE2c544uANMA4Iv01-8tGguuTj79eY8nmRJX1ZE9yYo_DEtPoOEh9m35-BUjXtdQAKMfmylF-0Sl6zOGqRwQyu-2V0dUUKCINneKJQzhAPcc4mDwth-81xEESpQNKON6HyX8PLA/s1600/IMG_0779.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEdXpHrE2c544uANMA4Iv01-8tGguuTj79eY8nmRJX1ZE9yYo_DEtPoOEh9m35-BUjXtdQAKMfmylF-0Sl6zOGqRwQyu-2V0dUUKCINneKJQzhAPcc4mDwth-81xEESpQNKON6HyX8PLA/s320/IMG_0779.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Todd sorting through Madagascar and Venezuela cocoa beans</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKWZMSRMQ0HvUP_DE1kNQLdmUlHl2RfIx_jhek8pWrTSQjkCiBfXHIjfQJsl0FRTSXKyyhHDfU8Tf0PgbFaCbOM-xz0J4teMrDqNyYOt9MJgtBMZbrQLGraUDJrz4rSOrYZKqc_KW5PRM/s1600/IMG_0802.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKWZMSRMQ0HvUP_DE1kNQLdmUlHl2RfIx_jhek8pWrTSQjkCiBfXHIjfQJsl0FRTSXKyyhHDfU8Tf0PgbFaCbOM-xz0J4teMrDqNyYOt9MJgtBMZbrQLGraUDJrz4rSOrYZKqc_KW5PRM/s320/IMG_0802.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Alice sampling Madagascar chocolate as she <br />measures the size of cocoa particles with a micrometer</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAmFwQajoUi_x34DJ42RCl2_HJHnMdCiVQVnUxiuLAaqlcJ7yPnDTKOcnvXfHCSeVwIlBGytVjxx35vFIq2F9LCQGWn9oR0CdUNXxW8TpGh6Vwvj-FTgjGfY6-aZfUnRPluOpZJFdrKmQ/s1600/IMG_0807.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAmFwQajoUi_x34DJ42RCl2_HJHnMdCiVQVnUxiuLAaqlcJ7yPnDTKOcnvXfHCSeVwIlBGytVjxx35vFIq2F9LCQGWn9oR0CdUNXxW8TpGh6Vwvj-FTgjGfY6-aZfUnRPluOpZJFdrKmQ/s320/IMG_0807.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">Mmmmmmm . . . fresh garage chocolate</span></td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: small;">The team (l-r): Todd, Cameron, Alice,<br />and (almost Dr.) Chiann, aka the Wrapping Ninja</span></td></tr>
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docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-19121911302724719672011-09-17T15:14:00.000-07:002011-09-17T15:15:01.174-07:00Writing chocolate at DjerassiI am now living the writer’s dream life, high in the Santa Cruz mountains. For a month, I am a <a href="http://www.djerassi.org/2011artists.html">writer-in-residence</a> at the Djerassi program, along with seven other artists, including a playwright, a poet, a choreographer, and a musician. Already my chocolate works are flourishing, including my book, an edited volume, and various articles and short stories.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.djerassi.org/index.html">Djerassi</a> is one of a handful of residency programs around the country that give artists precious time, quiet, and support to work on their projects, far away from the demands of everyday life. This is my second such residency (the first was at Hedgebrook in 2009), and it is once again a true gift.<br /><br />Djerassi has a remarkable history. It was founded in 1979 by Dr. Carl Djerassi, who, along with his colleagues at Stanford University and the Syntex Corporation in Mexico, invented the Pill. The financial success of the first oral contraceptive allowed Djerassi to purchase the land I am on now -- a sprawling ranch in the brown rolling hills near Palo Alto, which he named, with all the literary inventiveness of a biochemist, the SMIP Ranch: Syntex Made It Possible.<br /><br />Then, in 1978, Djerassi’s daughter Pamela, who was an artist, committed suicide. Djerassi himself discovered her body. Grief-stricken, over the next year he sought a way to soothe his own soul and honor Pamela’s. The result was the Djerassi Resident Artists Program.<br /><br />At first, the program was only for women, and one artist a year came to live and work in Pamela’s old house. The women found it lonely, though, spending a year on the ranch by themselves. In time, the program expanded to accommodate more artists, and men were invited as well. The ranch's many-sided barn -- a visually striking building -- was converted into studio spaces and sleeping lofts for painters, dancers, photographers, and musicians. The ranch house became a residence for writers, and that’s where I am writing from now.<br /><br />During the day, I write and run in the hills. In the evenings, the chef arrives to cook a meal that we all eat together up here in the writer’s house. Then we share our work. The other night, the playwright asked me to read a part in one of his plays; I was a soon-to-be out-of-work vaudeville actress from the 1930s. After that, I did a little talk on chocolate and led a tasting of origin bars, which seemed to please the other artists. None of them have edible work like I do.<br />
<br />I’ll share some of my writing as it comes along. Till then, here are some pictures of the ranch.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Twelve-sided barn, where visual artists, dancers, and musicians live</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk7fkdhD8KonxRtrHvFIl7nG45yYdfJXA6gDJ3Jcox0Y3M2yV7esHxqs5PdFVkt6aqB4lvcnZjNndaShJzY4jMVpBEf7DE2MPqLh3msz4ZKnUzj4UXH5HgGJ4IEmvj-N0EHJBNPmrsbSw/s1600/ranch+lands.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhk7fkdhD8KonxRtrHvFIl7nG45yYdfJXA6gDJ3Jcox0Y3M2yV7esHxqs5PdFVkt6aqB4lvcnZjNndaShJzY4jMVpBEf7DE2MPqLh3msz4ZKnUzj4UXH5HgGJ4IEmvj-N0EHJBNPmrsbSw/s320/ranch+lands.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">View from the top of the hill where I go running in the afternoon </td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-m3VHiauBdlijNfvD3CLYeJTwr3YIVbaISvWIwS2NRaYRe93Wnw3zY_7-Tm4jQGq0I43ePPC7MIonk9_1Gd6ruR3Hn2VaeCWqaCwR4Rxpnwk1Xs16NasjrhmAKgQxxfJ0tZaWhy0R-0I/s1600/stick+creature+family.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-m3VHiauBdlijNfvD3CLYeJTwr3YIVbaISvWIwS2NRaYRe93Wnw3zY_7-Tm4jQGq0I43ePPC7MIonk9_1Gd6ruR3Hn2VaeCWqaCwR4Rxpnwk1Xs16NasjrhmAKgQxxfJ0tZaWhy0R-0I/s320/stick+creature+family.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The ranch is dotted with sculptures by former residents. This is one of my<br /> favorites - maybe giant bowtruckles, or very small Ents?</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Family of stick people</td></tr>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Another favorite - giant wagon</td></tr>
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<br />docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-1042445979185042182011-09-14T09:30:00.000-07:002011-09-14T09:30:47.638-07:00Tcho in San FranciscoI did not go to <a href="http://www.ghirardelli.com/">Ghirardelli</a>. I know that it is very famous and has a whole square named after it, and I even planned to visit and eat a brownie sundae with hot fudge. But instead I went to <a href="http://www.tcho.com/">Tcho</a>.<br /><br />Tcho is the dictionary’s phonetic start to the word “chocolate,” which makes it a cool linguistic artifact and not a weird misappropriation of something Mayan, as I did suspect. It’s also a bean-to-bar chocolate factory, the only one in town after Scharffen Berger’s departure from Berkeley (shame on you, new owner Hershey), on <a href="http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Pier+17,+San+Francisco,+California+94111&hl=en&ll=37.802172,-122.398167&spn=0.009427,0.017016&sll=47.672369,-122.3989&sspn=0.008034,0.017016&vpsrc=0&geocode=FcPQQAIdI1q0-A&t=m&z=16">Pier 17</a> along the Embarcadero. If you visit San Francisco, I <i>insist</i> that you take a tour and eat all the chocolate they give to you.<br /><br />This is important: you must eat all of it. The reason is because they make a whole line of chocolates, each with a particular flavor - citrusy, chocolatey, nutty, fruity. Talking to Tcho’s chocolate makers made me feel that no one else on earth understood flavor. One of them, Zohara, spends her days tasting chocolate that has been fine-tuned in different ways by their factory machines, determining which one tastes the most “chocolatey.” This is her <i>job</i>.<br />
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Imagine having that as your job. Whatever you are doing right now, pretend that all the things on your desk, or in your backpack, or on your boat deck just transformed into chocolate, and your new priority for the workday was to eat it all and figure out which one tasted the best. And this wasn’t some random Employee Appreciation Day benefit, but you got paid for doing it, every single day.<br /><br />You can approximate that by visiting Tcho and sampling their entire line, as I did. Leaving that factory was one of very few times in my life when I felt that I had approached my chocolate limit, so I think you will not be disappointed.<br /><br />Next up: a month at <a href="http://www.djerassi.org/">Djerassi</a>, an artists residency near Palo Alto, to write a few masterpieces.docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-20432829411949912722011-09-11T19:02:00.000-07:002011-09-11T19:02:26.300-07:00Angelino chocolate<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxLZ0v9u-ZF66CcKDkmSgreqL-NKqy0TwuXvSMsrXKTw8PMo0p3za0qXtulgxse4rauJsUCl1fr0DeFErl-BquJ1j-B88oPSETSNiPeV3kcduw2tR9fFi3lHQG1TM6nQYHoBrBO8LP-Pc/s1600/LA+chocolate.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxLZ0v9u-ZF66CcKDkmSgreqL-NKqy0TwuXvSMsrXKTw8PMo0p3za0qXtulgxse4rauJsUCl1fr0DeFErl-BquJ1j-B88oPSETSNiPeV3kcduw2tR9fFi3lHQG1TM6nQYHoBrBO8LP-Pc/s1600/LA+chocolate.jpg" /></a></div>
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Guesses? Any at all?<br />
<br />Come on, it totally looks like brown rice, covered in chocolate and shaped like teddy bears. Yes, it does!<br />
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Here, I did an autopsy on one of the bears, so you can see the rice:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7tGq_ZLOoJPsuU112G6-UYOKvMxNRc2NC1f_C7v9IOb3TOEhqm5XVGBImqLptJn6yz8GsDWmRHbcdTcFWWqE6JcGRlm5mSJPDYe-mt0Ct4VOXv7c_qkivVA-2VhcfL2RNogOkqdQ6izc/s1600/cross+section.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7tGq_ZLOoJPsuU112G6-UYOKvMxNRc2NC1f_C7v9IOb3TOEhqm5XVGBImqLptJn6yz8GsDWmRHbcdTcFWWqE6JcGRlm5mSJPDYe-mt0Ct4VOXv7c_qkivVA-2VhcfL2RNogOkqdQ6izc/s1600/cross+section.jpg" /></a></div>
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This precious thing is (was) called a K Bear, created by Diane Krön of <a href="http://www.dianekronchocolates.com/">K Chocolate</a>, and was one of the many delicacies I sampled in her postage-stamp sized shop in Beverly Hills. Diane was managing the store when I visited, and introduced herself as “The Chocolate Doctor.” Well, really! I looked around and saw no diploma, and thought it would be more gracious to keep silent about my own credentials.<br /><br />Instead, I said, “Really? Brown rice?”, to which she replied, “Honey, this is California. What did you expect?”<br /><br />In fact I had been expecting a lock of Jennifer Aniston’s hair dipped in chocolate, but Diane handed me a large, rock-shaped confection rolled in cocoa powder (“Our secret weapon”), so I ate that too. Between the generous samples of K Truffle, K Spanish Orange, and K Pecan Krisps, I was distracted enough to hand over the better portion of my paycheck for a small bag of dark chocolate (Venezuela, around 80%), and flee back out into the concrete-covered city.<br /><br />I then made rounds of several more of LA’s finest chocolate shops, buying largish quantities, on my way to meet my friend Dawn for lunch. Dawn is a writer, and has in the past supplied me with many alternate adjectives for the word “brown” (just try writing at book length about chocolate without them). I put before her a sampling of Angelino chocolates and awaited her opinion. Would this be the best chocolate in the world?<br /><br />
“Good,” she declared, “but—it’s not much better than what I could get in a drugstore. As an LA native, I’m embarrassed that we can’t do better. We have no football team . . . and apparently no chocolate.”<br /><br />So there you go. The best chocolate in the world is not to be found in LA. If anyone has been here and can claim otherwise, I’d love to hear about it. San Francisco up next . . . docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-89621704319532126352011-09-07T23:21:00.000-07:002011-09-07T23:21:32.912-07:00The search beginsAnd so my next chocolate travels begin. Tomorrow at the crack of dawn, I leave for Los Angeles, and then San Francisco, to eat chocolate made by the Californians. Back in the old days, my chocolate travels were mostly to cocoa farms. But today I am on a different mission: to find the best chocolate in the world.<br />
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Will I find it in Beverly Hills, or beneath the Golden Gate Bridge? Maybe. It's possible. The people of California have long been at the vanguard of food revolution in this country, embracing such exotic but salubrious items as the avocado since at least the nineteen eighties, a time when primitives on the east coast still reckoned <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Mills_monster-themed_breakfast_cereals">Boo Berry</a> cereal as fruit and ketchup as vegetable.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpSticLDiPRzoJMA0MNBoqQc8MnkhBRrwygp51XVatBHUWnd0hmZKnneY_IEZHeaXR7347J9JGzy0ByGkw5RA4AL5ZgSQhd0vomNUnjzkKfBFv2nIQSn_H2ctr6k00o0_tkX5AA2oVae4/s1600/Boo+Berry.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpSticLDiPRzoJMA0MNBoqQc8MnkhBRrwygp51XVatBHUWnd0hmZKnneY_IEZHeaXR7347J9JGzy0ByGkw5RA4AL5ZgSQhd0vomNUnjzkKfBFv2nIQSn_H2ctr6k00o0_tkX5AA2oVae4/s1600/Boo+Berry.jpg" /></a></div>
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Yum! Thanks, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Mills_monster-themed_breakfast_cereals">Wikipedia</a>!</div>
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So I guess I might find the best chocolate in the world there. Just in case not, though, I have packed some other chocolates to sample and review in the coming weeks.<br />
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I will be in California for one month. This amount might get me halfway through. More to come from the road . . .docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-32636197736254118642011-09-05T10:34:00.000-07:002011-09-05T10:34:09.529-07:00A new blog is coming . . .A new blog is coming, and it is going to be irresistible. . . . Check back this Wednesday for the first of many new chocolate adventures.docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-25826771196465994732009-10-31T09:42:00.000-07:002009-10-31T11:42:12.049-07:00From the mother's breast: chocolate ads gone awry<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4mH5ZfdSADmt2xgne0tBdA30S4IVfXFa6f8g3Da2WKCAmVFHTsk-28-dzFO2QXEnuZWdyWustQMxEe5BJchvvSgcHY7X80d_XQACPE04DPsHLCdnzHnNGj5nirZc9Q9K4zRYv53BYV8U/s1600-h/heidi-klum-reverse-angle_166x216.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 166px; height: 216px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4mH5ZfdSADmt2xgne0tBdA30S4IVfXFa6f8g3Da2WKCAmVFHTsk-28-dzFO2QXEnuZWdyWustQMxEe5BJchvvSgcHY7X80d_XQACPE04DPsHLCdnzHnNGj5nirZc9Q9K4zRYv53BYV8U/s320/heidi-klum-reverse-angle_166x216.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398805618190962066" border="0" /></a><br />Know who that is? It's Heidi Klum, Victoria's Secret supermodel, television star, wife of Seal, mother of four children, charity supporter. I want to take at least one sentence to represent Heidi in all her varied selves, because the this post is going to quickly forget the fact that this woman spends at least part of her day changing diapers and running a million dollar industry, and become instead more interested in the social mechanisms by which she has created an entire industry of images around her body. The most recent of which stars chocolate.<br /><br />Please don't think that I don't love Heidi Klum. Who doesn't? I haven't owned a television for like ten years, but most Thursday nights see me driving far across town to my friends' place on Capitol Hill to watch Project Runway. We enforce strict rules of silence during this hour of programming, so that we may all focus properly as the drama unfolds. We pay Heidi respect. But these photos of her make me think very seriously about what it means when we are asked to consume, along with images of people working hard at a craft (making clothes, modeling clothes, hosting television shows), images that utterly blur the distinction between subject and object, seller and thing, woman and chocolate.<br /><br />On Thursday, I gave my annual guest lecture to an Intro to Women's Studies class at UW. In this lecture, I have students consider the fact that chocolate, as a tradable commodity, has both an economic and a social "life" - that is, it has a monetary value but also a social value - it means something to us that cannot be captured by a price.<br /><br />To illustrate one way that this social value is created, I showed students a series of chocolate advertisements. All I did was google "chocolate ads", and what came up was a litany of images that not only featured women, but in effect made women <span style="font-style: italic;">into</span> chocolate. Images whose message was, consume them, eat them - they are the same.<br /><br />I want you to keep two things in mind when you are looking at these images. One, that in contemporary Western culture, chocolate is marketed mainly <span style="font-style: italic;">to</span> women, thus raising the question of why use sexually charged images of women to sell something back to them? In a culture where we also assume, for the most part, that everyone is heterosexual, this seems counter-intuitive. And two, what the heck would happen if it was a <span style="font-style: italic;">man</span> in these images instead? Would they be as attractive, sexually? Aesthetically? As effective as advertisements for a food?<br /><br />I used a lot of images in my lecture; here I'll just give you the best of the sample.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8rip6NmFcWh0-AxXSZLbM7u_5PNMfHnVTCAwQdruoiDge-tmJjNPotRyfbHzdzMErdEIvxKDARjN7pk7m0u78QaCv9-CU3BEuOjvAqoRe8RIwQFsrKtGVZrYWgK1ZSj5h3IctxWkdg2U/s1600-h/sweet-br2_25.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 232px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8rip6NmFcWh0-AxXSZLbM7u_5PNMfHnVTCAwQdruoiDge-tmJjNPotRyfbHzdzMErdEIvxKDARjN7pk7m0u78QaCv9-CU3BEuOjvAqoRe8RIwQFsrKtGVZrYWgK1ZSj5h3IctxWkdg2U/s320/sweet-br2_25.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398814302715275474" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGrP4gsTzFgfOXxoMqJ49T_2CnWSqMSSLFCK4w-5IsCeOd0wTbMr6dxs36J2OGDJYtiITM3TTbDGCrtmhADxk1cVjK9wdbpdTc_J66w4-0saernAIi-UZlN94xoAES-hF7cE0fYZa6EWQ/s1600-h/sweet1_25.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 232px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGrP4gsTzFgfOXxoMqJ49T_2CnWSqMSSLFCK4w-5IsCeOd0wTbMr6dxs36J2OGDJYtiITM3TTbDGCrtmhADxk1cVjK9wdbpdTc_J66w4-0saernAIi-UZlN94xoAES-hF7cE0fYZa6EWQ/s320/sweet1_25.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398814498563564370" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="http://www.adpunch.org/entry/an-artistic-impression-of-chocolate-advertising/"><br />Images from AdPunch.org</a><br /><br />These two are contemporary ads from Brazil, made by a marketing firm to advertise dark and white chocolate. Even for an industry that commonly conflates the object being sold with the one selling it, these are incredibly explicit. There is NO distinction at all here between the chocolate and the woman. She <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> chocolate. She is <span style="font-style: italic;">made of</span> chocolate. The boundary between who we are as persons with lives and loves and goals and talents, and this food that gives us momentary satisfaction - that has been erased, eroded, it no longer exists. We are literally what we eat.<br /><br />Lest we think that chocolate is unimportant here, that this is just another feminist analysis of the use of the female form, let us remember that it would be very difficult to do the same thing with broccoli.<br /><br />No, chocolate is also central. It is central because of its social value. It <span style="font-style: italic;">means</span> something to us, beyond its function as a food. Love, romance, indulgence. Reward and comfort. It is our friend and companion and caretaker when we are in need.<br /><br />This is not a new idea. This Cadbury ad, taken from a 1928 postcard, does the same thing, only in a more sexually muted fashion:<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7EeoktxSGHG67gYTXoqOt5j8dFw3GOV1SYcoRoZml895K44Xckeh3AA0gCrBimcEB1PS2NWxKuMXPyncYkqiaew93_E4g2YYAB4bFx-k-FWB7QOZOITyWy8GaFzZH7mWs41ac3yHhYuY/s1600-h/cadbury+milk"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 229px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7EeoktxSGHG67gYTXoqOt5j8dFw3GOV1SYcoRoZml895K44Xckeh3AA0gCrBimcEB1PS2NWxKuMXPyncYkqiaew93_E4g2YYAB4bFx-k-FWB7QOZOITyWy8GaFzZH7mWs41ac3yHhYuY/s320/cadbury+milk" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398817228255956178" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><a href="http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3084/3551292367_7185324fbc.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.flickr.com/photos/castlekay/3551292367/&usg=__A-N0aQSmd4RUuH0UNCb7NiBS9-s=&h=500&w=357&sz=167&hl=en&start=43&sig2=zp5yInNymGv2xTyJUXg5LQ&um=1&tbnid=8nE-dLzYfB0NwM:&tbnh=130&tbnw=93&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dchocolate%2Badvertisements%26ndsp%3D21%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26sa%3DN%26start%3D42%26um%3D1&ei=UnPsSra5LoaCsgOSjNn1Aw">Image from Flickr</a><br /><br />I love this ad. I love it because it is freaking hilarious. LOOK AT WHERE THE MILK IS COMING FROM. Directly from this woman's breasts! It is practically pouring out of her nipples.<br /><br />On first glance, students on Thursday said that they saw a mom in a kitchen, preparing chocolate for her family, whom she loves. It gave them, they said, the sense that Mom <span style="font-style: italic;">made</span> chocolate, although they knew this not to be really true.<br /><br />When we looked more carefully, we could see that in fact the ad went further: that this woman was pouring out her own breast milk into the nice Cadbury bar, which she will then serve to her family - all of them: husband, kids, sisters, aunties, grandmama. No matter how old they are, everyone can partake of the lovely, milky bar of the breast. Talk about a comfort food.<br /><br />When I sat down to write this morning, I thought I might do a post about Halloween. I read the morning chocolate news and the first thing that came up was a warning about keeping the dog away from Halloween candy. But then there were these pictures of Heidi Klum, and I could not take my eyes off them.<br /><br />For they are the same kind of image, even though they are not advertisements per se. They are selling something - maybe Heidi's own image-dependent career/industry? Maybe the dream of women who want to be models or fashion designers or married to a humble rock star? Frankly, I don't know what was going through her mind when she made these pictures.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhptb-ZJ2rMamNAc9Q_q00W4WkrKyY-LxRGcHJ3Wxur1dlnkTNqFQXwI2gu5UBSodkrrJ15PziCIwcyF3-jq9Y91LJWO9wOEz2unVOi3xuG-y8yGvjrbGQGlT-e6N-0ja6rXN9Lel3x3pE/s1600-h/heidi-klum-cleavage-picture_166x216.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 166px; height: 216px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhptb-ZJ2rMamNAc9Q_q00W4WkrKyY-LxRGcHJ3Wxur1dlnkTNqFQXwI2gu5UBSodkrrJ15PziCIwcyF3-jq9Y91LJWO9wOEz2unVOi3xuG-y8yGvjrbGQGlT-e6N-0ja6rXN9Lel3x3pE/s320/heidi-klum-cleavage-picture_166x216.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398820613146734770" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxxbwC2t8xyrZz2g7-X5Wp_ROh-3RGxrpvDMkZwwdW1DG-doznKIISaggiU_KP2HDYgWbmiNqtVxCs7PPNCCeAhrLeLxoNiFwvqPhOgXaBd_6AbmEOFqCPY9qTt50vojpxAXdwJgP1hqQ/s1600-h/heidi-klum-naked-picture_166x216.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 166px; height: 216px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxxbwC2t8xyrZz2g7-X5Wp_ROh-3RGxrpvDMkZwwdW1DG-doznKIISaggiU_KP2HDYgWbmiNqtVxCs7PPNCCeAhrLeLxoNiFwvqPhOgXaBd_6AbmEOFqCPY9qTt50vojpxAXdwJgP1hqQ/s320/heidi-klum-naked-picture_166x216.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398820782641639250" border="0" /></a><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLQ61Dq0oyGtKgrxiZMHVxp3qnPTDpvWV9StE2oxYg9Q9xAalZpiMrXU7ANC3aR6IO2Jx-2OrSoeAxUg7iEZbxVP0oe__P1E_fdIHNJ0L4PwZtaWe0Ui22hKaF_mOSBK54rA5hYLkn-To/s1600-h/heidi-klum-nude-picture_166x216.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 166px; height: 216px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLQ61Dq0oyGtKgrxiZMHVxp3qnPTDpvWV9StE2oxYg9Q9xAalZpiMrXU7ANC3aR6IO2Jx-2OrSoeAxUg7iEZbxVP0oe__P1E_fdIHNJ0L4PwZtaWe0Ui22hKaF_mOSBK54rA5hYLkn-To/s320/heidi-klum-nude-picture_166x216.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5398820895161442690" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Heidi Klum images from <a href="http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/gallery/stars/heidi-klum/">TheHollywoodGossip.com</a><br /><br />Except that in a culture that finds it so easy to conflate women and chocolate, these images seem as if they <span style="font-style: italic;">make sense</span>. Women love chocolate. Men often admit to loving it too. We all love Heidi Klum. Put them all together - yum!<br /><br />Only not yum. To me, all the images here have a certain creepiness about them, even though they are aesthetically also pleasing. The ads that show women made of melting chocolate recall a Dalian sense of impermanence and chaos, the 1920s ad the straight jacket of suburban housewifery.<br /><br />The photos of Heidi Klum covered in chocolate are also nerve-wracking. It just looks so goddamn uncomfortable. I think, write, love, and eat chocolate every day of my life, and yet I never want to be as covered in chocolate as Heidi Klum is in these pictures. Chocolate in my hair, getting all over my contacts, running down my back, glommed up in my armpits and bellybutton? No thanks.<br /><br />Because what on god's good earth can Heidi Klum <span style="font-style: italic;">do</span> in such a state? Nothing at all, except be looked at, desired, available to be literally eaten. It is the ultimate in passivity and, to my mind, forces together two things that really ought to stay quite separate: chocolate, which we eat, and a woman, who can actually go out and do a whole lot else with her waking hours.<br /><br />I personally would rather eat a piece of chocolate and not have to think about it running down someone else's body. Isn't chocolate good enough to stand on its own? Do we really need Heidi Klum to colonize chocolate for us to enjoy it? No, I think we do not. There is enough room in the world for both to be as nature meant them.docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4425535259814041518.post-51416858787270782092009-10-16T20:56:00.000-07:002009-10-16T21:53:50.362-07:00On loveLove. It is always one of the first answers shouted out when I ask my students to list our cultural associations with chocolate. What does chocolate mean to us, what does it represent? Love, they say. Then they say other things: Easter bunnies, PMS, comforting indulgence food. The list is long, but love is always on it. Why is this so?<br /><br />There is nothing inherent in chocolate to make it a good representative of this emotion. Love is often illogical, we can come up with no good reason for why it exists. It's just there, like it or not, whether the object of our love is a hero of epic proportions or someone that our friends dread hanging out with. The one who makes people shake their heads and say, "Why? WHY? It makes no sense."<br /><br />Chocolate is nothing like that. Chocolate is not illogical at all. It is the result of a very definite, mechanized process, each step of which has been deliberated by masterful engineers. Cocoa beans, which bear no resemblance at all to the final product, are run through machines, each carefully designed to take something bitter and turn it sweet. To make a delightful thing out of what, naturally, we would be inclined as a species to turn away from in disgust.<br /><br />And yet having just written that, it occurs to me that maybe chocolate and love really aren't that dissimilar. There is no rational basis for love, and there may not even be a lived experience to sustain it - sometimes it just exists in the heart, even though nothing about everyday life is present to support the feeling.<br /><br />It's as if the heart, or perhaps the soul, takes something that naturally just <span style="font-style: italic;">is</span> - heck, it might even be abhorrent, wayward, uncommitted, insecure - and transforms it into something beautiful. Something to believe in. Something that the eye of the lover alone can behold with wonder, with gratitude, contentment and desire. Rationality is suspended, self-preservation set aside. The loved object becomes one of beauty even if the subject is worn down by sustaining that belief.<br /><br />But the machines that make chocolate out of cocoa are not like a soul. They are the issue of the rational mind, the observing engineer, the scientific chemist or the cunning businessman. The roaster and mills, the refiners and conches and molding machines - these all perform a similarly wondrous feat of taking something bitter and turning it sweet, but their relationship with the final product is one of cold rationality, not warmth of feeling.<br /><br />None of my students, I am sure, are thinking of this transformation when they are answering my questions about the social life of chocolate. The majority of them, I am sure, have no idea that chocolate even starts out as a bean, much less a bitter one. And yet the cultural commitment to the chocolate-love metaphor is strong. It is almost impossible today in the US to find someone who does not admit to the emotional command of presenting a piece of chocolate to someone you love, or whose love you crave. Even if they hate chocolate themselves (and there are a few who do), they will recognize the symbol.<br /><br />So maybe on some basic level, the part of our being that is the house of primitive instincts - and maybe these are purely species-preservational instincts - there is some alliance between chocolate and love. Some affinity for the power involved in the process of both.<br /><br />For if we think of chocolate and love as processes, rather than as endpoints or nouns with a fixed and eternal existence, we can open ourselves up to the view that each is a path, a journey, a sojourn from hell to heaven, from cold to warmth, from bitterness to passion. No other food that I know of undergoes this kind of transformation, just as no other human emotion that I feel can render the plain, the uncompelling, or even the undeserving into a treasure, that can take the chafing grain of sand and turn it into a pearl.<br /><br />Maybe, in our souls, we see chocolate for what it is - the magical and mind-boggling transformation of acid-seed into culinary perfection - and we realize that somewhere inside, we are wired to do the same for people, for good or for ill. And we imagine that by presenting the one that we love with a piece of chocolate, we are saying to them all that must be left unsaid: that they are imperfect and untrue, but that our hearts have worked the magic of making them flawless. Of making them loved.docofchochttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06769501192169652548noreply@blogger.com0