Recently in Chocolate - Misc. Category
Chocolate caviar is one of those things that most people never really think about. After all, how could such a thing exist? But hey, if people can put together chocolate and sauerkraut to make a cake, a combination of fish eggs and cocoa shouldn't be too far-fetched. Don't you think?
Needless to say, it does exist, and in several different forms. One form uses fish eggs for real; the other just pretends. We'll talk about both at length in this week's exciting episode of Extreme Chocolate.
You can do much better than cookbooks when it comes to reading about chocolate! If you're a fiction lover, you might not know about the dozens of delicious fictional accounts designed to make chocolate lovers salivate. In fact, an Amazon search for chocolate fiction calls up close to 40,000 results! These are some of the best -- the cream of the chocolate crop!
So-called "tropical" heat resistant chocolate used to be almost exclusively military. Lucky for us, real confectioners have recently gotten into the act.
When it comes to producing heat resistant chocolate for our troops to enjoy, the U.S. military is good at breaking things and blowing them up.
Let's face it: we chocolate extremos have a desperate need for heat resistant chocolate. You see, the melting point of chocolate is pretty close to human body temperature, which means if you try to slip a Hershey Bar into a pocket or backpack, you're gonna end up with a gooey mess.
Even if you don't keep your chocolate close to your heart, you'd better keep it close to an air conditioner if you live anywhere south of Saskatchewan in the summer, because otherwise you'll be dealing with melted chocolate. Bummer.
Since there's only one species of Theobroma cacao, the tropical tree that produces chocolate, you might think it unlikely that different types of cacao beans should even exist. Well, think again. Over the years, cacao experts have defined three different varieties. Or four. Or maybe two. It depends on the expert.
Before crying foul, recall that the Chihuahua and the St. Bernard, and all the hundreds of breeds between, all belong to the same species of domestic dog; and the humblest banana pepper is brother to the hottest habanero. With that in mind, let's take a look at variation within the aptly-named "food of the gods."
When you come right down to it, we take chocolate production for granted. All those pretty shiny packages at shops and stores hide sweet, delicious treasures which we pop into our mouths without a thought for the hours and processes that have gone into making them. How can we be true chocolate extremists when we don't even know where our chocolate comes from?
Never fear: here's the lowdown on chocolate production from cocoa bean to chocolate bar!
Back again, with another installment of our chocolate-y reading list -- a set of the sweetest literature ever to hit the shelves. By this we mean books with chocolate in the title and as a major theme, of course.
As always, easily get these books online, and you can usually find them in your local bookstore, too. And remember -- also as always, these books just barely represent all the books about chocolate that you can find out there.
When last we left you, we were at the end of our travels to museums of chocolate in Canada. Come meander with us south of the Canadian border, and discover a handful of famous U.S. chocolate museums that you shouldn't miss.
In parts I-III of this series, we told you about famous museums of chocolate all over Europe, from Switzerland to Italy to England --a total of 11 European countries boast chocolate museums. In Part IV, we'll explore museums of chocolate on this side of the pond, in Canada. Quebec and New Brunswick please extreme chocolate fans in a few different ways.
Never heard of chocolate theft? It's America's fastest growing crime, an epidemic sweeping the nation... well, maybe not. But we're not just talking about shoplifting a chocolate bar here. We're talking about real, serious crime -- or if not serious, at least illegal.
