Researchers predict that chocolate sales will continue to increase and could exceed $19 billion by 2014.

According to an article on www.marketwire.com, most of the 2009 growth comes from the 75% of Americans who, in spite of increases in chocolate prices, kept buying quality chocolate as an affordable treat.

The chocolate market in the U.S. is competitive, but companies that continue to offer products in the area of functional chocolate, use ingredients such as super fruits, or incorporate savory and exotic flavors will have an edge.

Trends like singe-origin chocolates and extra high cocoa content may be slowing down.

One quote from the Marketwire article really hit home with me. Don Montuori, publisher of Packaged Facts (a market research publication) says, “For many chocolate-loving Americans it’s more about the experience than it is about mere consumption…”  

He put into words what I have been sensing for quite some time.  The chocolate consumer wants to appreciate chocolate more and the market is filling up with people who are more chocolate savvy than ever before.

Both types of coatings must be thin enough to cover and bend over the ice cream, thick enough not to crack open and let the ice cream seep through, and simultaneously be crunchy and melt in your mouth.  That’s not asking too much, is it?

Most of these demands have to be met by the fat system used in the coating.

The first type, real chocolate, ice cream coatings are made with cocoa butter.  This type is quite tricky.  Cocoa butter contracts quickly and is prone to cracking.  Adding milk fat or butter oil will soften the coating and make it more pliable and resistant to cracks.  Also, it works best to bring the fat content up to about 40 to 45%.

The second type is the most common ice cream coating.  It is a chocolate flavored confectionery type made with oils like coconut and palm kernel.  These coatings are much easier to work with because they harden quickly and coat evenly.

Coconut oil combined with a small quantity of softer oil like peanut or sunflower, will quickly form a hard and thin shell while at the same time maintaining plasticity that covers almost any shape of molded ice cream.  Typically the amount of fat is much higher than its cocoa butter counterpart.  These coatings have around a 60% fat content.

In the consumer market the confectionery types of coatings are often sold as being fun for kids because they go on easy and harden quickly, though much of the chocolate flavor gets lost in the formulation.

Speaking of all this ice cream coating, how about that raspberry chocolate sauce I wrote about a few days ago?  Maybe it’s time to try some of that over ice cream!

Interested in impressing your dinner guests with a scrumptious chocolate dessert? 

Your family is begging for a new recipe with lots of chocolaty goodness?

This one will do it!  Dig in!

Enjoy!

But chocolate milk is the center of controversy in many cities in the US.  The school districts of the District of Columbia; Berkeley, California; and Boulder, Colorado have already banned chocolate milk from the cafeteria.  Florida schools are considering it.

What’s the big deal? 

As you probably know, obesity among children is on the rise in the US and foods high in sugar get a lot of blame.  Of course, there are two sides to every story, and this is no exception. 

On the one hand chocolate milk is higher in sugar (almost twice as much) than white milk but on the other hand, many kids refuse to drink milk if it isn’t chocolate, and to grow up without the nutritional benefits of milk is unwise.

Milk, both chocolate and white, provides calcium, protein and vitamin D, all of which are lacking in our kids’ diets according recent studies.

Some parents say the added sugar in chocolate milk is worth the nutritional trade-off, while others say it is sending the wrong message about beverages high in sugar being part of a healthy diet.

What say you?  If you have an opinion, please comment below.  I’d love to hear your thoughts on chocolate milk in school.

My in-laws recently traveled abroad and brought back a Novi milk chocolate bar for me.

This chocolate, called Novi Al Latte Classico, is an extra fine milk chocolate with a cacao content of 30%.

The label was in Italian but through the modern wonders of online translators, I found out what it said: “For over a century, we select the best cocoa beans, a true gift of nature. The precious beans reach our factory where they are roasted with advanced technology, while respecting tradition. We control of all stages of production, from raw material to finished product, and this ensures the uniqueness and goodness of Novi fine milk chocolate.”

This milk chocolate is smooth and velvety while it melts in your mouth.  It is very creamy, and the soft, cooked milky flavors blend well with the stronger chocolaty and nutty notes from the cacao.

I really do enjoy tasting a variety of chocolates.  Every aspect of chocolate production, including where it is made, adds a statement, subtle or grand, to the final flavor.

Ciao!

“Once chocolate has been melted, how long is it good for once it has been molded (again)?”

Chocolate is a very versatile and tolerant product to work with, the nuances of tempering aside.  Chocolate can be melted, tempered and molded, re-melted, re-tempered and re-molded, again and again. 

The shelf life of chocolate depends on whether it is milk or dark and whether or not it has inclusions like nuts, coconut, or dried fruit.

Dark chocolate lasts the longest before oxidizing, or going rancid.  Cocoa butter is a very stable fat and once chocolate is crystallized, or tempered, it can resist bloom – fat migration – fairly well. 

A good temper and a consistent environment during storage are two of the more important steps to making dark chocolate last a long time.  Typically, the shelf life of dark chocolate is nine to twelve months (I have seen it last longer).  In fact, age will actually enhance the flavor of chocolate, although it will be subtle. 

If some bloom is present on the surface of the chocolate, melt the chocolate, temper it and mold again and it will be fine.  Bloom is that grayish or whitish coating that can form on the surface of chocolate. It does not destroy the flavor of the chocolate, but the appearance is not appealing. 

Milk chocolate has a shelf life range of six months to nine months.  The main reason milk chocolate has a shorter timeline is that the milk fat (butter oil) part of the milk oxidizes or goes rancid faster than cocoa butter.  The higher the milk content in chocolate, the shorter the life span.

Adding nuts to chocolate will decrease the shelf life in terms of bloom and rancidity.  Nut oils migrate quickly to the surface of the chocolate causing bloom, and the oils behave similarly to milk fat in that they oxidize faster.

Keep a bag of frozen raspberries on hand for an all year ‘round treat…

Enjoy!

According to feedback from participants in a medical research study out of Australia, it is!  What, no way!  Sure enough, read on…

Heart patients were given 50 grams of 70% chocolate to be consumed daily as medicine during a research study on how the antioxidants in chocolate help control blood pressure.

By the end of the study, many participants said they would rather take a pill containing the antioxidants than eat any more chocolate.  About half the people in the study found the chocolate difficult to eat because of the strong flavor and about 20 percent “considered it an unacceptable long-term treatment option” over the concern for the fat and calories from the chocolate.

Although I wouldn’t have a problem eating 50 grams of 70% chocolate each day (ahem, I do eat 50 grams of 70% a day), I guess I can understand where they are coming from. First of all, if you prefer milk chocolate, dark chocolate is not going to stay palatable for very long, and second, who wants to take chocolate as medicine – dispensed like a prescription drug?  I mean, besides a freak like me?

The good news is, the study found dark chocolate to be very helpful in reducing blood pressure. 

I doubt that doctors will start handing out chocolate instead of pill prescriptions (but one can dream) so for now, eat chocolate because it is fun and has great flavor. Oh, and because it is good for you, too!

Cocoa beans grow inside a thick-walled pod surrounded by a sugary pulp that provides nutrients to the beans (seeds).  The pulp is made up of about 12% sucrose which gets broken down by microbes, mostly yeasts. 

During the harvest, pods are cut down from the tree, opened, and the cocoa beans scooped out by hand.  Large mounds or heaps of pulp and beans are built in order to start the fermentation process.  To speed things along, big leaves (like banana) are used to cover the heaps in order to seal in the heat generated by the microbial action.

The temperature can reach 40C to 50C in the fermentation heap.  Many chemical reactions take place, and it is here during fermentation that chocolate acquires its color and flavor.

While the yeasts break down the sugar, ethyl alcohol and heat is produced.  Then, both the alcohol and the heat kills the yeast.  The heap has to be stirred and turned in order to aerate it and eventually stop the fermentation.  The whole process takes about 5 days.  Fermenting any longer than 5 days and the microbes will begin to attack the beans instead of the pulp.  Over-fermentation can result in creating off-flavors and odors in the cocoa beans.

The beans are dried thoroughly in the sun after fermentation to drive off all moisture and prevent further chemical and microbial activity.  At this time, the flavors are locked in and ready for transporting to the manufacturer for roasting, grinding, and making into chocolate coatings and bars.

For the optional dipping you can simply melt chocolate and dip.  The cookies will taste good.  But if you really want them to be extraordinary, temper the chocolate before dipping.  Then the chocolate will set up hard for impressive presentation and a good snap when you eat it.

If you need a tempering refresher, refer to my How to Temper Chocolate post.