Chocolate and mint always make a good pair. I guess it’s safe to say by now you already know some significant tidbits about chocolate. Let me shine some light on you about mint this time.
Mint flavor is extracted from mint leaves that have a rather powerful scent, and available all through the year. Its leaves are typically green, but there are some that are purple, blue, and yellow in color. The plant can grow to approximately 120cm tall.
Mint leaves can be used to repel mosquitoes and as a medicine to soothe the stomach. While sometimes used even in beauty products, mint is mostly utilized in the culinary department. It is often used in beverages, syrups, ice cream, and chocolate candies.
Chocolate mint is produced when mint flavoring, such as peppermint, spearmint, or crème de menthe, is combined with chocolate. Just so you know, every 19th of February is the Chocolate Mint Day as declared by the National Confectioners Association.
Here’s a simple yet luscious chocolate mint drink recipe for you!
Place peppermint tea bags in bottom of pan. Add milk and heat to just under boiling. Gently squeeze tea bags and remove. Place 1 tablespoon chocolate in each of 6 mugs, and pour 1 cup of hot minted milk over the chocolate. Serve with a fresh mint leaf on the side or with a peppermint stick candy.
Chocolate is divine all its own. I’d pretty much eat anything that has chocolate in it. But orange and chocolate combination is just downright scrumptious.
The tangy note of orange is just heavenly when united with the sweetness of chocolate. When a certain cake features the combo, it leaves an intricate taste in your mouth. You’ll know it’s not just another boring dessert.
You can use this recipe for these up-and-coming holidays and entertain your guests with a cake that has the interesting combination of orange and chocolate with the crunch of walnuts.
Orange Chocolate Crunch
• 2 cups orange sections, about 6 oranges
• 1/2 cup orange juice
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
• 1 2/3 cups flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup walnuts, chopped
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350°. Peel and section oranges. Cut sections into small pieces. Combine the orange pieces and orange juice. Beat eggs and add oranges, vanilla and almond extract. Mix well. Sift dry ingredients together and add all at once. Pour into a greased and floured 9×13-inch pan. Combine the brown sugar, chocolate chips and nuts. Sprinkle on top of cake. Bake at 350° for 45-50 minutes.
Yep, chocolate and beer pairing is getting so popular I might as well share a recipe that has it.
It may sound bizarre to others who don’t experiment with food much, but beer and chocolate go together splendidly, especially the dark variants. The pairing sounds pretty strange but boy does it work!
People who aren’t crazy about beer often have a fancy for chocolate, so it’s safe to say it’s a win-win recipe. Huge beer fanatics can find flavors in beer that can also be found in chocolate.
With some experimentation, foodies now have come up with something that would make beer fans and chocolate lovers meet halfway. Those who have a sweet tooth are the ones who will enjoy it better, though!
Chocolate Beer Pudding Cake
Batter:
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup beer
• 1/3 cup oil
• 1 egg, slightly beaten
Syrup:
• 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa
• 3/4 cup beer
• 1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
• 1/3 cup sugar
For batter, mix dry ingredients; make a well in center. Add beer, oil and egg to the well. Beat just until smooth. For syrup, make a paste of cocoa and a little beer. Add remaining beer and sugars. Heat to boiling. Pour batter into a greased 8-inch square baking pan. Drizzle syrup over top. Bake at 350° for 40 minutes. Cool about 5 minutes, loosen sides of cake from pan; invert onto platter. Even out pudding layer with knife. Serve warm or cool.
As you may have read in the earlier blog posts, one of the things that makes a chocolate and beer tasting great is the fact that it is unusual, yet it works! Even people who say they don’t like beer, often do like chocolate so everyone can enjoy the event.
Last week’s Craft:Beer+Food event was a huge hit, the pairings were sublime. If you weren’t able to attend, fret not, as a sequel to this delightful affair is anticipated. After Craft:Beer+Food comes the next big thing, BitterSweet:Beer+Chocolate. It is a non-profit happening that enables local breweries to showcase their beers along with the remarkable chocolates of Seattle’s own Theo Chocolate.
BitterSweet:Beer+Chocolate presents the connection between craft beer and artisan chocolate. This event showcases beer paired with chocolate and even beer made with chocolate. Sound interesting, eh? Eight of the Seattle area’s most renowned brewers are taking part in BitterSweet. As expected, they will be providing beer from their regular listings coupled with products from Theo Chocolate, which will be collaborating with them. In addition, they will also be producing new beers just for this event.
Chocolate makers and confectioners from Theo are the ones held responsible for the pairings. For those who haven’t tried this before, head to Theo Chocolate in Fremont and taste the marvelous list of products that they are offering. Their mouthwatering goods are worth your time and effort!
There was a different vibe when the team of brewers was introduced to their counterparts at Theo Chocolate, a good vibe, specifically. Amazingly, they speak the same language and share the same passion for their craft. With the use of chocolate from Theo and byproducts from the chocolate-making process, the brewers plan on making innovative, fresh, and original world-class beers.
Save the date as doing anything else will only make you, as the cliché goes, miss half of your life. Get to experience it and walk away amazed.
People who come to pay a visit at the Bruge’s Choco-Laté Festival, held in the Belfort bell tower, can relish their much loved dessert in whatever shapes & forms possible! So all you chocoholics, listen up and unite. Succumb to your every chocolate craving and indulge in your favorite sweet treat!
Choco-Laté is the annual festival of our favorite guilty pleasure. The vibes that chocolatiers give off at several stands lure the customers and magically bring them to a chocolate haven.
The festival will be hosting an array of activities to make visitors drool with tons of interesting and fun interactive programs such as body painting, chocolate recipe exhibitions, creations such as sculpture by chocolate artists and sculptors, a chocolate village for the little ones, and a “chocolate walk” through the town of Bruges, among many others.
The patrons are given a chance to learn about chocolate creations and recipes that are easy enough to do by themselves during live demonstrations by top chefs, bakers and chocolatiers.
Today, chocolate is used as a health aid and also for aesthetic purposes, not just to curb our sweet tooth cravings. Some of the innovative means of using chocolate are through treatments such as chocolate massages, chocolate packs or cocoa therapies.
Practically any chocolate is tempting, but as with what was stated on yesterday’s blog post, pairing it with a nice glass of wine will surely kick the chocolate delight up a notch. Choco-Laté will be revealing the art of delectably combining chocolate with other delicacies. Case in point: fruits dipped in chocolate fondue, and that is just one of the basics.
And finally, for the true blue chocolate lovers, the festival presents a Choco-Laté junior – a creative corner for kids where they can nourish their imagination in chocolate through fun body painting, sculpting and decorating, and many more.
When: 11 – 13 Nov 2011
Where: Belfort, Belgium,
Cost: €10; under 12s €6; under 6s free
Opening Hours: 10am-6pm
Although wine is pleasurable all its own, most people pair it with an array of different foods as it magnifies the tastes of those food. But did you know that wine and chocolate make a good pair? When the combination is created correctly, it gives a divine blast of taste in the mouth.
First and foremost, you need to make an appropriate choice of chocolate. Grabbing any chocolate bar available won’t be enough as they don’t hold distinctive flavors. Gourmet chocolates are your best bet, be it dark, white, or milk chocolate.
With regard to the wine you’ll be pairing the chocolate with, you need to find one that is at least as sweet as the chocolate, maybe even slightly sweeter. One of the main rules in pairing them is that the distance between wine and chocolate sweetness should always be short because if the wine isn’t sweet enough, the sour notes of wine will make it appear hollow, which makes it a horrible combination.
Red wines generally pair with chocolate easier than white wines. The acidity of Champagne and sparkling wines reacts with chocolate causing a bitter taste, but that doesn’t mean they can’t go along well together. Like I said, correct combination is key.
One main rule in this pairing is light chocolate tastes better with lighter-bodied wines. Simply put, the stronger the flavor of the chocolate, the more full-bodied wine you need for that perfect combination. Another thing to consider is the quality of wine as bad wine only gets worse when paired with chocolate.
Always taste the wine first! Only then should you start enjoying your chocolate. Drinking the wine before eating chocolate will allow you to assess the flavor and taste of the wine itself. Otherwise, your mouth and taste buds will be covered with a thin layer of cocoa butter, preventing you from tasting the wine.
It was once taboo, but pairing wine with chocolate is now becoming commonplace that some people have this particular pair as their comfort food!
If you would like to dig in deeper, consider enrolling as a student of Chocolate University Online. There are several lessons included to help you master wine and chocolate pairings.
Over the last couple of centuries, the cacao bean been has been used in many different ways such as medicine, as money, etc. But today, we eat it almost exclusively for pleasure.
There are different varieties of cacao beans and it has been said that each strain has been significantly changed due to its tree’s ability to naturally cross-pollinate, not to mention all the intended hybridization of the cacao bean for the past centuries.
Cacao beans go through a lot of processing to produce the chocolate we all love. They are harvested, fermented, dried, roasted, and ground to make chocolate liquor, which is then further processed into cocoa solids and cocoa butter.
Chocolatiers or the chocolate makers use these cacao beans or the cocoa mass to produce pure chocolate, which they call “couverture”. This is what they make their confections from.
To make the chocolate, the chocolate liquor is incorporated into cocoa butter and sugar. And these chocolates are categorized based on the amount of the chocolate liquor that was put into it.
The categories said are the following: Dark chocolate, which is known for its bittersweet taste, contains the highest quantity of chocolate liquor. Milk chocolates, which are made with milk ingredients, contain less chocolate liquor. While white chocolate, which is technically not real chocolate since cocoa solid content is zero, is made from cocoa butter, sugar and milk.
A few years back, Scharffen Berger started the style listing the percentage of cocoa mass on labels so people would determine how dark is dark. And within each category, characteristics are all laid down such as the type of cacao beans used, the maker and chocolatier, etc.
Chocolate and wine are known to be a perfect combination. Dark chocolates typically go well with stronger fruity red wines. Milk and white chocolates are often best with white and rosé wines. Just see to it that the chocolate is not as sweet as the wine.
Ports (sweet dark red dessert wine) are also known to be a good partner of chocolate. Tawny ports are preferred over vintage ones as the latter overwhelms the chocolate rather than complementing it.
Beer and chocolate can go superbly together as well. Think of any beer and pair it with practically any chocolate, keeping in mind that the darker the chocolate is, the better.
You can search this blog for more specific pairings of wine and chocolate as well as beer and chocolate.
During a recent chocolate and wine tasting program, I introduced the pairing of a dark chocolate covered pecan and caramel cluster with a Bogle Petite Sirah.
Looking for a wine that would work with cluster, I described what I needed and then took the suggestion from a very knowledgeable wine guru. But up until serving it, I had not tried this particular combination. This always makes me a bit nervous because I am using something unfamiliar, yet I’m simultaneously excited to try something new.
The pairing did not disappoint! This wonderful twosome worked great in the tasting and would also be a very satisfying after dinner treat.
Petite Sirah wine is dark, and inky colored, with firm texture and thick mouth feel. This works well with the thick feeling of caramel and pecan. The flavor notes in this particular petite sirah offered deep fruit of plums and red berries with a hint of spice and a touch of astringency that enhanced the nutty and buttery notes of both the pecans and caramel.
The dark chocolate, around 60% cacao content, complements the tannins in the wine without creating a bitter aftertaste. I think if the dark chocolate were any higher in cocoa solids and the wine a bit more aged, this pairing would be unsuccessful. But somehow all this complexity works, and it works very well!
The wine came from the Bogle Winery in California. According to their website, www.boglewinery.com, Bogle Petite Sirah is “…voluptuous and full-bodied on the entry, the heady aromas of black currants and plums awaken the senses…tones of leather and cocoa…juniper and spice…this wine finishes long and lingering.”
They say it is best served with rich meat dishes and hearty sauces, but I should inform them that it is best enjoyed with Dark Chocolate Pecan Caramel Patties!
North Star Fine Coffees is introducing a new coffee that is designed for students of Chocolate University Online and chocolate lovers with a keen sense of taste.
“Simply Decadent” is not a chocolate flavored coffee, but rather is a coffee designed to pair well with chocolates and chocolate desserts.
I have tried Simply Decadent with dark chocolate and it’s amazing. I have also had it with a variety of chocolate desserts (the chocolate cheesecake was amazing) and breakfast items (like pancakes with chocolate chips) and it’s been fantastic!
Here’s the good news… Chocolate University Online has negotiated a deal to give you a sneak peak of this coffee, for no cost, with special arrangement from North Star Fine Coffees.
To get your free sample (enough to make 10 cups) of this premium grade 1 coffee, click the link above. Then look for the “tell us your coffee story” button on the right side. Click it. Provide your shipping information and a story about coffee.
Important: So that you get a sample of the right coffee, type in “P.S. send me Simply Decadent.”
You’ll get great coffee even if you miss this step, but if you want to be among the first to try a great new premium coffee at no cost, make sure you put in the P.S. That’s how they will know to deliver the right coffee to you.
And there is truly no cost, not even a shipping charge. We want you to be able to try this coffee because once you do, you’ll be hooked! (Sorry, this offer is only valid for U.S. delivery.)
If you’re already a Chocolate University Online student go ahead and pair your favorite chocolate from lesson 10 with Simply Decadent. I’d be curious about your experience.
If you are not a Chocolate University Online student then consider joining us. You’ll develop your own chocolate tasting profile and learn how to pair chocolate with food and wine, and coffee too.
A few days ago I walked into my kitchen and saw my 12 year old daughter take out a bowl of melted milk chocolate from the microwave and dip a stick of string cheese into it. Yummy she crooned.
I was not so sure about that combination, but I tried it anyway. Actually, it was not bad.
Lately, I have been eating all sorts of chocolate and food pairings that I never thought I would enjoy. For example, I recently ate a dark chocolate covered piece of bacon I bought from my local chocolates shop. You heard right, bacon! It was very delicious.
It is not unusual these days to find chocolate bars with all sorts of exotic flavors, at least what I would consider “exotic.” And each time I visit a chocolate shop, I find truffles made with pretty some weird, or should I say “unique,” ingredients.
Did you know you can buy chocolate truffles made with goat cheese (chèvre), shitake mushroom, balsamic vinegar, or wasabi horseradish?
Chocolatiers are adding red hot chili peppers in their retail candy bars. Dagoba Organic Chocolate offers the Xocolatl bar, a 74% dark chocolate bar with spicy chilies. Chocolove makes a bar with dried cherries and ancho and chipotle chilies in dark chocolate. Vosges Haut Chocolate company has two varieties of spicy chocolate bars – The Red Fire Bar and the Oaxaca Bar.
Vosges probably makes the most unusual line of chocolate bars I have ever had. The Black Pearl Bar combines ginger, wasabi, and black sesame seeds in dark chocolate. They also make Mo’s Bacon Bar.
If you find you are not in mood for the same old chocolate experience, try Lindt’s Hot Mango bar with mango-cayenne chocolate mousse filling in a 70% dark chocolate.
During a recent chocolate and wine tasting program, I introduced the pairing of a dark chocolate covered pecan and caramel cluster with a Bogle Petite Sirah. 
