Are you getting the most out of your chocolate?
I’m here to help you get more benefit and enjoyment out of chocolate.
By the show of hands, how many of you enjoy chocolate? How many of you are interested in getting more out of your chocolate? How many of you are confused about the question?
There are two aspects to getting the most out of your chocolate. One is the health, the other is the enjoyment.
We all know moderate amount of chocolate is healthy for you. Recent studies has shown that eating chocolate can reduce your stress, lift your mood, and make you less susceptible to infectious diseases.
What you may not know though, the chocolate that offers these benefits are not the usual suspects you find on your grocery store shelves.
There is a popular quote from an unknown author:” “There are four basic food groups: milk chocolate, dark chocolate, white chocolate and chocolate truffles.”
To get all the healthful benefits of chocolate, you should eat only dark and undutched chocolate.
Dark chocolate contains 70% or more cocoa. Undutched chocolate are natural not treated with alkali during processing. Milk also neutralizes all the anti-oxidants contained within cocoa.
Thus, your M&M or Sneakers bar will not give you any of the benefits mentioned above because of the inclusion of milk, and also high sugar content.
Now let’s talk about the enjoyment one gets from eating fine chocolate.
Good chocolate is like good wine, it possess a complex set of flavors. Those of you who are familiar with wine tasting will appreciate the similarities.
I have here one of the best chocolate in the world, Lindt Excellence 70%. It’s made in France, from a blend of cocoa beans cultivated around the world. It’s widely available, and quite affordable. It contains four ingredients, cocoa, sugar, cocoa butter and vanilla. Notice the absence of any additional flavoring agents.
For our tasting, we’ll focus on three aspects of fine chocolate: appearance, aroma and the taste. Please follow along.
First of all, please peel off the wrapper. The first thing you notice is the appearance. Is it shiny or is it matt? Notice the deep and rich color that rivals the finest boudouxe. Did you notice the tints of dark purple and maroon among the sea of blackness? How would you describe the surface?
Now let’s move on to the aroma. Put your nose close to the chocolate and take a deep breath. Do you smell cinnamon? Liquorices? How about honey or vanilla? A good chocolate should not only smell chocolaty, but only other desirable aromas as well. Don’t worry if you can’t detect the aromas I outlined, just like wine, it takes years of fine wine tasting to appreciate the subtle existence of these aromas.
Finally, we’ll do the tasting. The good news is, unlike wine tasting, you don’t need to spit it out at the end.
The bad news is, most of you have tasted chocolate the wrong way. The proper way to taste fine chocolate is to put it on top of your tongue, and wait for it to melt. Once it starts to melt, twirl it around using your tongue so the flavor touches every part of your mouth. Close your eyes and try to taste the different flavors. How would you describe the taste? Is it fruity? Is it blackberry or currant? Did it change? To honey or caramel? Did it finish with hazelnut or was it coffee?
As you’ve seen, to get the most of your chocolate, you need to employee your eyes and nose, in addition to your mouth.
I urge you to seek the world class chocolate offered in the Bay Area. You can get them at BitterSweet Cafe and Sharffen Burger factory store in Berkley, and Fog City News in San Francisco. Host your own chocolate tasting parties, explore and share the wonderful world of chocolate with friends.
Life is a journey, and chocolate is perfect food to bring along, and I wish you many years of enjoyment and good health tasting the world’s finest chocolates.