Some things just go together naturally and no one can necessarily explain why. One of these popular pairings is chocolate and romance. Chocolate is often associated with love and romance and we only have to think about Valentine’s Day to get some idea of how this sweet treat is used to woo a partner (or [...]
Here’s some good news for all you chocoholics – eating chocolate is good for you! Well, hang on a minute; let’s not get too excited just yet. I’m not saying that you can clear all the fruit and vegetables out of your cupboards and fill them with oversized chocolate bars and biscuits. ‘Everything in moderation’ [...]
The cocoa bean market is a pretty volatile one and prices can really fluctuate on a yearly basis. As many cocoa farmers have smallholdings they are completely reliant on the sale of their cocoa beans for their income. This income is pretty low at the best of times so if world cocoa prices take a [...]
As we’ve learnt, cocoa is a pretty versatile ingredient. As it’s naturally bitter in flavour it can be adapted for use in all kinds of food and drinks and can be used in both sweet and savoury dishes. It can also be turned into an alcoholic drink. Liqueurs often tend to be sweet and many [...]
Hot chocolate, drinking chocolate, a nice cup of cocoa – call it what you will but people have been enjoying the benefits of liquid chocolate for thousands of years. It was the ancient Mayan and Aztec civilisations that first discovered this drink, although, of course, it was rather a bitter concoction back in those days. [...]
Come on, admit it; who hasn’t been tempted to raid the baking box when the biscuit tin is empty and a swift chocolate fix is required? I’m not going to answer this one myself but suffice to say I don’t keep cooking chocolate in the house any more unless a baking session is imminent.
So, what [...]
Many chocolate aficionados don’t class white chocolate as being chocolate at all. Why, I hear you shout? Well, it’s a pretty persuasive argument I suppose. The fact is that white chocolate doesn’t actually contain any cocoa solids. It has cocoa butter, sugar and milk solids but no cocoa solids. I suppose it comes down to [...]
This is by far the most popular and widely consumed type of chocolate in the world. Its existence came about due to the diligence of a chocolatier called Daniel Peter in the 1870s. He was searching for a way to combine milk with cocoa to make a creamy, pale chocolate that was less bitter than [...]
It’s time to talk about the main types of chocolate now and I’m going to start with the purists’ choice – dark chocolate. And why is it the purists’ choice you might well ask? Basically, dark chocolate has the most amount of cocoa solids and therefore the most actual ‘chocolate’ in it. The higher the [...]
For a contrast I thought I’d now mention a South American producer. Despite their first forays into cocoa production, they’re not such prolific growers these days. Venezuela isn’t even the biggest South American producer (that accolade goes to Brazil) but I chose this country, as it’s renowned for its extremely high quality cocoa.
Venezuela did, at [...]