Monday, November 5, 2007

ChocolateBet: November 5, 2007

Chocolate of the day:
Teuscher
1 piece - walnut marzipan
Very Good
Wt: ~ .4 oz.
Calories: ? (~70-80)
$ ? (per piece?)
This was part of a tiny hand-packed assortment box of 4-5 pieces
Purchased at Teuscher store in San Francisco, CA, near Union Square

ChocolateBet: November 4, 2007

Chocolate of the day:
Teuscher
1 piece - milk chocolate honeybee
(shaped like a bee; can taste honey it's made with - slightly crunchy (honeycomb?)
Good+ - Very Good
$ ? (per piece)
? oz./grams
? Calories
Bought at Teuscher store in San Francisco, near Union Square
This was part of a tiny hand-packed assortment box of 4-5 pieces.

ChocolateBet: November 3, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
Recchiutis
1 piece
Cassis Strata (cassis fruit gelee layer, dark chocolate ganache)
Very Good, but I would like to have tasted fruit flavor even a bit more
~.4 oz./? grams
Calories: ?
$ ?
I bought this (and a few other pieces) at the Recchiuti chocolate shop in the Ferry Building in San Francisco. They have some very nice/interesting flavor combinations, but I would love to have some of these flavors come through a bit more than they do now. The flavors are not quite strong enough for me, although they're very nice, high-quality chocolates. (Recchiuti is a local San Francisco Bay Area business and, I was told, was founded by Michael and Jacky Recchiuti.)

ChocolateBet: November 2, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1 piece
Recchiuti
Sur de Lago ("bitter" chocolate ganache topped with crushed Sur de Lago cacao nibs)
Very Good
Wt. ~ .4 oz.
Calories: ?
$ ?
Purchased from: Recchiuti, SF Ferry Building, in San Francisco, CA

ChocolateBet: November 1, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1 piece
Recchiuti
Burnt Caramel (burnt caramel and dark chocolate ganache)
Very Good
Wt. ~.4 oz.
Calories: ?
$ ?
Purchased from: Recchiuti, SF Ferry Building, in San Francisco, CA

ChocolateBet: October 31, 2007

Chocolate of the day:

Recchiuti
Star Anise and Pink Peppercorn
Very Good
Weight: ~ .45 oz. (estim.)
Calories: 65? calories
Cost: $ ?
Bought at: Recchiuti, SF Ferry Building, San Francisco, CA

Recchiuti is a high-end supplier of carefully executed chocolate jewels that you can view at the company's attractive display case in the San Francisco Ferry Building. They're pricey, but good.

Trying today's Recchiuti chocolate with spices helped mask my frustration over not having more time to hunt down a more Halloween-specific chocolate to feature for today -- Halloween. One of the biggest chocolate holidays of the year.

I tried looking in Latino markets close to home for chocolate skulls or skull molds associated with El Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead, celebrated in Mexico), another late autumn holiday celebrated this week, but no luck.

Vosges chocolates' web site looked like they carried chocolate skulls, but I couldn't find them online (at least in time for this year). Next year!

ChocolateBet: October 30, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1 piece
Recchiuti
Rose Caramel
Very Good
Wt.: ~ .4 oz.? (estim.)
Calories: ~ 65 calories (estim.)
Cost: $?
Purchased from: Recchiuti, in the Ferry Building, San Francisco, CA

ChocolateBet: October 29, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:

1 piece
Whole Foods/Belg.?
Belgian Little Bites - Dark Chocolate
Very Good; small individually-wrapped chocolates
Weight: 4.4 oz./125 g. pkg total
Calories: ~ 26 calories each
Cost: $?
Purchased from: Whole Foods, Los Altos, CA

Extreme Chocolate Reading...
This week I read a great article about chocolate in the New Yorker magazine (Oct 29, 2007 issue, p. 68). This piece, titled (Notes from a Gastronome) "Extreme Chocolate" is by Bill Buford; and it focuses on Dagoba founder, Frederick Schilling.

The author also takes you, dear readers, deep into the jungles of South America to talk about how beans are grown, harvested, fermented, and eventually poured into chocolate molds somewhere else in the world. Some interesting history about families in this business as well.

ChocolateBet: October 28, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:

1 piece
Shaw's
Dark Coffee Toffee
Very Good
Weight: .65 oz.
Calories: 80 calories (estimate)
Cost: $3.95 (for a whole bag/package of these dark coffee toffees)
Purchased from: Shaw's, Millbrae, CA

This Shaw's Dark Coffee Toffee candy had a great coffee toffee taste -- close to a toffee-ette*, another childhood favorite candy that tasted great, but could pull the fillings right out of your mouth. They were so good, you were more than willing to take that chance. My mother loved coffee, and thought nothing of giving her six children this coffee toffee candy now and then. Wow, that was brave.

But, I digress. Shaw's was a favorite neighborhood candy spot that had a few different locations in California during its hey-day. The closest location was within bicycling distance of our childhood home and sold candy, ice cream and gifts. Have bicycle (and a few quarters), will buy chocolate.

Sadly, it now appears that the Shaw's Millbrae location, several miles up the peninsula, is the last remaining outpost. Thank you Shaw's for keeping kids of all ages something sweet to remember.

*This candy no longer exists. I believe the company that made them may have been based in Alameda, CA.

ChocolateBet: October 27, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1/2 bar
Cocoa Pete's
Berry Berry Dangerous
1.25 oz. (for 1/2 of a 2.5 oz. total pkg)
Very Good; hard to taste (dried?) strawberry though.
160 calories
$?
Purchased from: Walgreens, Palo Alto, CA?

ChocolateBet: October 26, 2007


Chocolate of the Day:

1 oz.
M and M's / Mars
Light and dark pink-colored chocolate M and M's (special "edition")
Very Good
Weight: 1 oz. (28 g.) / 14 oz. (396.9 g.) package
Calories: 140 calories for 1 oz. serving
$2.50 (sale price)
Purchased from: Walgreens, Palo Alto, CA

This was a nice, fresh-tasting bag of milk chocolate, special edition M and M's chocolate candies. Mars M and M's Brand is planning to contribute $550,000 to "Susan G. Komen for the Cure" this year. The pink-colored blend of M and M's were designed to show continued support in the fight against breast cancer.

Note on avoiding duplicate chocolates: 

I'm choosing to count different versions (shapes and colors) of a few chocolate candies (such as M and M's and Reese's peanut butter cups) as different types of chocolate for the purposes of this chocolate bet. You may disagree, but I figure if it has a different retail sku, and different packaging, and either a different recipe - i.e. different colorings, shapes - then it counts as a "different" chocolate. On the other hand, if the chocolate candy appears in different wrapper colors, but it's really the same item inside the wrapper, and/or has the same bar code, then I'd have to say no, this wouldn't do... My apologies if you're bored with this whole thing by now.

ChocolateBet: October 25, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1 serving (heaping tablespoon?)
Arbonne
Chocolate Protein Shake powder (mixed with milk and water)
Good - Very Good - Not bad for one of these types of drinks
~1 oz? of powder into ~ 6 oz. of milk/water and ice
Calories: ?
$ 0 - gift sample
Obtained from: my sister

One of these days I'm going to dedicate a week to chocolate diet drinks; that should be fun. And if consuming these products resulted in the loss of a pants size, then I would be OK with that too. Maybe I'll try this in January 2008, as part of a resolution to lose a bit of weight.

ChocolateBet: October 24, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:

Vosges Haut Chocolat
Gianduja Bar ("exotic candy bar" line)
Good - Very Good
Weight: 32 grams/85 grams total
Calories: 190 for 1 serving
Cost: $6.95 (estimate)
Purchased from: Whole Foods, Los Altos, CA

This Gianduja "exotic candy bar" from Vosges Haut Chocolat (Chicago, IL) was made of almonds, caramelized hazelnuts, and deep milk (41% cacao) chocolate.

As described on the bar's packaging, first almonds and hazelnuts were caramelized with sugar, then ground into a thick paste, and blended into milk chocolate.

ChocolateBet: October 23, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1 serving/scoop
Safeway Select (light ice cream)
Caramel Caribou "Denali" light ice cream
Good - Very Good for light ice cream
Wt: ~ 1/2 cup or 62 grams
Calories: 120 calories/serving
Cost: ~ $3.00 for whole container (on sale - two for $5.99)
Purchased from: Safeway supermarket in Palo Alto, CA

ChocolateBet: October 22, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:

1 bar
Vosges
Mo's Bacon Bar
Very Good - Yum
Weight: 3.0 oz. (85 grams) in 1 bar
Calories: 425 calories (estimate) for whole bar (according to label)
Cost: ?
Purchased from: Whole Foods, in Los Altos, CA

This Mo's Bacon Bar from Vosges (Chicago, IL) is a bar that most people will probably either love or hate. Count me in the former camp.

What is a Mo's Bacon Bar? The packaging described the gluten free, savory milk chocolate bar by listing the ingredients (a combination of) "applewood smoked bacon, Alder wood smoked salt, (and) 'deep' milk chocolate."

Creator, Katrina Markoff explains, on the back of the package, that her interest in experimenting with chocolate + bacon dates back to age 6, when she remembers eating chocolate chip pancakes with syrup, and bacon.

The bacon pieces I tasted in this Mo's bar were just the right texture; they were still crunchy and they harmonized almost perfectly with the deep milk (41% cacao) chocolate that encased them.

ChocolateBet: October 21, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:
1 pop
Tootsie Roll Industries
Tootsie Roll Pop - Chocolate
Good; enjoyed nostalgic value (and biting into the center)
Wt: 0.6 oz./17 grams
Cost: free
Obtained from: Candlewood Suites, South Austin, TX

For all of us of a certain age... Yes, I think I can still remember the Tootsie Pop TV commercials I watched when I was a kid. I remember a wise cartoon owl character admonishing us to try not to bite into the chocolate tootsie pop center. You were supposed to be patient and lick the candy shell off instead. But, people had trouble being patient. And people would inevitably bite into the thing after only 3 or 4 licks, as I recall. Several baby boomer authors have written with humor and nostalgia about our candy-coated culture, and a few fondly reference TV commercials in the 1950s - 1970s. The book that I've read that seems most directly tied to this theme is Steve Almond's "Candy Freak." I also just bought a copy of the life and times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson - which I will read looking for chocolate memories (and the commercials that sold us these memories) as well. I'll look forward to reading a few more of these books in between new chocolate search expeditions.

ChocolateBet: October 20, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:

1 scoop
Amy's Ice Creams
"On Any (Given) Sundae" ice cream
Good+
Weight: 4.5 oz. (estimate) total
Calories: 290 calories (estimate)
Cost: $ 2.98
Purchased from: Amy's Ice Creams, Austin, Texas (Austin-Bergstrom Airport)

Well, you have to try the BBQ when you're in Texas, right? I'm not a big meat eater anymore; but I do enjoy at least one barbeque item when I'm in Austin or San Antonio.

Unfortunately, I was too full of BBQ from the Salt Lick (near Amy's Ice Creams) in the Austin, TX, airport, to completely finish this cup of ice cream (very unusual for me).

ChocolateBet: October 19, 2007

Chocolate of the Day:

Chocolove
Chilies and Cherries in Dark Chocolate bar
Very Good
Weight:  1.066 oz. (30 g.) in 1/3 bar / 3.2 oz. (90 grams) total bar
Calories: 151 calories for 1/3 bar
Cost: $3.99
Purchased from: Z. Cioccolatos, North Beach, San Francisco, CA

I brought this Chocolove bar with me on my business trip to Texas this week -- in case I didn't have time to search for new chocolates. I thought this chocolate with (ancho and chipotle) chili peppers in it might be a good thematic choice given that I'd be in Texas.

The bar was made of good, quality dark (55% cocoa content) chocolate; and it could have passed for a higher percentage than this. I really liked the fact that I could taste the cherries and the chilies in this well-balanced bar.

The "free" love poem inside the wrapper was clever.

This subject of this passionate poem reminded me to go back and rent/watch two movies: "Chocolat" with Johnny Depp and Juliette Binoche; and also "Como Agua Para Chocolate" (aka Like Water for Chocolate). Both are good films for lovers of chocolate, chilies, and love poems.
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