Patti's Lemon and Chocolate Cupcakes - LMNOPQR Week - Feb. 24, 2017

Chocolate of the Day: 

Patti's Perfect Pantry

1. Lemon Curd Cupcake
2. Lemon Cheesecake Cupcake
3. Chocolate Fudge Cupcake
4. Chocolate Chip Cupcake

Welcome to the first day (Day #1) of LMNOPQR Theme Week. We'll be continuing to work our way through the chocolate alphabet this week, starting with the letter "L."

What starts with "L" that blends well with chocolate? Answer: Lemon. I've always enjoyed bars and confections made with dark (or dark milk) chocolate and lemon.

Limoncello, lemon custard or lemon curd in a dark chocolate shell is like a little black dress in a woman's wardrobe that's simple, elegant, and always in fashion.

Today's find of the day was Patti's Perfect Pantry (Morgan Hill, CA). Their bakery, cafe and take-out offerings were all made in a dedicated gluten-free kitchen. It's not every day I can enjoy a "Mad Hatter" sandwich (honey ham, Swiss cheese and pineapple) on gluten-free pumpernickel bread. (Thank you Don for finding this place.)

Chef Patti has created a series of gluten-free cupcakes, including ones with lemon and and chocolate. The two made with lemon curd were particularly delicious. I wouldn't suggest eating four whole cupcakes at one sitting. But, I did have a slice of all four mentioned above, for scientific research purposes.

I'll likely go back to Patti's to try other gluten-free chocolate cupcake flavors: brownie, chocolate peanut butter and Boston cream cupcakes, to name a few.

Fig and Lemon bombons - March 7, 2013

Chocolate of the Day:

Productos La Higuera, S.L.
6 Rabitos Royale bombon de higo
Very Good
Weight: .558 oz. (15.8 g.) / 3.35 oz. (95 g.) total package of 6
Calories: 55.8 calories in 1 piece
Cost: $N/A - sample
Purchased from: Green Gecko Coffee, Hawaii

Today's chocolate fig bon bons (from Almoharin, Spain), were carefully crafted and then individually wrapped. Each dried Mediterranean fig (higo) was filled with a creamy truffle and Brandy liquor filling, and covered in 54% cocoa chocolate. These figs arrived courtesy of Green Gecko Coffee Farm's website.

As a companion to these chocolate fig jewels, I picked a Meyer lemon from my yard, and made some candied Meyer lemon slices -- which I dipped in dark chocolate with a touch of butter.

The figs were the star of the show, but they paired nicely with the candied and cooked lemon flavors.

Fruit Butter Chocolate Cups

The emphasis on butter(s) this week also inspired me to create a series of three different dark chocolate cups filled with three different fruit butters.

These butters included: 1.) Traditional English Lemon Curd (London) topped with lemon peel; 2.) Liliko'i (passion fruit) Butter (from Happy Honu Farm, Hawaii) topped with thin slices of kumquat; and 3.) Coconut Butter (Honomu Jams, Hawaii) topped with fresh, green lemon mint leaves.

Fruit butters are made by slowly cooking and stirring sugar, egg, and butter with fruit together in a pan on stove. Lemon's tart and sassy sweet flavor gets richer and mellower when cooked with the egg and butter. 

The Liliko'i (passion fruit) butter was delicious. All three paired well with chocolate. Messy eating, but very good.

Nothing like virtual travel from my backyard garden in California to Spain, Paris, London, and then Hawaii -- all via the wonderful power of chocolate, and a smidgeon of imagination. 

Today was Day #6 of Chocolate and Butter Theme Week, and Day #2 of Chocolate and Lemon Theme Week. 

ChocolateBet: July 3, 2012

Chocolate of the Day: 

Astor Chocolate Corp.
Chocolate Liqueur Cups
Good - Good +
Weight: .9 oz. (25.4 g.) / 2.75 oz. (77 g.) total box of 12 cups
Calories: 109 calories in 4 cups
Cost: $12.99 total box of 12
Purchased from Draeger's Market, San Mateo, CA

Today was Day #6 of Chocolate and Backyard Barbeque and Bacon Theme Week.  Happy 4th of July eve to all in the U.S.

We had lots of skewered fun for dinner this evening.

The main course: gluten free chicken sausage, pepper and potato kebobs with just a hint of onion and barbeque sauce (with a pinch of cocoa and pepper spice).

The beverage course consisted of a tall glass of raspberry lemonade over ice with little Meyer lemon chunks and fresh strawberries on toothpick skewers.

The first dessert course: gummy bacon and fresh fruit skewers. (The gummy bacon was strawberry flavored.)

Last, but not least, Dessert #2 was the featured chocolate of the day. Playing off the lemonade theme, we created a set of four Chocolate Liqueur Cups from Astor Chocolate (Lakewood, NJ). Cup #1 was filled with Dickinson's lemon curd with a lemon rind garnish. The second cup was filled with Sticky Fingers lemon curd (sweeter, less eggy than the Dickinson's). The third cup contained lavender and honey ice cream topped with limoncello-marinated lemon zest threads. And the fourth cup held an Omega-3 lemon cocktail from the health food section of Costco, topped with an Omega-3 lemon gummy vitamin drop -- which quickly sank to the bottom of the cup. So much for the healthful option.

ChocolateBet: June 21, 2011

Chocolates of the Day:

The Oakland Chocolate Co.
1.) Lavender Truffle - Very Good
2.) Spearmint Truffle - Very Good
3.) Pistachio Rolled Truffle - Good + - Very Good
4.) Filled Oval Leaf (lime pepper jelly) - Very Good
5.) Filled Scallop Leaf (lemon curd) - Very Good +
6.) Filled Small Log (hazelnut butter) - Very Good - Very Good +

People ask me if I ever have trouble finding new chocolates. No, not yet. But, if I have too many oversampling days like today, I just might. I selected six possible Mediterranean flavors that came in a box of chocolates from The Oakland Chocolate Company (a bean-to-bar-to-bonbon operation). All these individual chocolates were made from Jamaican dark chocolate.

The Lavender Truffle was filled with a white ganache and topped with delicious candied lavender buds. The Spearmint Truffle with a chocolate ganache also was blessed with a tiny piece of what I believe was candied spearmint leaf. My two favorites were: the dark chocolate leaf filled with lemon curd -- a combination that is hard to beat in my opinion; and the small chocolate log filled with hazelnut butter. The hazelnut butter sparkled with bright bits of flavor, sweetness and texture. I much preferred this to overly homogenized hazelnut fillings present in some commercial chocolates.

In the same vein as the leaf with lemon curd, the oval chocolate leaf that was filled with lime pepper jelly was also good -- tart and pleasing, but not overly spicy.

Today was Day #5 of Chocolate and Mediterranean Theme Week.