Gourmet chocolate truffles for my birthday

They were so good and they actually had Guinness Beer in them. Very rich and decadent and I loved them!

Thanks to The Cocoa Tree and Threadventures for their support of "The Nashville Experience"

I need to thank The Cocoa Tree and Threadventures for sponsoring my show the other night. The Cocoa Tree provided $10 gift card, which Nicole won and Threadventures created the Nashville Experieince shirt. Thanks to both businesses, I really appreciate your support!
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Visit The Cocoa Tree website to start planning your next visit there. http://www.thecocoatree.com/
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Visit the Threadventures website to find out what all you can have done for you. Embroidery, designing logos, direct to garment printing, vinyl graphics, digitizing and much more. http://www.threadventuresemb.com/

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and the winner of a gift card to The Cocoa Tree is...

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Nicole Winter won the $10 gift card to The Cocoa Tree. Thanks for watching the Nashville Experience and keep watching for more cool stuff in the future.

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Scenes from the NASFT Fancy Food Show in NYC

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So the chocolate tasting was a success

Here is a testimonial from someone who went to the chocolate tasting at The Cocoa Tree. The folks from The Cocoa Tree were just in New York City for the Fancy Food Show. I hope that went well for them and perhaps someone can tell us all about soon.

Corey Webb

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The chocolate tasting was amazing! Thank you for letting me know.

Bonus Part was the fact that I was eating great chocolate, washing it down with chocolate and won a raffle prize for a $50 gift certificate to a Moment's Peace Day Spa!

Amanda

What is it?

Viking Cooking Classes this weekend

November 14
Chocolate Workshop
6:00 pm - 9:00 pm

Chicago Steakhouse
6:00 pm - 9:00 pm

November 15
Holiday Sweets Workshop
10:00 am - 1:00 pm

Sushi Workshop

3:00 pm - 6:00 pm

Check out the entire schedule at the Viking Cooking School website.

Are you in need of good chocolate for Valentine's Day?

Here are some options for some really good, gourmet chocolates. Yes, she will know the difference when she tastes it so go out and do something to impress her.

Xoconochco
Historic Downtown Franklin
434 Main Street
Franklin, TN 37064
(615) 599-0236

Cocoa Tree
121 3rd Ave N
Franklin, TN 37064
(615) 599-1989

Pralines by Leon
138 2nd Ave N # 102
Nashville, TN 37201
(615) 254-5030

Chocolate Tasting with Dorie Greenspan

After baking authority and author Dorie Greenspan did a Valrhona chocolate tasting with the company's sensory expert, she stopped by the show to share what she learned. As she and Lynne sampled Valrhona's Manjari Grande Cru, Dorie explained the seven steps involved in tasting chocolate:

Look: note the color and sheen (shininess is a sign of good tempering)
Smell: breathe in the odor (what you smell when breathing directly through your nose)
Break: assess the "snap." A crisp snap indicated good tempering.
Put in mouth: note the texture.
Melt in mouth by pressing the chocolate against the roof of your mouth with your tongue.
Distinguish aromas: fruity, floral, warm, heavier (toasted nuts, woods)
Taste: you taste acidity first and bitterness last



This comes from the Splendid Table.

Hot chocolate on a stick

Lars Klove for The New York Times

They look like the kind of chocolate lollipops SpongeBob SquarePants would have in his cupboard. But they are actually Petrossian’s hot-chocolate-on-a-stick, a clever way to make the warming winter drink. Scald a cup of milk for each serving, pour into mugs, then give each person a pop, which melts as it is stirred in.

Read more of this article in the New York Times.

Visit the website of Petrossian to order and learn more.

A $25,000 Dessert in New York

By Vivianne Rodrigues


NEW YORK (Reuters) -

A day after New York City came up with a $1,000 bagel, a local restaurateur unveiled a $25,000 chocolate sundae on Wednesday, setting a Guinness world record for the most expensive dessert.

Stephen Bruce, owner of Serendipity 3, partnered with luxury jeweler Euphoria New York to create the "Frrozen Haute Chocolate," a blend of 28 cocoas, including 14 of the most expensive and exotic from around the globe.

The dessert, spelled with two Rs, is infused with 5 grams (0.2 ounces) of edible 23-karat gold and served in a goblet lined with edible gold. At the base of the goblet is an 18-karat gold bracelet with 1 carat of white diamonds.

The sundae is topped with whipped cream covered with more gold and a side of La Madeline au Truffle from Knipschildt Chocolatier, which sells for $2,600 a pound.

It is eaten with a gold spoon decorated with white and chocolate-colored diamonds, which can also be taken home. "It took us a long time to experiment with all the ingredients and flavors, and more than three months were needed just to design the golden spoon," Bruce told Reuters.

Read the entire story at Reuters.

Chocolate Week in New York City

Attention all chocoholics: New York has declared its “First-Ever Chocolate Week.” Launching Sunday, November 4th, restaurants around the city - Artisanal, Butter, Le Cirque, Country, P*ong, to name but a few - will be getting in on the action with chocolate cocktails, tastings and entire chocolate menus (sweet and savory).

In conjunction with the week’s festivities, the 10th Annual Chocolate Show will be held from November 9-11 at the Metropolitan Pavilion and Altman Building (125 W. 18th Street).

For more info, visit the Chocolate Show.


This post is from Restaurant Girl

Edible Chocolate Boxes

To celebrate their third birthday Charles Chocolates...you get a presen. Their edible chocolate boxes, all 25% off, if shipped by October 15. As a special bonus, everyone who takes advantage of this deal will also receive an e-mail coupon for 10% off on all holiday orders (orders placed during November and December 2007).

Sundae Sunday at Serendipity 3

Chocolate Truffles

Chocolat clip

Chocolate Special at Xoconochco this weekend

Bing CHERRIES and CHOCOLATE
Available this weekend only!
July 14-15, 2007

They've Arrived! They've Arrived! We've been waiting for picked-at-peak BING CHERRIES like a kid waiting for Santa Claus. We were so excited to open the shipment yesterday.

Cherries. Big, bold, firm, dark, mahogany red cherries. Straight from the orchard.This summer, we are participating in a limited program with Batch's Best Family Farms, a farm with acclaimed cherries located in the high plateau of eastern Washington. There, fruit is allowed to ripen on the tree rather than en route to the store. Tom Batch's family hand-picks each piece of fruit, and then the cherries are checked for size, color, firmness, and even to be sure they have a stem, five times, before they are boxed and shipped. This means every cherry is, well, cherry-picked from all the rest! Perhaps this is why they have been sited in publications such as Bon Appetit', Saveur, and the New York Times.

BING CHERRIES are the most popular variety of sweet cherry and the first cherries of the season. Washington produces some of the finest cherries, apples and pears in the world, but most of that fruit is picked too early, because it needs to travel by truck or train across the country to reach our supermarkets. At Batch's Best Family Farms, they are available for just one day a year - the day they are picked and immediately shipped to us - perfectly ripe- straight from the orchard. We waste no time in dipping them in white, milk, or dark chocolate and topping them off with ground almonds, walnuts, or pistachios. Our goal is for YOU to enjoy them as if you just brought them in from your OWN beautiful orchard and dipped them straight into luxurious chocolate. We have limited quantities available and when we are sold out, there will be no more until next year. So, come by early or call us to reserve your selection of FRESHLY PICKED, FRESHLY DIPPED CHOCOLATE CHERRIES!

Visit us at the shop or call us at 1-877-LUV-XOCO.

Options include: dark chocolate (64%), dark chocolate with almonds, milk chocolate (40%), milk chocolate with walnuts, white chocolate, white chocolate with pistachios.

Price:$ 1.45 each

Chocolate Sommelier :: Amber Restaurant, Landmark Mandarin Oriental, Hong Kong

C’mon, you knew it was going to happen. Some trends, copy-cats and sequels should just never happen, but sometimes they are the perfect evolution. (Case in point, “Live Free or Die Hard” was even better than the original.)



A fine dining establishment provides expert sommeliers to help educate, entice and guide us through often unknown territories. First there were wine sommeliers, next cheese sommeliers (often referred to as Affineurs) and a few times I’ve even had a lavish silver cart wheeled up to me with me with my “water sommelier” offering his pairing suggestions for my meal.

So, hiring a Chocolate Sommelier is a natural! When you’ve risen above arguing the merits of milk chocolate vs. bittersweet, and let no less than 85% cocoa pass your lips although you really prefer 95%, or words like “single origin, varietal, & estate grown,” creep into not only your wine but chocolate vocabulary, than you’ll want the services of a trained C.S.

Read the complete story at Vagablond

Where to Find Chocolate in Nashville

Take the time to stop in and visit these wonderful places for delicious chocolates and other sweets. Support your local businesses so we can all enjoy their creations for years to come.
~C.S. Webbspun

Xoconochco (locally owned)

The Cocoa Tree (locally owned)

Pralines by Leon (locally owned)

Godiva Chocolatiers

Chocolate Beetles

This is from the blogger Un-Swiss Miss. Check out her blog for some great photos and stories. http://unswissmiss.blogspot.com/


What next?


America is, with some justification, considered one of the most consumeristic countries in the world. However, in some ways Switzerland is just as bad. When I was here back in October, I saw that many shops had already started displaying their Christmas wares. Then, Fasnacht cakes took the place of Christmas lebkuchen and läckerli cookies, and those in turn were nudged aside by enormous chocolate Easter bunnies and elaborately decorated eggs. Whenever I'm here, there's been something special for sale in the stores.

Now that Easter is over, I've been wondering what they'll come up with next. As far as I'm aware, there are no religious, national, cantonal, or city holidays coming up. So what excuse will Coop and Migros use to get people to indulge?

Well, yesterday I went into Migros for the first time since Easter, and the answer seems to be: BEETLES.