Would that all homework were this tasty! 

A clever use of chocolate describes how an elementary teacher uses Hershey's chocolate bar to illustrate fractions.

"Michelle Lester, has been teaching 'chocolate fractions' to her students for a few years and said the students grasp the concept of fractions more easily with this idea.

"Students have to figure out fractions by moving the individual pieces of the Hershey bar."

Now, if only someone would bring on chocolate calculus!  

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Big or small, chocolate handbags say it all.

Indonesian hotel puts chocolate handbags on menu tells us that you can get life-size chocolate handbags now, although they only last for two months. "An Indonesian hotel [Mulia] is dishing out tasty totes with all the trappings of real bags from buckles and locks to fine crystals and buttons -- except instead of leather the bags are made of chocolate."

For a more bite sized version, try Choco Choco House's Chocolate Handbags (pictured left). In many "designer" styles, these confections mimic the great ones, including an exquisite little "Pravda." And if you really want to make your accessories match, they make shoes as well.

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Well, the proposed new standards for chocolate have released a firestorm! Here's your own little sampler:

Could changes be coming for chocolate?

Gary Guittard, president of Guittard Chocolate Co. in Burlingame, Calif., is taking a public stand over a request submitted to the Food and Drug Administration to allow a product to be called chocolate even though vegetable fats are substituted for cocoa butter.

The war on chocolate

The FDA is thinking about allowing Big Chocolate to pass off waxy imitations as the real deal.

Our chocolate has got to be real

The FDA is entertaining a "citizen's petition" to allow manufacturers to substitute vegetable fats and oils for cocoa butter. The "citizens" who created this petition represent groups that would benefit most from this degradation of the standards. They are the Chocolate Manufacturers Association, the Grocery Manufacturers Association, the Snack Food Association and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (OK, I'm not sure what's in it for them), along with other food-producing associations.

Sign a petition to keep our chocolate real

To help defend chocolate, visit www.dontmesswithourchocolate.com and learn how to submit feedback to the FDA.

Chocoholics unite!

This page, following its tradition of promoting truth and wholesome ingredients in food, stands for chocolate as it has been made for generations. Yet for the masses to rise up and beat down this proposal, many Internet surfers may find the FDA's Web site too incomprehensible to navigate. An easier way to defend chocolate is to visit the Web site http://www.dontmesswithourchocolate.com. The very future of chocolate as we know it hangs in the balance.

And, in case you didn't get the message, that petition page is:

Don't Mess with Our Chocolate

Directions for the non-intuitive petition submission process are here.

Have at it!

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And chocolate wins, in an unusual comparison test! 

SkyNews reports in Chocolate Hits The Spot that "Researchers discovered romantically-involved couples responded more to chocolate melting in their mouths than snogging." ("Snogging," for the non-Brits among us, means "kissing.")

Of course, the test consisted of allowing chocolate to melt in your mouth without chewing it, and then kissing each other "as you normally would," with weirdly wired hats in a room where others are assumedly observing you. Brain waves in the pleasure zone were measured and compared.

So which would you respond to more? I know my chocolate score would be off the charts!  

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If it looks like chocolate, feels like chocolate, and tastes like chocolate, is it always chocolate?

Possibly, if chocolate standards change as proposed by Grocery Manufacturers Association.  

As reported in It looks like chocolate — but is it?, the proposal, spearheaded by the GMA and supported by the Chocolate Manufacturers Association and 10 other food groups, would allow chocolate makers to substitute far cheaper fats for cocoa butter, diluting the idea of what chocolate should be.

More details can be found at Proposed Industry Changes in the Recipe for Chocolate Threatens What Consumers Love About Their Chocolate.

Is it just me, or is this a truly bad idea?  

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While chocolate eggs can do a lot of things, hatching is most likely not one of them. But tell that to this devoted cockatoo. 

BBCNews reports in Cockatoo guarding chocolate eggs:

A cockatoo at a wildlife sanctuary has spent a fortnight trying to hatch a bowl of chocolate eggs.

Pippa has been protecting the chocolates at Nuneaton and Warwickshire Wildlife Sanctuary since she was taken outside, put on a table and saw them.

Her owner, Geoff Grewcock, said: "She went straight over, climbed on the creme eggs and that was it. She thinks they're her eggs.

"Until she clicks they're not real eggs, we'll just leave her there."

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What do you use to relax? If it's tea, you might want to upgrade -- to chocolate.

NewsLocale.org reports in Dark Chocolate Scores Over Tea in Reducing High Blood Pressure:

"Foods like dark chocolate, which contain plenty of cocoa, may potentially reduce high blood pressure by acting in a manner similar to many blood pressure-lowering drugs, according to an analysis of previous studies by German researchers. Researchers from the University Hospital of Cologne examined data of five cocoa studies and five tea studies and concluded that dark chocolate and other cocoa-rich foods acted to reduce high blood pressure better than tea."

Time to change the name from High Tea to High Chocolate? 

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Sadly, not all chocolate is produced in an ethical fashion.

In 'Slavery' behind Easter chocolate, BBC News tells of the thousands of children who are working as slave labour on West African cocoa farms.

The International Labour Organisation says 12,000 children have been trafficked to the Ivory Coast. A coalition of anti-slavery charities says they work long hours for no pay and little food on the plantations. British chocolate manufacturers said a certification scheme was being set up to tackle "unacceptable" conditions. The coalition, called Stop the Traffik, wants the manufacturers to declare chocolate "traffik-free" so consumers can be sure they are not supporting child slave labour.

Let's help the world become traffik-free with our support.  

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There are some good guys out there.

Green & Black owners Craig Sams and Jo Fairley have worked to make cacao farming in the Mayan communities of Belize more equitable for the farmers. From The Leader Online:

In 1994, organic chocolate manufacturer Green & Black's added Maya Gold to its line of chocolates after founders Craig Sams and Jo Fairley fell in love with a Mayan drink while on vacation in Belize. "Kukuh," the Mayan drink, had been consumed by native cocoa farmers for generations. The company had already begun with the belief that sourcing organic ingredients for its products would be beneficial to taste. The company also believed that farmers who grew their crops organically were more interested in the quality and taste of what they grew, and were therefore more personally invested in their crops.

The most important aspect of their new product was the agreement Sams and Fairley entered into with the local farmers while on their trip. After learning that a large chocolate corporation had promised the farmers lucrative prices to plant hybrid cocoa trees rather than indigenous varieties familiar to them - eventually causing the community to collapse in economic ruin - Green & Black's offered to trade directly with the farmers. The company agreed a price with the growers that made it profitable for them to grow cocoa and, signed a rolling contract for 5 years minimum with a cash prepayment to ensure that their cooperative could reimburse members 'on the spot.' This equitable deal meant that Maya Gold earned the first Fairtrade Mark ever to be awarded in the United Kingdom. 

Progressive tactics for a multi-national company. I'll be picking up a bar or two on my next grocery run.

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This year, celebrate Easter with a basket full of these fine chocolates. 

Burdick Chocolates fine bunnies (pictured) are sure to please. "For the customers who have made our chocolate mice and penguins among our most popular items, we have created a line of hand-piped chocolate bunnies," said Paula Burdick, co-owner of L.A. Burdick Chocolate of Walpole, NH.

See's Candies offers a full line of beautiful Easter products, including their chocolate butter pecan egg.

Willy Wonka has created a special Golden Egg, just in time for Easter.  

You can even go organic and/or ethical with Abel & Cole's Easter eggs, or Whole Foods Market's imports from Iceland.  

Enjoy the holiday!

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StaffNurse.com has some good news for its patients -- and for us. Chocolate Clue To Longevity tells of a substance in cocoa, epicatechin, may rival penicillin and anaesthesis in its importance to medicine.

Studies of the indigenous Kuna of Panama, central America, show that their annual consumption of natural cocoa is up to 40 cups of cocoa a week -- and natural cocoa has high levels of epicatechin. This may be why the Kuna have low rates of stroke, heart failure, cancer and diabetes, only 10% of that of the Western average.

Sounds like a great prescription to me!

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Are you a true connoisseur of chocolate? Then you'll enjoy hearing about these taste-testing
opportunities.

First, the Geneva Chocolate Festival 2007 is rapidly approaching. "There is a huge tent with an interactive show about how chocolate is made where visitors can, of course, taste chocolate from 15 different Swiss chocolate producers. Be amazed at the size of the chocolate fountain and the ‘chococinema’, where you can sit back and relax and you eat your naughty treats as you watch chocolate related films, such as ‘Chocolat’ with Johnny Depp."

Next up, an article highlighting the newest trend of single-origin chocolate: Single-Origin Chocolate Goes Mainstream. "As with wine grapes, the source of cacao beans is supposed to result in distinct flavors and aromas. Chocolate from Colombia might seem peppery while chocolate from Venezuela might smell like vanilla. 'It's like colors on a palette,' says Gary Guittard, president and chief executive of San Francisco's Guittard Chocolate Company. 'There is a tremendous parallel between wine and chocolate.' "

Finally, enjoy this short piece that describes in detail the best way to taste-test chocolate -- let it melt, don't bite.

Bon appetite!

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Chocolate good for you? At least for your memory, according to a new study. 

Some sweet news: Chocolate could be good for your memory explains:

"The beneficial brain effects [from chocolate] appear to stem from flavanols' impact on the blood system. In essence, the chemicals stimulate an increase of blood flow to the brain, particularly in areas that light up during tasks that require alertness. Experiments suggest this neurovascular activity is distinct from the well-known stimulant effects of caffeine."

In related news, hot chocolate is enjoying a resurgence as a winter drink. Hot chocolate holds steady as winter's power drink details the different ways hot chocolate can be enjoyed, whether with richer cocoa or with additions such as brandy or liquor. 

Sign me up!  

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Creating chocolate isn't easy -- and it's an art

If you have ever made peanut butter at home, you know something about making chocolate. Making peanut butter is incredibly easy. You take peanuts, roast them, and then toss them in a grinder or a blender. The peanuts turn into peanut butter.

You can do exactly the same thing with cocoa beans. If you roast them and toss them in a grinder or a blender, you get a thick liquid called chocolate liquor. It smells absolutely heavenly.

Makes me want to whip up a batch right now!
 

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A series of informative articles this week reveals that chocolate can be used for a good cause, and might even help the environment, too.

• In Beaumont, Texas, Suga's Deep South Cuisine and Jazz Bar hosted a dessert-themed fundraiser to benefit arts programming for school-age children. The beneficiaries executive director said, "We wanted something really fun and casual where people could visit. Suga's pastry chef, Melissa Lavespere, really is excited about this. It's a wonderful opportunity for her to showcase her talents. She's doing a wide variety of desserts, from chocolate dipped strawberries to petit fours to a chocolate fountain. We'll also have wine and champagne and cappuccino drinks."
• Roanoke, Virginia, saw another chocolate-themed fundraiser, this time to support sending junior chefs to a regional competition. The event included a pantheon of scrumptious confections, including a dessert that was a combination of desserts -- french silk and Kentucky Derby pies. The layered creation included chocolate silk, a chocolate chip blondie, chocolate peanut butter fudge and chocolate ganache piled on an Oreo crust.
• In related news, YubaNet.com reports on the "greening" of cacao farming in Belize to help turn the tide on deforestation with shade-grown cacao. "Cacao trees, the source of those unusual seeds from which they make cocoa, are uniquely suited for organic, shade grown conditions. The low trees do best in the protection of the rainforest canopy, relying on the tall, mature trees to protect them from wind and sun and conserve soil moisture."
• Finally, in a public service decision above and beyond the call of duty, Mars Inc. in the U.K. has recently vowed to stop targeting children under 12 in their chocolate ads. "The US-based company is one of the world's biggest advertisers and it has a policy already in place of not advertising to children under six years of age. Its latest decision spurs from the debate over advertising and promoting junk food and the increasing rate of child obesity."

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Can chocolate get any better? It sounds like it can! Read about how manufacturers are experimenting with "hot" new flavors. 

Spicy and exotic flavors add pop to chocolate explores the wide variety of options out there.

"At Target, you can buy premium Choxie 'Aztec Thins' flavored with Ancho chiles and cinnamon for about $2. Or you can go upscale and splurge on an artisanal-quality chocolate 'Firebar' by Vosges Chocolate. They're $7 (or higher) each at such establishments as Pittsburgh's The Chocolate Moose and Mon Aimee Chocolat, for example. Sarris Candies makes a milk-chocolate 'hot pepper bar' for $1.95."

Chips and salsa -- move over! I'll take my hot with some chocolate.

In a fun column from the Norwich Bulletin, Charlene Perkins Cutler reveals the long legacy chocolate has in this Connecticut town.

Chocolate has rich history here tells the story of chocolate's immigration from Mexico to Spain to England, and back to the New World again with the addition of milk and sweeteners.

Trendy, and some thought addictive, chocolate became popular with the "rebels" even before American independence. Norwich's Christopher Leffingwell established the town's first mill in 1770. It was a drink at first, before it became the solid treat we know today.

In related news, Carol Off's Bitter Chocolate: Investigating the Dark Side of the World's Most Seductive Sweet, recently published from Random House, is reviewed on blogcritics.com. Not quite as a cheery story, but very informative.
 

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Here's a new taste sensation: grilled chocolate sandwiches.

It's pretty much like it sounds.  Two buttered pieces of bread, chocolate, grilled. Like grilled cheese, only gooier.

For more details, check out Chocolate Meets the Grill in Cake Sandwiches.

"For my first attempt, I replicated the procedure for the first sandwich. The results were a little disappointing. With the introduction of butter, the pound cake was not strong enough and fell apart too easily. For my second attempt, I did not butter the outsides. It was better, but needed an extra touch. In the third attempt, I started to go through some spices and though ground cinnamon would add a nice touch. The combination of melted chocolate and cinnamon reminded me of Mexican hot chocolate and the taste was rich and sinful."

Now all we need is cheese ice cream for dessert! 

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Something I've always wondered about chocolate has finally been answered: what is that white stuff that sometimes forms?

Apparently, it has its own name: chocolate bloom. And, it's not as bad as it looks or as good as it sounds.

As explained in boston.com's Is chocolate with a white-ish coating safe to eat?, this substance forms when chocolate, which is a carefully balanced mixture of a lot of different thiings, is allowed to soften and therefore separate. The cocoa butter especially can come to the surface and form a "bloom." The article concludes:

"Industry spends a lot of effort trying to keep blooms from forming, and you'd be amazed at the technology that goes into studying this stuff -- all the way up to X-spectroscopy, radioactive isotope labeling, atomic force microscopy, etc., but the problem is far from solved, as you will no doubt find if you leave some holiday chocolates around until spring!"

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Hershey, PA, that is.

• There’s more to Hershey, Pa., than just chocolate tells about the many chocolate-themed attractions at this well-known chocolate venue. There's an enormous amusement park, a spa, several tours, and even an interactive chocolate factory.

• Edible beauty treatments zeroes in on Hershey's Chocolate Spa, featured earlier on this blog and still receiving new coverage. "'It looks like chocolate, smells like chocolate, but it's mud,' Joann Bowers, a spa technician, said as she massaged a client with the fudgy muck. 'Don't lick it.'

• Finally, for the story behind the man who started it all, Milton Hershey, read The secret behind the Hershey bar. There, you'll find out about the Milton Hershey student home, written in Christian parlance, but well-meant and informative. 

Here's to Hershey, a gem among chocolates!

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