Chocolatier

I always wondered what it would be like to be a chocolatier, and whether or not I could handle working with a decadent substance that I love so much. I thought I would check out a chocolatier website and read a little bit about what it takes to be a chocolatier.

I found a website for a school called Ecolechocolat, professional school of chocolate arts. I thought it was fitting because all of the classes are actually taught online! How do you teach chocolate making online? According to the lead instructor, Pam Williams, "Our online programs are intensive and the curriculum's are robust, containing anywhere from 75 – 122 learning activities to make sure you develop the expertise you need. Those learning activities include: lectures, technique instructions and case studies and also activities such as: forums, chats, glossaries, polls, questionnaires." She even has a video explaining how great online training can be.


 On the home page, there is a list of topics that the in-depth curriculum teaches you. They include:

• chocolate history as a background to current production practices 
• chocolate making process and techniques 
• taste and attributes of different chocolates g
• ourmet chocolate recipes that you can tailor to your own vision 
• learn techniques with chocolate molds 
• chocolate making supply companies 
• chocolate making equipment suppliers 
• recipe development and production planning

This school sounds like a fun way to learn how to craft chocolate and it can all be done from the comfort of your own home! Learn more about the school by visiting their website!

Do Beauty Pageants Serve Any Purpose in Today’s Society?

There are beauty pageants, and contestants, of all different shapes and sizes. Thousands of awards have been given to young girls around the world for being “the most beautiful girl”. But is it really all just glitz and glamour? Or do the scholarships and self-esteem boosting competitions really help young women across the world?

Miss America:

The most popular beauty pageant, of course, is Miss America. Miss America was not always as glamorous as it is now. “It started out as a promotional gimmick -- dreamed up by Atlantic City businessmen in 1921, as a way to keep tourists in town after Labor Day.” According to Leonard Horn, the former CEO of Miss America, “It was one of the first, if not the first instances of the marriage between advertising and the beauty of the female form which was ingenious because from then on many, many advertisers thought they could get more attention by putting a good looking woman into the picture.” However, many people oppose Miss America as well. In 1968, a group of feminists went to the Atlantic City Boardwalk to send the message across that Miss America is “an image that oppresses women in every area in which it purports to represent us.” Beauty pageants are so popular that no matter what people do, there will always be “lovers and haters”.

The Incident:

The “haters” would most likely use one of the more recent examples, Lauren Upton’s (Miss South Carolina 2007) response to why some Americans cannot find their country on a map. Many Americans also thought the video of the incident was sheer entertainment. In a recent article talking about Miss Pakistan 2010 Catherine Porter from the Toronto Star commented saying, “she is nothing like the cute, bubbly Miss South Carolina Teen USA who became a symbol of pageant vacuousness and a YouTube sensation three years ago, with her answer to why one-fifth of Americans can't find the USA on a map. (She sputtered on about South Africa and then Iraq. Watch it if you are feeling glum. It's a sure pick-you-up).”

Scholarships:

One of the top reasons why women enter these contests is to win scholarships. These opportunities available to any young woman who wishes to compete is what advocates beauty pageants would say they are all about. The scholarships are awarded to:

• Miss America Winners

• Miss America runner ups

• State competitors

• Local competitors

  Horrific Truth About Pageant Life:

JonBenet Ramsey

Six-year-old JonBenet Ramsey, pictured above, was found beaten and strangled just hours after she went missing in the basement of her home in Boulder, Colorado in 1996. She was a child beauty pageant contestant with, still today, an unsolved murder case.

 During a Larry King Live interview with Lin Wood, the attorney for John and Patsy Ramsey, Wood discussed the problem the Ramsey family faced with the police department. When asked about whether there was any information that the Boulder Police would deliberately frame the family, Wood replied, “You know, Larry, there was -- evidence was established that there was, in fact, a plan by the Boulder Police Department to leak information accusatory to the Ramseys to the media, in an effort to convince the public that they were guilty, to pressure them so that somehow they might confess.”

Murder because of fame, uncommon yet possible, is high on the list of reasons why Miss America pageants do not serve a good purpose in society. There is much opposition of beauty pageants, especially child ones, but some people are saying they are good for children.

Opinions Differ:

            Jane Treays filmed two child beauty pageant stars, Brooke and Asia, in 1995 competing for the title of Charm Pageant winner. Treays then interviewed them separately ten years after competing to find out what happened to those childhood stars. When asked how they were now, 15-year-old Brooke said, “The pageants helped me…gave me confidence, helped me focus.” Unlike Brooke, Asia still competed in them and has won eight titles in the last two years. She said, “It’s cute when little kids tackle those adult songs. And I regularly teach pageant techniques to young neighborhood girls.” Although their lives turned out very differently, neither of them was negatively affected by the pageants.

Personal Opinion:

            All of the evidence, good and bad, has an impact on whether or not beauty pageants serve a purpose in today’s society. Depending on someone’s personality, they could be more focused on the fact that they provide scholarships, or still be baffled by Miss South Carolina’s response. There are hundreds of reasons why beauty pageants do and do not serve a purpose in today’s society; it’s a matter of personal opinion. Even though I have never been to a beauty pageant, I think that they do serve a purpose in society. The scholarships and lessons learned are extremely beneficial to young women and offer a great opportunity to them. Just like Brooke said in her interview, the pageants help young girls become confident in themselves and focus on schoolwork. After researching beauty pageants, there is a part of me that wishes I participated in them!

Easter

I thought it only fitting that since Easter is coming up this Sunday I did a blog about all the great Easter chocolate there is out there. Seeing as I am Jewish this may be a little weird, but I actually enjoy Christmas and Easter more than many Jewish holidays (maybe because of the candy?).

First I thought it only fitting to start off with a chocolate Easter bunny, the staple chocolate candy for any great Easter. Any brand of chocolate Easter bunny is suitable for me. The fun about the bunny is that it is very entertaining to eat. First, I can never decide where to start demolishing my treat. The ears? The head? The feet? Then once I pick a spot, I can never get it to fully break off and it ends up falling on the floor. In the end however, I always do enjoy chomping down on a cute little bunny. Here is an example of an ordinary bunny you can get at your local Walgreen's!

One of the other great chocolate Easter candies are Reese's creamy peanut butter eggs. The reason I love these so much is because they are just like my favorite candy, Reese's cups, but even bigger and creamier. I like to indulge in about one of these a day when Easter roles around as to not feel too bad about myself. These scrumptious candies are perfect for a gift or they come in individual packages if you just want a little snack while you are at your local pharmacy picking something up!

My final and FAVORITE Easter candy of all time are Cadbury Eggs. These delicious little eggs are the best treat in the entire world. They come in a small bag of about 20, or a big bag of about 200 little eggs and I swear I could eat them all in one sitting. They are hard on the outside and softer on the inside. And when you bite into one, it melts in your mouth within seconds so you have to savor every last bite. You can get them at your local pharmacy or grocery store around Easter, and sometimes if you are lucky, any other time of year!

Chocolate World

Frozen Haute Chocolate

I recently stumbled upon a site that shares unusual ways to use chocolate and I was hooked! It was extremely interesting and I love chocolate so much that I definitely want to try at least some of them if not all of them!

First off was the chocolate spa. It is located at THE HOTEL HERSHEY in Hershey, Pennsylvania. The spa performs all of their treatments using chocolate. Some of the treatments listed were Whipped Cocoa Bath, Cocoa Butter Scrub and Chocolate Fondue Wrap. All of those sound extremely interesting and I would love to go visit that spa and get one of the treatments (although I might end up eating my treatment off me). I definitely think it is worth checking out since Hershey is one of the top chocolate producers.

The second fun chocolate treat was Suedy's Koo-ki sushi! Now this really got me because my two favorite foods are chocolate and sushi. I know it sounds kind of weird but it is actually a cookie based sushi with chocolate and confections for toppings and fillings. They use fun ingredients like chocolate, crispy rice cookies and candies instead of seaweed, raw fish, vinegar and rice. And they are known for unique features and flavors, such as green tea, piña colada, lemon and caramel, which are perfect for both sushi and chocolate lovers.

Skipping ahead to number 8, is frozen Haute Chocolate: the worlds most expensive dessert. It costs $25,000 per order! It is a joint effort between Dessert Emporium and jeweler Euphoria New York and sold at Serendipity-3 in New York City. This decadent creation is made from a blend of 28 finest cocoas from all around the world and is served in a goblet lined with edible gold and topped with whipped cream, more gold and a side of La Madeline au Truffle from Knipschildt Chocolatier, which sells for $2,600 per pound! But do not worry it does not end there! The lucky man or woman who orders the dessert gets An 18K gold bracelet with a carat’s worth of diamonds that rests at the base of the goblet and a gold spoon set with white and chocolate-colored diamonds as souvenirs. Even though I will NEVER get to experience this dazzling dessert, a girl can dream.

Chocolate is GOOD For You

Many people think that chocolate is bad for you; it makes you fat, gives you pimples, damage your joints. But what people do not know, are the benefits of eating chocolate. Take my father for instance, a perfectly healthy fifty-eight-year-old who has been eating chocolate his whole life!

According to Dirk Taubert, PhD, dark chocolate can help lower blood pressure if you've reached a certain age and have mild high blood pressure. It is also a healthy antioxidant which gobble up free radicals, nasty molecules that can be the source for heart disease and other ailments. Mary Engler, PhD, even says that eating a small 1.6 ounce bar of dark chocolate EVERY DAY is good for you! She gives credit to the flavoniods in dark chocolate that keep cholesterol from gathering in blood vessels, reduce the risk of blood clots, and slow down the immune responses that lead to clogged arteries. Today, chocolate companies have now learned to make dark chocolate that keeps up to 95% of its flavoniods! Engler also added that you cannot really get these flavoniods that you need from other foods. Chocolate, which most people do not realize, is plant derived, and needed for a healthy and balanced life.

Of course, all of these healthy findings come from chocolate in moderation. But that certainly means next time you are craving that little piece of chocolate, go for it!

Too Much Chocolate to Handle

Being in a sorority, I have to take a "little", and spend an entire week showering her with gifts which pretty much consist of a lot of candy (aka chocolate). This week is the start of "big/little week" and I have to decorate my little's room every day with gifts, posters, and lots and lots of chocolate. Being a chocoholic it is very difficult to have pounds of milky ways, snickers, and reeces laying around your apartment. I even converted all of my roommates into chocoholics for the week. They are constantly asking me to have a piece of my candy, which I was hoping to just steal myself so my little wasn't missing that much candy when I decorate her room.
I have also found that I have put on a little weight since this all started. I remember last year, being on the other side, getting showered with food, I definitely gained weight. It is really hard to not snack on candy all day when your room is covered in it!
New media has made contacting my little in secret ways very easy. I created a facebook page called BestlittleEva LaurenTorretta and I talk to her through that so she does not know who I am. I honestly do not know how people contacted their little's secretly before facebook!
In sum, big/little week and chocoholics is not a good mix.

The Chocolixir

As I was studying for a test coming up this week, I got a not unusual craving for some chocolate. I didn't know if I wanted dark chocolate, milk chocolate, white chocolate (which actually is not really chocolate for everyone out there who thinks it is), a candy bar, or a baked good. Then I remembered one of my favorite chocolate experiences of all time, the chocolixir from Godiva. You know it already sounds good by the name of it, chocolixir, which sounds like a pokemon character mixed with a theme park ride.

I was at the mall with my friends doing a little shopping one day when, of course, my chocolate craving came up again, and i NEEDED to get some chocolate. We were walking by the Godiva store so I thought, why not, and popped in to see what kind of chocolate they had. It was heaven. They had everything from truffles, to biscuits, to chocolate covered strawberries! Then I saw a menu over the cashier with a list of flavors for "chocolixirs" and I knew I had to try them. I ordered the dark chocolate decadence, since I like dark chocolate the most, and waited in awe as the cashier poured layers of rich, decadent, chocolate into a blender. He topped it off with some whipped cream and caramel and I entered a food coma. I did not speak to anyone as the intense, refreshingly cool chocolate frappe-like drink slid down into my stomach. Bits of chocolate are even present in the blend so you get that extra kick for the chocolate lovers like me out there.

Thanks to new media, you can search for the nearest Godiva store that offers chocolixirs so you can go get one yourself! Just click here!

The Beginning

I have probably been a chocolate all of my life, but I realized it at summer camp when I was 9. Camp is full of sports, activities, friendships, singing, and just plain old fun. But what they don't tell you about camp is that is full of food. And A LOT of it. Parents love to send their children secret packages with candy hidden inside teddy bears, magazines, and anything else they can stuff wads of mike and ikes into. However, the mother of all candy celebrations is the birthday. I was fortunate enough to have my birthday during camp and let me tell you I still, to this day, have never seen so much food in such a small area in my life. Brownies, cookies, sodas, pretzels, chips, dip, frosting, cake, (notice how they are two separate things), cup cakes, pizza, and candy up the wazoo all filled our cabins every time there was a birthday.
I found myself scavenging for all the chocolate I could find when those packages came. If the cake was vanilla, I wouldn't touch it. If the candies were simply sour and fruity, I wouldn't even think about it. All I cared about was the chocolate brownies, candy, and frosting I could get my hands on. I would even get upset when our counselors would hand us all out candy so we weren't fighting about it, and I would get something not chocolate.
Another thing I remember is saving my chocolate and storing it in secret places for me to eat at other times. I would put it in my drawers, under my bed, or even just under my pillow for before bed. If I thought one piece was ever missing, I would automatically blame my friends, even though I had probably just forgotten I ate it.
Writing this out now, 10 years later, I feel very stupid. I can't believe I would get upset when I literally got handed candy, and it was not chocolate. Or that I blamed my friends for eating my chocolate when it was me the whole time. I guess that it what happens when you are addicted to something; you will do anything to get your hands on it or protect it. Maybe now I have a little more respect for alcoholics or drug addicts...maybe not.