Chocolate Sampler: December 11

CHOCOLATE SAMPLER: Every few weeks I like to do a round-up of Chocolate Stories, Reviews and News.

TRAVEL

• The World's Largest Chocolate Fountain at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas is among the World's 10 Weirdest Romantic Destinations. World renown pastry chef Jean Philippe Maury spent a year and a half in design and planning to build this structure. The chocolate fountain is 27 feet tall and circulates 2,100 pounds of chocolate at a rate of 120 quarts per minute. There are three types of chocolate in the fountain and while you may not be able to eat directly from the fountain, Jean Philippe’s bakery offers plenty of the prized chocolate. Read the entire article here.

• Looking for something fun to do in Santa Fe during the holidays or anytime, check out The Santa Fe Chocolate Trail: Kakawa Chocolate House, Todos Santos Chocolates and Confections, and CG Higgins Confections and Chocolate Smith, the last stop on The Santa Fe Chocolate Trail.

• I did a round-up of Chocolate Museums around the world a little while ago, and one of my chocolate friends of Estonian heritage sent me this article about the Kalev Chocolate Museum in Tallinn, Estonia.

• Chocolate Marmites: A Geneva Exclusive. Marmite here doesn't refer to the icky U.K. Marmite yeast extract blend; rather, every year, leading up to the weekend closest to December 12, bakery and chocolate shop windows all over Geneva proudly display chocolate cauldrons, or marmites as they are known, filled with marzipan vegetables and decked with red and yellow ribbons, Geneva’s colors. Families and businesses buy the cauldrons for a ritual that requires the youngest and the oldest member of any given group to smash the marmite open and then serve the chocolate shards and the brightly colored veggies to the others present. Read more at Suite101: Chocolate Marmites – A Geneva Exclusive: The Three-Legged Pots Are Filled With Marzipan Vegetables. Read more here.

• Planning a trip to Normandy? Alençon that has two of the best chocolatiers: Jacky Pedro and Chocolat Glatigny. Chocolate making has been a speciality in Alençon, a market town in Lower Normandy, for over a hundred years. Jacky’s premises have been the site of a “chocolaterie” since 1895. The adjacent Chocolat Glatigny shop has a more recent history, established in 1975 in a medieval timber-framed building opposite the entrance to the church. Glatigny specialities include Les Sieurs d’Alençon or Squires of Alençon made from hazelnut paste flavoured with calvados, coated with dark chocolate and rolled in icing sugar, and Le Point d’Alençon a caramel ganache flavoured with green apple compote, coated in milk or dark chocolate and finely decorated with a lacework of white chocolate. Read the rest of the article on the Velvet Escape website.

NEWS

• Megacompany Hershey debuted a new addition Hershey’s Bliss ® Chocolate line by introducing Hershey’s Bliss White Chocolate with a Meltaway Center. This new chocolate indulges Hershey’s Bliss Chocolate fans with rich and creamy white chocolate around a smooth, meltaway center. The domed-shape of the individual square fits the mouth, allowing the white chocolate to melt evenly. Lots of hyperbole in the press release, but I must admit it tastes great, but I'm a white chocolate fan.

Contests:

• Don't forget you have less than a month to enter the Scharffen Berger Chocolate Adventure Contest. I posted about it here. Great prizes, great adventure ingredients. Deadline for the contest is January 3.

• Hershey’s Bliss Chocolate: Share the Bliss ™ Essay Contest based on the New York Times best-selling book The Necklace. By taking a page from the book to help others experience the undeniable bliss of sharing just like the women of The Necklace, the Share the Bliss contest intends to connect women nationwide with the chance to share a 16.5-carat diamond necklace. Continuing through December 2009, consumers can visit www.hersheysbliss.com to enter the Share the Bliss contest by submitting their stories (150 words or less) of why they want to experience or be “blissed” the Hershey’s Bliss Chocolate diamond necklace. Lucky women will be selected to share the 16.5-carat diamond necklace for two weeks and will receive the necklace, a variety of Hershey’s Bliss Chocolate and a signed copy of The Necklace. Each winner will be asked to share their experience with the necklace through a blog on the Hershey’s Bliss Chocolate Web site and to help select the next winner, thus connecting women nationwide.
  

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