​Days sick: 0Days danced: 0This month’s update will be relatively short. July marks over half of 2020 being in the past, and as of today, I’m a week out from being 25. I’ve been pretty reflective over the last few weeks, and since I’m still in quarantine, quite frankly there’s not much to report. Also, this …

The first thing I did upon arriving in town, after a 4-hour bus ride from the Netherlands, was begin visiting the best chocolate shops in Bruges. This is normally an activity reserves for after you’ve seen the requisite castles and museums, but, well, this pilgrimage was for one purpose: Belgian chocolate. A friend I interviewed …

“The vast majority of the farming community still doesn’t know that they are actually working against nature… Everything is the latest generation of chemicals.” -Harish Manoj Kumar, Co-founder of Soklet Chocolate & Regal Plantations Not only is India one of the world’s largest economies, but the country has a huge range of micro-climates, even within …

How are cacao and cocoa different? Which is healthier, cocoa or cacao? Do cocoa and cacao taste the same? As a chocolate writer, I get these questions all the time, and the answer is quite simple: cacao and cocoa are the same word, in different languages. It’s a bit of a debate in the craft …

Do you remember when books were the social media of choice? I don’t. But I’ve heard tales of a time when people used to put photos in albums and just eat the food on their plate instead of taking a picture of it from every angle. It seems that what people love even more than …

Days sick: 0Days danced: 0This month I was getting a lot of tests done, reconnecting with a lot of people, moving back into DC, and starting a new venture (or two) online. I did some seminars & other book learnin’ for work-related things, in addition to (almost) finishing the redesign of my site. What I’m …

Chocolate can taste creamy and sweet and bitter and umami and sour… but is chocolate vegan? The short answer is that it depends; it can be. Many dark chocolates are vegan, and a small but rising number of white and milk chocolates are vegan. There’s currently no vegan ruby chocolate, but I have no doubt …

Jump To Recipe Ever since I was in middle school, I’ve been trying to figure out the best approach to a chocolate truffle recipe. The sugar bombs I made back then used sweetened condensed milk and chocolate with minuscule amounts of cacao. They’d probably taste cloying and, well, gross to my adult palate, like a …

“We have this motto… never ask your customer what they want, because they of course have no idea what they want. A customer, a consumer, a person on the street can only tell you what they already know.” -Julia Zotter, Creative Director at Zotter Chocolate Since 1995, Zotter Chocolate has been creating confections in southeastern …

The number of chocolate shops in Brussels is meant to astound. Most people will point you towards the most established Belgian chocolate shops in Brussels, like Leonidas, Mary’s, Godiva, and Planete, but historic doesn’t always mean good. Sometimes crappy products continue to thrive because every guide book is just recommending what all the others are. …