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I don’t have much to say about chocolate. So I won’t say much. Except for the fact that I eat it often and I enjoy it often. I like most chocolate you can find. Everything from Cadbury to Lindt to Snickers to Mars Bars to Mast Brothers (rest in one single piece)
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Mast Brothers had a wonderfully public fall from grace in 2015 which can be read about here. It was a sad time. They were for many years the darlings of the speciality chocolate scene. Beautifully presented, packaged for an instagram age before instagram arrived, accessible in their offering across the palette and wholly inaccessible in price for the vast majority of the population. I went to visit their first shop when I first went to NY in 2010. They had a small shop in Brooklyn around the corner from one of the best mens clothing shops I have ever visited, filled with beautifully made Japanese menswear, which at the time I had a real fondness for. I still do. Justifiably.
I found two beautiful shirts and a jacket and walked around the corner to buy some chocolate only to find they were closed. Red bearded brethren refused me entry. I was sad. Very sad. They sold it to Thomas Keller and Dan Barber. I wanted to taste the goodness. They expanded to London in 2015 and supplied us with a sponsorship of chocolate at the restaurant. It was excellent cooking chocolate, excellent eating chocolate. They gave me a chocolate book. I’m not sure if I still have it but I recall it being worth the read. They were cancelled at a time where artisanal food production had hit somewhat of a ‘peak’ cool in NY and London. They opened a huge production facility and chocolate cafe on Redchurch St in Shoreditch, East London. No expense was spared, the cafe was lined with mod-bars, cast in white, with a factory on display through four meter high glass walls. Everything that went on in production was there to see. Bean to bar production in the heart of shoreditch. They sailed a boat from Brooklyn to South America to retrieve coffee beans and then sailed it back to dock in Brooklyn, the first to dock and unload at Red Hook since 1939. Read about it here. It was peak hipster. Peak craft. Big claims of sustainability and locality and accountable practices. Which was their undoing. The article that started it all off can be read here, it’s in four parts. A deep dive into the frustration, deception and ultimate disappointment of the two brothers who changed the artisan game. It’s worth the read. It wasn’t long before they shut down almost all of their retail outlets. So my supply ended. Sadly.
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to Tony’s,
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The story of Tony’s is well known now. If you don’t know it or haven’t seen it or haven’t tried it, here is the brief. All of their bars are inconsistent in the chocolate ‘piece’ sizing. Now, imagine for a second you are looking at a Cadbury chocolate bar. All of those pieces (even somehow conveniently the old school ‘snack bars’ where pineapple clearly ruled supreme) were equal in size, an easy break. While the Cadbury approach has changed slightly (only recently) with the introduction of their crack chocolate bars with uneven pieces, traditionally all pieces are even. Easy break. Easy distribution. Easy portioning. Not so with Tony’s. No no. The theory is that until there is equality in the chocolate industry there will not be equality in the sizing of the chocolate bars. Here is a video they made to explain it more clearly in case my explanation wasn’t enough. The bars are very good. Even if unevenly distributed in piece size. However don’t buy the white chocolate bar. That is not very good. In fact it is total shit. It will make you hate chocolate. All chocolate. Every single type. If I could place a footnote within the footnote I would make clear that I am aware that white chocolate is not technically defined as ‘chocolate’ I know. I know.
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to Pump Street
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Pump Street Chocolate started in Suffolk in the UK. It is an excellent chocolate company. They supply chocolate to some of the best restaurants in the UK and the single bars they make are fucking outstanding. The croissant chocolate is one of the best chocolates around. Fact. The sourdough chocolate is incomparable. The textural interplay that within these bars is inspiring. When Mast Brothers died their quick death, we started using Pump Street. They do a wonderful job. If you ever see Pump Street Chocolate, buy it.
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the Smooth Chocolator,
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People say that the Smooth Chocolator put Australia on the chocolate ‘map’ at the International Chocolate Awards in 2018 by taking out a number of awards along with the Gold in the category for Asia Pacific Cocoa and Chocolate Market. The International Chocolate Awards have somewhat of an unceremonious website detailing the awards found here . Smooth Choolator is a Geelong based ‘small batch bean to bar operation.’ They do all the things that we have come to expect of artisan chocolate makers in this time, working tirelessly (they said it, not me) to enhance each beans natural characteristics through the bar. Their website is also somewhat unceremonious: click here to see what sort of opportunity might exist for a design proposition for them. Shout out to all web designers, opportunity for quid pro quo.
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Metiisto chocolate,
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If you google Metiisto chocolate this blog comes up which is far more fun than an actual chocolate shop, although remove the dash and the actual website will appear. Originating in Sweden and now based out of Toowoomba. They work specifically with Pacific Island cocoa and endeavour to be both sustainable and accountable in their practice (how they achieve this is not outlined anywhere except for on the website where they declare that ‘[they] are dedicated to the future of chocolate, a future of cocoa farmers and a never ending commitment to making the finest chocolate we can,’ which can mean many things).
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Ms Peacock,
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Lisa Morley is in the Southern Highlands of NSW. The goal is to source sustainably and to create something of such brilliance that even though it is chocolate you can be convinced it’s good for you. She tries to sell this idea on her website by posing the question ‘Can something that tastes so good, actually be good and do good too?’ Which is confusing because a chocolate bar is an inanimate object and can’t actually ‘do’ anything and like most things, in moderation can be good but in excess is most definitely in some way not so good. In light of that, in moderation try the almond with smoked sea salt and butter toffee, the birthday cake bar, milky chocolate, mint choc chip (dark and light), and the chocolate honeycomb thins. It’s fun.
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and those cheap easter eggs that we have all been eating since before we had teeth, the ones that taste slightly of nougat for some unexplainable reason.
Across the board, from what would be considered the good to what would be considered the bad, I enjoy eating chocolate.
The chocolate I can’t get around is the wildly expensive, unceremoniously self congratulatory chocolate of the upper crust. These are made and sold on the premise that not all chocolate is made equal. I cannot argue with this, not all chocolate is made equal. Some ingredients and practices and techniques require recognition and this recognition comes at the point of purchase. However $250 / truffle is where I get a little bit confused. I cannot help but feel that upon eating this truffle you would be sad. Very sad. Sad beyond belief. On the other hand I feel as though I think this way because I can’t afford to eat this chocolate so I can’t even conceive of what it means to be able to enjoy it. Does chocolate made in this way that it costs $250 exist on some sort of spiritual, astral plane? Have I been missing out on the true beauty of what chocolate can be?
I can’t answer these questions, what I can do is offer you some recipes that involve chocolate.
The first is a cheat way to ‘make’ chocolate at home, which is really just a nice and fun way to flavour something your own way. It’s ideal as a gift or on the Christmas table or to finish a dinner you might have with friends. You can make it with kids and it can be ‘their’ chocolate, or make it for your friends as a flex without a true explanation of how it was done. Secrets make kitchens and kitchens hold secrets (and snitches get stitches…).
The second is an easy and really satisfying way to make chocolate fudge at home. There is nothing better than chocolate and chocolate fudge.
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