Now that I have decided I rather like port and chocolate – or at least, Salt Spring Vineyards Blackberry Port, tasted with some dark chocolates from Denman Island Chocolate Company, I can’t just let the bottle sit in the cupboard. I have a hankering to dive back into the soft, well emulsified, creamy security of ganache, after yesterday, and my second (and final, I am determined!) humiliating effort at silicone molding (see Epic Fail), which resulted in me screaming and hurling verbal abuse at the ghostly and unappetizing grey hued chocolate figures which emerged from the molds.  I had just arrived home from rehearsal last night, sunnily confident that all would be well upon unmolding, this time. I was sure, after my first disastrous attempts, I had learned many lessons.  I realized I had rushed my tempering on that occasion, had chosen perhaps, the hottest day we have had so more »

I didn’t blog last week.  I slipped away and played hooky, and it was worth every minute.  I took my In-Laws, who are visiting us from Winnipeg, to Salt Spring Island for an extended weekend away. We have had such terrible weather I was a bit worried, but they brought the sunny weather with them and it remained glorious the whole time. I adore Salt Spring Island, one of the Southern Gulf Islands, about 22 nautical miles from Vancouver:  either an hour and ten minutes away by ferry, or a visually breathtaking 35 minutes float plane ride.  I did both this weekend.

I have five pots of gleaming, ruby red freezer jam sitting on the window sill, and am feeling exceedingly proud of myself. I have smashed and compounded peak-of-the-season fruit from last year, and my inspiration to make them was because I needed the freezer space for this year’s incoming strawberry bounty, already jockeying for position, as I strong-arm the lid down on our smallish freezer.

It is almost summer in Vancouver.  Officially it is, as of this weekend, but just try telling that to Mother Nature.  I have been craving berries and summer fruits, and our front yard garden crop of strawberries is beginning to look very good, if wet, but until they are at their peak of perfection, I have found a wonderful cheat. I had such fun a few months ago, using pounded up (in a mortar and pestle) freeze dried berries to naturally colour white chocolate. 

With apologies to Chummy McGregor, of the Glenn Miller Orchestra (my Dad’s favorite) who, in 1942, wrote the unforgettable It Must Be Jelly ‘Cause Jam Don’t Shake Like That. After last week’s adventure to the EAT! Vancouver food show, after marveling at the chocolate bolts made by Chef Christophe Bonzon for his impressive chocolate sculptures, and having him explain to me that he often uses gelatin to create molds for “just about anything you can mold”, I was fascinated and determined to have a go at it.

It was great fun to attend the tenth anniversary of EAT! Vancouver, the Everything Food + Cooking Festival, this past weekend, at BC place stadium. I was there with my intrepid photographer partner, to check out the BC Chefs Association Chocolate Competition, open to culinary professionals, bakers, pastry chefs and advanced students. We arrived on Friday afternoon, just as the festival was getting underway, and had the opportunity to get the “lay of the land” as the exhibitors put the last minute touches on their booths.

I had the wonderful opportunity, recently, to visit Portland for the premiere of my talented niece (a dancer/choreographer)’s program of new works. It was one of those “slightly less than 24 hour” visits, but I was determined to get to a boutique chocolatier I had read about:  Sarah Hart’s Alma Chocolate, on NE 28th Avenue, in the Northeast Portland, Kerns district. I love Portland because it is home to all kinds of wonderful, unique little spots.  A walking and biking city, Portland celebrates a diversity of interests – in fact one of its slogans is “Keep Portland Weird”, in other words, unique.

My dear partner has been suggesting to me, ever since I started the chocolate making course at Ecole Chocolat, that we should do something to combine chocolate and sailboats. One idea, of which he is really fond, is to have me make bonbons and truffles and, packaging them in waterproof bags, we would then take them around to boats at anchor in the marinas up and down the waters of Howe Sound, the idea being that nothing would be quite so wonderful after a day on the ”big blue” as some fine chocolate.

The walk through Minoru Park, on my way to rehearsal at the Gateway Theatre is hopping with bunnies.  My co-director and I have named several of them, as their personalities emerge along with their upstanding ears, from the hedgerows.  There is Piggy, Nosy, Brat, Cheeky, the Twins and Stanley. I have also taken (in self-preservation) to carrying bags of “not at their peak” vegetables with me, in anticipation of being met by some very curious, and rather assertive wiggly noses, beady, unblinking, expectant eyes and twitching whiskers.

I was delighted and a little nervous when Pam Williams of Ecole Chocolat, asked me to be a part of a chocolate testing panel, this week. Yikes!  I was sure I was not qualified, until Pam assured me that the chocolate was actually just “the vehicle” for the test. This is all for the newly minted International Chocolate Awards 2012.

After spending a lovely afternoon talking to Adam Chandler, at Beta 5 Chocolates, last week, and thinking again how much their chocolates, topped with in house crafted transfer sheets, look like beautiful mosaic tiles, I am ready to have another go at making my own transfer sheets. And because I want something safe and sturdy to enrobe, I am going to make homemade malt balls (turned into cubes) as the centres.   That would be Maltesers to those of us from Canada and many other countries, Whoppers to those who hail from the USA.