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A Chocolate Thank You

Although I have now been working with chocolate for three years (gosh, has it really been that long?) and have had the privilege to write this blog all that time, I am still very much an apprentice and feel I always will be.

So when my dear friend, Steph asked if I would make some chocolate thank you gifts for generous folks who have supported a wonderful organization we both work with (Vocal Eye Descriptive Arts), I became very nervous.

“I’m really not a professional, you know. Won’t they be disappointed?” [Read more…]

Some Bloody Good Chocolate

I made a chocolate coffin, this week. And then I stuffed it with dark chocolate bleeding hearts. It was a lot of fun especially with Hallowe’en coming.

My old alma mater, Studio 58, did a production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream, which they are billing as “Shakespeare with Bite” … because the director has set it in the Carpathian mountains and the fairies are vampires who “taunt and terrorize all who wander there”.

I know, I know. Haven’t we had enough of vampires? Actually no, judging by this tongue-firmly-in-cheek, very creative and energetic take on this classic play. [Read more…]

Tea and Chocolate Tasting

Tea and Chocolate: These are a pair of my favorite things.

There is nothing like a vibrant cup of well brewed tea in my favorite translucent-but-strong mug, my fingers laced around its warmth, feet slung over the arm of a chair, nose in a book, to calm me down and make me feel everything is going to be okay.

I feel the same way about a square of really good chocolate. Holding a piece strategically, between tongue and hard palate, just sorta letting it melt inconspicuously, no one ever need know I am not paying attention to what they are saying. [Read more…]

A Chocolate Hen Party

I have always been slightly afraid of chickens … until now.

Last weekend my partner and I had a long overdue opportunity to visit my sweet friend, Georgia and her backyard chickens. I’ve been meaning to go and see “the girls” ever since she got them, but have never actually been organized enough to catch Georgia while she had some spare time, being the vibrant, involved, active person she is. She recently finished a cross Canada bicycle journey – the chickens stayed home to bond with her Dad. [Read more…]

Golden Goodies for Hanukkah

When my kids were in elementary school, I used to look forward to Hanukkah, even though I am not Jewish.

But we are fortunate to have dear friends from Isreal whose kids are the same age as ours, and every year, the wonderful Havi would go into the kids’ classrooms to tell them the Hanukkah story (she didn’t pull any punches – they got the whole story of Mattathias and the Maccabees) and to prepare a feast of potato latkes, and the most delicious jelly doughnuts I’ve ever tasted, that Hanukkah special – Sufganiyot. [Read more…]