Chocolate Stereotypes
Just in time for Easter Charlotte Franklin takes a pleasure adventure of quite a different kind in to the world of chocoholic logic and discovers that chocolate can tell a lot about a woman. . .
Green and Blacks
Company Slogan: (Quite simply) ‘Organic’
Origin: UK
The world’s first organic chocolate, made from 70% cocoa and its bittersweet texture has become the chic girls Saturday night treat. “Two cubes only please” she’ll say as she slips a perfectly toned bronzed leg over the other. Your Green and Blacks girl will be drinking red wine and smoking Vogues as she bites the crisp dark chocolate laced with cherries or orange and spices. The G and B girl has had enough after one, the high content of cocoa goes to her head faster than the wine and she’s smiling a smile that purrs like a cat.
When she’s alone at night she opens the black fridge door (she keeps her chocolate in the fridge) and lifts the Maya Gold bar, made from the ethical Brazilian cocoa bean for its rare melting ability, from its special place under the pomegranate juice and pak choi and devours the dark crisp moment to herself. She has no idea that the sophisticated, organic and fair-trade chocolate is now owned by Cadburys, and they’re sure as hell not going to tell her.
The Green and Blacks Organic Easter Egg (180g) comes in great flavours including Dark Chocolate, White Chocolate, Maya Gold and Butterscotch and is available from Waitrose for £4.99. *
Thorntons
Company Slogan: ‘The Art of the Chocolatier’
Origin: UK
The Marks and Spencer of the chocolate scene and timeless confectionary favourite, which has been doling out its delights since 1911, is the yummy mummy’s favourite treat. Adaptable to any occasion, whether it is the parent teacher meeting, Christmas with the in-laws or a bubble bath for one, there is even some for the chocolate loving diabetic. From its fondue fountains to its choc-fudge dreams it spans generations of chocoholics as the nations favourite variety. The Thorntons woman has a private moment with a mint-choc-chip ice cream on the way home from work before she picks up the kids. In the evenings she leaves the kids with her mother and as she slips on her Phase Eight heels there is a box of Eden Selection (the Thorntons seduction range) on the eiderdown next to a potpourri heart-shaped cushion. These little luxuries are best served with a goodnight kiss and a G and T.
The Milk Chocolate Thorntons’ Egg (400g) is available for £5.99 or two for £10 in all Thorntons’ stores. They are also available with hand-written messages. *
Valrhona
Company Slogan: The Chocolate Trend
Origin: France
Loyal to their slogan Valrhona chocolates are the Versace of chocolate. The rare designer cocoa label has been in circulation for a few years now, but only the best get their hands on this kind of class. The Valrhona girl, is a darling, she’ll say so herself as she sips pink champagne from a cut glass flute and cracks the chocolate between her ice white smile. From salted caramel fudge to blackcurrant basil truffles Lady Valrhona is satisfied. Her cream silk dress hangs gracefully over her designer bones, she’ll need no more than a chocolate for supper. But as she reaches for another Trendy Mini (Valrhona’s sugar free chocolate selection) she need not fear, they contain 65% Xociline, which she assures her fellow cover girls, with a wink, sounds alarmingly similar to Ex-Lax. Lady V chooses another from the silver tray under the chandelier, there is no point pretending, these chocolates are fit for the cat-walk themselves with their gold graphic prints and their fashionable size.
Valrhona make their beautiful hand-made eggs to order, prices are given upon ordering. Look out for their Tiffany collection (made to resemble Tiffany lamps) for a real treat. *
Rococo
Company Slogan: Inspired by the definition of Rococo – Florid to the point of bad taste.
Origin: UK
If chocolate could age gracefully Rococo’s collection of fine cocoa merchandise could be certified antiques. The chocolate is expertly shaped in historic moulds, their gold leaf and hand written packaging makes them masters of the chocolate experience. Their wrappers adorned with the traditional motifs from Letang Fils’ 19th Century catalogue and beneath the signature crepe paper lies chocolates flavoured with all kinds from pink pepper and sea salt to basil and lime. The Rococo of women oozes understated style in cashmere cardigans with eggshell blue eyes. She loves the outdoors and keeps chickens in an old farmhouse in the Isle of Skye. Every Christmas the grandchildren receive stocking fillers from Rococo’s Favourites Range, little bags of chocolates shaped and hand-painted to resemble everything from Fungi de Bosco to Olive Toscano, tied up with a royal blue ribbon. The Rococo woman speaks fluent Italian and makes lemon and polenta cake when her husband returns from a shooting weekend in Oxfordshire. When the couple attend a drinks party she arrives equipped with a box of Pink Marc de Champagne truffles and some Islay Malt Whisky Fudge courtesy of her “scrumptious” Rococo. Her host remarks that she has surely bought her “treasures from an ancient cave” as Mrs Rococo smiles with pleasure.
Rococo’s Easter selections reveal a glorious range of hand painted eggs. The famous chocolate gentleman hares are always a charming surprise for Easter. Prices range from £6.50 to £100 from their Easter range. *
L’artisan de Chocolat
Company Quote: ‘Trained chocolatiers are as common as unicorns’
Origin: France
A scientist as much as a chocolatier with a taste for the medicinal qualities of chocolate, your L’artisan lady is an artiste of course and is French, or wishes to be so at least. She has lived between New York and London since she met Aaron, the wealthy doctor who is away a lot since she painted the living room cerise pink and joined a fusion yoga group. In her twenties she spent much of daddy’s money travelling the world as elderly man’s muse, she has kept her trim figure eating one and a half cubes of her beloved gourmet French chocolate after a macrobiotic multi-seed power snack, with a cup of ginseng tea. At dinner parties she indulges her guests, among them members European Embassy, with a tray of decadent Kalamata Olive and Spicy Hot Chilli Pepper truffles, all made to order directly from the skilled hands of the L’artisan de Chocolat’s chef, in a white walled kitchen in Paris. At the end of a long day with Camille and Josepha, other loyal associates of the L’artisan de Chocolat circle, they indulge in a grand selection of bay leaf, fennel, sage and thyme chocolates brought to her by a butler called Paulo.
The medium sized L’artisan de Chocolat Easter egg costs between £15 and £20 at their only UK store in Lower Slone Street, London. *
Cadburys
Company Slogan: A glass and a half full of Joy
Origin: UK
The people’s chocolate, no airs and graces with this old stalwart. Cadburys is the fast food and quick fix, dear old friend of the chocolate world, running since 1824 this is your honest, no frills milk chocolate. The Miss Cadburys of this world have been dumped by the pretty faced boy next door. He sent her a text message this morning saying something about Europe and a Winnebago. But Miss Cadbury couldn’t care less anymore about Billy and his surfer boy hair. Curled up on the sofa draped in a floral Cath Kidson blanket she peels open the Flake wrapper. Her Bart Simpson slippers curl up beneath her as she indulges in the crumbliest, flakiest milk chocolate and suddenly as she closes her eyes she is the Flake Girl letting the chocolate do all the talking and the seductive demolishment ensues. From that moment a warm breeze and a cascading waterfall runs through her mind. She can only be happy. Until her mother returns home, “you’re not going anywhere until that bedroom is spotless”. Slowly she rises from the sofa, up in her room she is lost in reality until she finds a Cadburys Crème Egg under the bed that Billy gave her last Easter, and she wonders melancholically how he ate his?
The Cadburys Dairy Milk Egg 215g is £3.15 in Woolworths’ stores nationwide. *
Galaxy Mars
Company Slogan: Why have cotton when you can have silk?
Origin: UK
The poor girl’s posh choc. No cubes, no pieces to be seen here this chocolate comes in satisfying chunks. Galaxy is the Diamante of Diamond. Miss Galaxy is round her best friend’s house in her favourite Topshop sweater dress watching a Matthew McConahay movie. The glossy family size bar of Galaxy lies half eaten among the coke cans and Jenny is talking about some guy she met in Po Na Na’s last night. Miss Galaxy tries to listen but she’s more interested in the size of Kate Hudson’s thighs as she climbs aboard a motorcycle with Mr Wonderful on the TV screen, she sighs and takes another chunk of creamy comfort from the golden wrapper.
“Do you know what I mean?” Concludes Jenny.
“Men are all bastards” says Miss Galaxy, “ooh I can’t stop eating chocolate, take it away from me.”
The Galaxy Minstrel Easter Egg is available for £5 in all good supermarkets. *
*Please note prices may vary.
The Art of Chocolate Tasting:
Check List
Appearance
Good chocolate should be glossy.
Bad chocolate is matt and does not shine.
Tone
Good chocolate should have a crisp clean snap when broken.
Bad chocolate sounds blunt or silent when broken.
Smell
Good chocolate should smell
· Woody
· Grassy
· Floral,
· Fruity
· Sweet.
Bad chocolate can smell
· Rubbery (due to under fermentation of beans)
· Like ripe fruit (due to over fermentation of beans)
· Stale (due to mouldy beans)
Taste or ‘Mouth Fee’
Good chocolate should melt cleanly and smoothly.
Bad chocolate will feel sticky and waxy in the mouth.
How to chew:
Roll the chocolate around with the tongue using your four taste zones:
The tip of your tongue is sensitive to salty tastes, the two sides detect sour flavours and back of your tongue tastes bitterness. (End)
Just in time for Easter Charlotte Franklin takes a pleasure adventure of quite a different kind in to the world of chocoholic logic and discovers that chocolate can tell a lot about a woman. . .
Green and Blacks
Company Slogan: (Quite simply) ‘Organic’
Origin: UK
The world’s first organic chocolate, made from 70% cocoa and its bittersweet texture has become the chic girls Saturday night treat. “Two cubes only please” she’ll say as she slips a perfectly toned bronzed leg over the other. Your Green and Blacks girl will be drinking red wine and smoking Vogues as she bites the crisp dark chocolate laced with cherries or orange and spices. The G and B girl has had enough after one, the high content of cocoa goes to her head faster than the wine and she’s smiling a smile that purrs like a cat.
When she’s alone at night she opens the black fridge door (she keeps her chocolate in the fridge) and lifts the Maya Gold bar, made from the ethical Brazilian cocoa bean for its rare melting ability, from its special place under the pomegranate juice and pak choi and devours the dark crisp moment to herself. She has no idea that the sophisticated, organic and fair-trade chocolate is now owned by Cadburys, and they’re sure as hell not going to tell her.
The Green and Blacks Organic Easter Egg (180g) comes in great flavours including Dark Chocolate, White Chocolate, Maya Gold and Butterscotch and is available from Waitrose for £4.99. *
Thorntons
Company Slogan: ‘The Art of the Chocolatier’
Origin: UK
The Marks and Spencer of the chocolate scene and timeless confectionary favourite, which has been doling out its delights since 1911, is the yummy mummy’s favourite treat. Adaptable to any occasion, whether it is the parent teacher meeting, Christmas with the in-laws or a bubble bath for one, there is even some for the chocolate loving diabetic. From its fondue fountains to its choc-fudge dreams it spans generations of chocoholics as the nations favourite variety. The Thorntons woman has a private moment with a mint-choc-chip ice cream on the way home from work before she picks up the kids. In the evenings she leaves the kids with her mother and as she slips on her Phase Eight heels there is a box of Eden Selection (the Thorntons seduction range) on the eiderdown next to a potpourri heart-shaped cushion. These little luxuries are best served with a goodnight kiss and a G and T.
The Milk Chocolate Thorntons’ Egg (400g) is available for £5.99 or two for £10 in all Thorntons’ stores. They are also available with hand-written messages. *
Valrhona
Company Slogan: The Chocolate Trend
Origin: France
Loyal to their slogan Valrhona chocolates are the Versace of chocolate. The rare designer cocoa label has been in circulation for a few years now, but only the best get their hands on this kind of class. The Valrhona girl, is a darling, she’ll say so herself as she sips pink champagne from a cut glass flute and cracks the chocolate between her ice white smile. From salted caramel fudge to blackcurrant basil truffles Lady Valrhona is satisfied. Her cream silk dress hangs gracefully over her designer bones, she’ll need no more than a chocolate for supper. But as she reaches for another Trendy Mini (Valrhona’s sugar free chocolate selection) she need not fear, they contain 65% Xociline, which she assures her fellow cover girls, with a wink, sounds alarmingly similar to Ex-Lax. Lady V chooses another from the silver tray under the chandelier, there is no point pretending, these chocolates are fit for the cat-walk themselves with their gold graphic prints and their fashionable size.
Valrhona make their beautiful hand-made eggs to order, prices are given upon ordering. Look out for their Tiffany collection (made to resemble Tiffany lamps) for a real treat. *
Rococo
Company Slogan: Inspired by the definition of Rococo – Florid to the point of bad taste.
Origin: UK
If chocolate could age gracefully Rococo’s collection of fine cocoa merchandise could be certified antiques. The chocolate is expertly shaped in historic moulds, their gold leaf and hand written packaging makes them masters of the chocolate experience. Their wrappers adorned with the traditional motifs from Letang Fils’ 19th Century catalogue and beneath the signature crepe paper lies chocolates flavoured with all kinds from pink pepper and sea salt to basil and lime. The Rococo of women oozes understated style in cashmere cardigans with eggshell blue eyes. She loves the outdoors and keeps chickens in an old farmhouse in the Isle of Skye. Every Christmas the grandchildren receive stocking fillers from Rococo’s Favourites Range, little bags of chocolates shaped and hand-painted to resemble everything from Fungi de Bosco to Olive Toscano, tied up with a royal blue ribbon. The Rococo woman speaks fluent Italian and makes lemon and polenta cake when her husband returns from a shooting weekend in Oxfordshire. When the couple attend a drinks party she arrives equipped with a box of Pink Marc de Champagne truffles and some Islay Malt Whisky Fudge courtesy of her “scrumptious” Rococo. Her host remarks that she has surely bought her “treasures from an ancient cave” as Mrs Rococo smiles with pleasure.
Rococo’s Easter selections reveal a glorious range of hand painted eggs. The famous chocolate gentleman hares are always a charming surprise for Easter. Prices range from £6.50 to £100 from their Easter range. *
L’artisan de Chocolat
Company Quote: ‘Trained chocolatiers are as common as unicorns’
Origin: France
A scientist as much as a chocolatier with a taste for the medicinal qualities of chocolate, your L’artisan lady is an artiste of course and is French, or wishes to be so at least. She has lived between New York and London since she met Aaron, the wealthy doctor who is away a lot since she painted the living room cerise pink and joined a fusion yoga group. In her twenties she spent much of daddy’s money travelling the world as elderly man’s muse, she has kept her trim figure eating one and a half cubes of her beloved gourmet French chocolate after a macrobiotic multi-seed power snack, with a cup of ginseng tea. At dinner parties she indulges her guests, among them members European Embassy, with a tray of decadent Kalamata Olive and Spicy Hot Chilli Pepper truffles, all made to order directly from the skilled hands of the L’artisan de Chocolat’s chef, in a white walled kitchen in Paris. At the end of a long day with Camille and Josepha, other loyal associates of the L’artisan de Chocolat circle, they indulge in a grand selection of bay leaf, fennel, sage and thyme chocolates brought to her by a butler called Paulo.
The medium sized L’artisan de Chocolat Easter egg costs between £15 and £20 at their only UK store in Lower Slone Street, London. *
Cadburys
Company Slogan: A glass and a half full of Joy
Origin: UK
The people’s chocolate, no airs and graces with this old stalwart. Cadburys is the fast food and quick fix, dear old friend of the chocolate world, running since 1824 this is your honest, no frills milk chocolate. The Miss Cadburys of this world have been dumped by the pretty faced boy next door. He sent her a text message this morning saying something about Europe and a Winnebago. But Miss Cadbury couldn’t care less anymore about Billy and his surfer boy hair. Curled up on the sofa draped in a floral Cath Kidson blanket she peels open the Flake wrapper. Her Bart Simpson slippers curl up beneath her as she indulges in the crumbliest, flakiest milk chocolate and suddenly as she closes her eyes she is the Flake Girl letting the chocolate do all the talking and the seductive demolishment ensues. From that moment a warm breeze and a cascading waterfall runs through her mind. She can only be happy. Until her mother returns home, “you’re not going anywhere until that bedroom is spotless”. Slowly she rises from the sofa, up in her room she is lost in reality until she finds a Cadburys Crème Egg under the bed that Billy gave her last Easter, and she wonders melancholically how he ate his?
The Cadburys Dairy Milk Egg 215g is £3.15 in Woolworths’ stores nationwide. *
Galaxy Mars
Company Slogan: Why have cotton when you can have silk?
Origin: UK
The poor girl’s posh choc. No cubes, no pieces to be seen here this chocolate comes in satisfying chunks. Galaxy is the Diamante of Diamond. Miss Galaxy is round her best friend’s house in her favourite Topshop sweater dress watching a Matthew McConahay movie. The glossy family size bar of Galaxy lies half eaten among the coke cans and Jenny is talking about some guy she met in Po Na Na’s last night. Miss Galaxy tries to listen but she’s more interested in the size of Kate Hudson’s thighs as she climbs aboard a motorcycle with Mr Wonderful on the TV screen, she sighs and takes another chunk of creamy comfort from the golden wrapper.
“Do you know what I mean?” Concludes Jenny.
“Men are all bastards” says Miss Galaxy, “ooh I can’t stop eating chocolate, take it away from me.”
The Galaxy Minstrel Easter Egg is available for £5 in all good supermarkets. *
*Please note prices may vary.
The Art of Chocolate Tasting:
Check List
Appearance
Good chocolate should be glossy.
Bad chocolate is matt and does not shine.
Tone
Good chocolate should have a crisp clean snap when broken.
Bad chocolate sounds blunt or silent when broken.
Smell
Good chocolate should smell
· Woody
· Grassy
· Floral,
· Fruity
· Sweet.
Bad chocolate can smell
· Rubbery (due to under fermentation of beans)
· Like ripe fruit (due to over fermentation of beans)
· Stale (due to mouldy beans)
Taste or ‘Mouth Fee’
Good chocolate should melt cleanly and smoothly.
Bad chocolate will feel sticky and waxy in the mouth.
How to chew:
Roll the chocolate around with the tongue using your four taste zones:
The tip of your tongue is sensitive to salty tastes, the two sides detect sour flavours and back of your tongue tastes bitterness. (End)
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