Friday, May 6, 2011
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Sunday, April 17, 2011
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
What’s in your Easter Basket?
Chances are Child Slaves Harvested the Cocoa to Make Your Childs Bunny
This fact the cocoa industry chooses to hide and has broken international agreements not to import beans from West African countries that support slave labor. The exporters buy children as young as 7 years old to cut down the cocoa pods with machetes and harvest the beans.
These children are smuggled into the Ivory Coast by human traffickers with the promise that they will make money for their needy families in nearby countries. These families never see their children again. Human traffickers make about $230 euros per child. Their corrupt government has covered up this issue since cocoa is their leading export.
How sad it is that American children receive “Blood Chocolate” to celebrate a Holy day at the expense of children their own age. If you give chocolate for Easter, do not give any chocolate make by Hershey, MM Mars, Godiva, Cadbury, Nestle, Kraft or any generic or brand drug store chocolate. Look for the Fair Trade label or Direct Trade that is described on the label. Savorique has fine chocolates that are slave free, also you can find them at Food Emporium, Fairway, Whole Foods and health food stores. Even local chocolatiers buy bulk chocolate to re-melt it down and mold into those cute bunnies. They may not even know that the bean source is from West Africa, where the in the Ivory Coast alone 12,000 children are enslaved.
Be an informed and caring consumer by knowing where your chocolate and other foods like coffee and tea comes from. More info is on my site at www.ExoticChocolateTasting.com.
http://www.chocolatework.com/chocolate-slavery.htm
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Spa at Trump-Wellness Chocolate & Biodynamic Wine Pairing | Exotic Chocolate Tasting
Tuesday, April 26 7-9pm Trump Soho Hotel-Spa at Trump
246 Spring Street, NY, NYAntidote Chocolate, made from a blend of raw and roasted organic Ecuadorian cacao, dried fruits, flowers and spices for purity and nutrition are paired up with biodynamic red wines from South America’s acclaimed wine regions.
Roxanne Browning, New York’s Chocolate Sommelier from Exotic Chocolate Tasting and Matt Spirn from The Northport Tasting Room will be your guides though this relaxed evening that will awaken all your senses… and enrich your mind. Chocolate maker, Red Thalhammer will share her knowledge of chocolate health benefits of her chocolates named after Greek goddesses.
Experience this first time event at the luxurious and peaceful setting of the Spa at Trump. Treat your body, mind and soul with the gift and the “Food of the gods.”
Limited Seating RSVP a must, email Roxanne ExoticChocolateTasting@gmail.com $25 pp CASH ONLY at the door
If you are a NYC Chocolate Meet Up member or would like to be, join and pay here.
Friday, March 11, 2011
Chocolate 201- the passion behind dark chocolate | Exotic Chocolate Tasting
Americans are catching up to what Europeans have known for decades – dark chocolate is a sign of a discriminating palate. Not the anonymous chocolate that you find in the candy isle or in your Easter basket. Dark chocolate U. S. sales exceeded 5 billion last year and there is no end in sight. At Exotic Chocolate Tasting you will start your journey to discover the benchmark in today’s chocolate…the worlds best chocolates.
Let’s start from the beginning… Theobroma cacao – Theos, god. Broma, food. “The food of the gods” the scientific name. Around 1300BC, the Olmecs of the Gulf Coast called it Kakawa; today we call it cocoa or cacao.
A fruit that can only be grown in the 20/20 zone of the shaded and wet rain forests, migrated from the Amazon basin to Africa and Asia by way of the Spaniards discovery of the new world. A frothy drink for the Maya and Aztecs, a divine food reserved for the rulers, worship, births, sacrifices and funerals, Montezuma drank 50 cups a day! So valuable the beans were used as currency and certain death to any commoner that drank it.
Over the centuries, blights wiped out plantations; wars were fought over trade routs and regions. Small pox killed natives that farmed the lands that lead to slaves brought from Africa. Spain met with competition from Portugal, England, France and the Dutch that all wanted a finger in the chocolate sauce. All this activity had tremendous consequences to this day. A third world crop is “fair” game to exploit the land, its people and the manipulation of the bean itself for better and for worse.
Present day, Fair Trade and Direct Trade has brought positive change to small-scale farmers and the rain forests, this represents less than 10% of the global cocoa market. Entrepreneurial spirited American chocolate makers are making a difference by working directly with these farmers to bring you the superior chocolate that Europeans have enjoyed for years.
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