Tasting the Past: A Chocolate Sampler

Riversdale had a new event yesterday. Based on the researches of a food historian, 52 people got to eat our way through four centuries of the history of chocolate.

Dude! By the end, even I was chocolated out!

We started in the 17th century with chocolate as it first hit Europe; a bitter, spiced drink. Then we were given some of our own melted baker's chocolate to spice for ourselves. (I chose nutmeg, cinnamon, and orange peel. Although there was no sugar or vanilla in the chocolate, it was rather lovely.)

For the 18th century, we had a chocolate tart, a sugared chocolate cake, and chocolate wine - which was basically sherry cut with dark chocolate sauce, and YUM! The chocolate cake wasn't what you're thinking, though: part of the lesson was how the phrase "chocolate cake" has evolved over time, from a "round of melted & resolidified, spiced chocolate ready to be shaven into hot water for a drink" (17C) "an unleavened vanilla cake with chocolate icing on top (19C) to "fluffy sponge cake made with chocolate" (20C).

Things started becoming more recognizable by the 19th century, introducing the chocolate icing, chocolate ice cream, a sort of chocolate meringue cookie made with almond flour, a baked chocolate pudding (think pumpkin pie, not Jello pudding, and it included pumpkin pie spice), and a chocolate covered caramel, because Hershey started with caramels before he went into chocolate.

The 20th century chocolate was almost nauseatingly sweet after that. It included chocolate chip cookies (circa 1930), a Hershey's kiss (1907), the fluffy chocolate cake with chocolate sauce on it, a couple of Dove bites (one dark chocolate and one white, so we could have a taste of chocolate without the cocoa butter and one that was all cocoa butter), a Reese's peanut butter cup, and a Giradelli square of sea salt caramel to see how Hershey's original idea got poncified over the ages.

Among the interesting facts were that:
- Baker of Baker's Chocolate was a guy (I always thought it had that name because you baked with it.)
- Reese used to advertise that his "penny cups" were dipped in Hershey's chocolate
- Lindt was one of the first companies to do some extra processing to the chocolate
- Milk chocolate was considered a health food
- The first chocolate house opened in London before the first coffee house did
- White's Gentleman's Club started out as a chocolate house

We were given a recipe booklet and those who hadn't been there before could tour the house. Me? I went home and settled the sherry and the sugar with a steak.

It's making me all the more interested in finishing reading The Chocolate Wars by Cadbury. With that name, you know the author has both access and An Opinion, but it's about the long fight for marketplace dominance between Hershey and Cadbury, and it's particularly fascinating because it's not just about chocolate and market shares. It's about the social philosophies of the original Cadburys and Hersheys and how their religion drove that social philosophy, so it's a little bit history, a little bit religion, a little bit political, a little bit food, a little bit industrialization, etc. Just the sort of blend of things that I like to read about.

But first - to catch up on LJ after 3 days away!

Why do I not have a Riversdale tag? Silly me.

For the Knitters: Whisper Down the Alley Education

I was listening to a new podcast today: CogKNITtive, which combines psychology and knitting. That pointed to 2 Knit Lit Chicks (knitting and book reviews), and *that* pointed to an entirely new way of binding off (always a problem for me, being either too tight or too loose, or needing a crochet hook.)

It's called the Russian Cast Off; I found a video on YouTube which answered my question about flexibility by linking to another vid called My Favorite Super Stretchy Castoff. Basically, you knit two together through the back loop, put the resulting stitch back on the left needle, knit it and the next stitch through the back loop, etc.

Also, I've hit two Big Moments in stashdom: 1) It's too big for its container(s), and 2) I've got yarn I don't remember acquiring.