Skip to main content

Everybody loves chocolate

Saturday was a great day! My co-worker/friend Robin and I toured Kailua Chocolate Factory and The Original Hawaiian Chocolate Factory cacao plantation. Too cool. This, after a Thursday night class teaching us the finer points of tasting chocolate. I will never look at a Hershey bar the same way again. I think, in fact, I shall become even more of a chocolate snob than I am a wine snob.
This photo (left) shows a cacao pod, from which the elixir of life that is chocolate eventually flows.
The second photo depicts the contents of a pod spilled out onto the table. The seeds or beans are coated in white, fruity, sticky stuff. If you pop one of these slimy white segments into your mouth, it tastes like sweet citrus. As you can see, the gecko likes it, too. The white stuff is fermented off, leaving the seed, which is dark purple, brown or even brown with a white center. The beans are dried, their parchment or husk removed. The inside of the bean is ground into either a paste or what they call chocolate liquor. Eventually, sugar, cocoa butter (which I think is separated from the liquor when it's made) milk (if you're making milk chocolate) and an emulsifier like soy lecithin are added to create chocolate. The lecithin acts as a binding agent to keep all the components well blended. Viola! Yummy! I learned that white chocolate is not chocolate at all. There is no chocolate in it, although there may be cocoa butter in it. It's good, it's just not chocolate.
There were nine ladies, including the driver, who made the trip from Hilo to Kona and back on Saturday, enjoying our tours, lunch. I'd like to say I enjoyed the ride too, but I don't do well in passenger vans. Thankfully, we made just enough stops along the way to keep me from being much more than mildly head achy and queasy throughout the trip.

Today, we are breathing easier about our Mr. Sox. He disappeared last Thursday night and didn't re-appear until Sunday night. It was then I noticed a nasty wound on his chin, which made it painful for him to eat. He was gone most of the day today, too. When I saw him able back weakly this afternoon, I grabbed him up and whisked him off to the vet. He was none to happy about that, telling about how much he hated the ride all the way to town. Poor kitty. His chin sports quite a gash and is still looking a little pussy. He got a shot of antibiotics and vaccinations while we were there. When we got home, I dabbed some ointment on his ouchy and he snuggled up with me for an hour or so on the couch. Right now, he's sound asleep on a dining room chair. I think he'll be fine, though it will probably be a few more days before he's really comfortable eating. He can manage a little soft, wet food, but can't quite crunch the dry stuff. Luckily, Mr. Sox has some nice reserves. He's lost a little weight, since he didn't eat at all for nearly three days. But he's still got a little spare tire left. I was really worried about him all day today. I've missed him sitting next to me on the couch or waking me up early in the morning. Now, I'm confident he's on the road to recovery. He's a tough little buggah.

A hui hou. Aloha!

Labels

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mom

This is my beautiful mom. She died last Sunday. For those who knew her, my heart breaks with you. For those who did not, here's an introduction to the best confidante, role model and mother a girl could hope for in life. This is the obituary I'd planned to submit to the local paper, but have opted instead to publish here. Obituary: Beverly Todd Bev -- my mom -- was a longtime caregiver, advocate, and dear friend to countless elderly in South Salem. Hers was a kind and generous spirit. She devoted much of her life to the welfare of others, giving wholly of herself and doing so always with great affection and humor. She was born Beverly Marie Steinberger in Silverton, July 23, 1938, the first child and only daughter of Art and Marie Steinberger. Her brothers called her Bevvy Buns, a nickname she grew fond of and wore proudly within the family circle as an adult. Bev attended St. Paul’s Elementary School in Silverton, Silverton High School and Marylhurst Co...
2 comments
Read more

Back at it

It's been some time since I've written. My mom died in February, and I haven't had the gumption to write much, other than a couple of feature stories for the paper and the occasional pithy email to a friend. Tonight, sitting in my favorite burger joint with a pile of fries in front of me, I dunk them into a deep pool of ketchup mixed with a hot sauce. That's how Mom liked 'em. My burger? The Spicy Hawaiian, a nod to my 808 connections. It's a brilliant combination of peppers and pineapple, a favorite on the Power Stop menu. I'm sure she'd have loved it, too. There's a bubbly beer with a lime in it. That's not a homage to anything. I just like beer. These past months, I've done little but work, search and apply for jobs. Two rejection letters have landed in my email this week. Search-and-apply has become a futile obsession. It's time for a break, at least until I hear back from all those applications still floating around out there. I am...
Post a Comment
Read more

Goodbye Dan Fogelberg

Saturday started out as just another day to clean the house. Within a short time, however, I found myself on a mission; a mission of arachnid eradication. The spiders, for all their great bug-eating prowess, have a tendency to get a bit out of control in a place where there's no real winter. They're not only everywhere outside, but inside, too. I found webs with giant eight-leggers in corners, on the ceiling, hiding under window shades....everywhere! They were in places I vacuumed just two days before. Since the invasion of the beetles, the spiders have grown enormously fat and happy. So I sucked 'em all up. EEEEEEEEWWWWWW! I was none too keen on removing the vacuum bag. In addition to spider sucking, there was fun with fungi. What did the girl mushroom say to the boy mushroom? Gee your a fun-gi! Unfortunately, the prevailing fungus amongus was not shitakes or portabellos, but mold and mildew. Again.... eeeeeeeeewwwwww! I cleaned the top of the fridge, which was home to a n...
4 comments
Read more