The River Song: Divine Dark Chocolate with Raspberries

Photo Credit: Kimberly Shryack Johnson

There is, perhaps, nothing quite so quintessentially summer as floating down a river with a cooler of drinks surrounded by people you love. So, as August comes to a close and we face the myriad pumpkin drinks, dark nail polishes, sweater dresses, slightly grungier lawns, and proliferation of Halloween stuff that accompany the onset of fall, I packed up the car, nabbed my stalwart travel companion, Taryn, and drove down to New Braunfels to join a large group of other friends in floating down the Guadalupe for one last summer hurrah. 

Photo Credit: Taryn Staley

It had been far, far too long. I had forgotten how magical it is. 

After getting past the first gasp-worthy shock of the ice cold river creeping up your legs, and the initial logistical hassle of getting everything inflated, configured, tied, settled, and launched, there is an magical, expansive, untethered feeling that sets in just as you round that first bend and the launch point disappears. No gadgets, no notifications, no to-do lists, no shouda-woulda-coulda. You can't rush the river. You very quickly realize how comfortable you are with doing nothing at all. There is absolutely nothing in the world to do except sit back, enjoy the water and the good company until, without warning you're at the end.  

I had also forgotten how conducive the water is to extended philosophical musings. Major kudos to dear friend and fellow fan-of-talking-about-serious-things, Cord, who bore the brunt of my aimless, introspective ramblings.

Photo credit: Beth Horst Vinson

Four hours wasn't nearly long enough (although my sunburned knees might disagree...).

 Although I ended up a bit *ahem* over-served on the river and slept through most of the afternoon, it was still a thoroughly delightful day, and we managed to roust out in time to catch my good friends with the Mark McKinney Band play the closing set over at the River Road Ice House.

Granted, as relaxing as the river is, the sun, the water, and the drinking can take their toll, and I got back to Arlington on Sunday feeling like I needed a weekend to recover from the weekend. Fortunately I had some help in that department: extensive snuggles with the fur children, coupled with a fluffy adventure novel and some 70% cacao therapy had me feeling right as rain in no time. (Except for my poor knees. Ow.)
 

Regardless, after almost an entire summer on dry land and many years away from the river, it was reassuring how intuitive it was to get back to it. And now that I have my own tube I will certainly be returning to the river sooner rather than later. It won't be years before my next float. 


Item: Dark Chocolate with Raspberries
Percentage: 70% cacao 

Made By: Divine Chocolate
Made In: Cacao grown in Ghana, processed into chocolate in Europe
Purchased At: Whole Foods - Arlington, TX
Purchase Price: $3.59

Review: Divine does good, solid snacking chocolate. Nothing too adventurous or remarkable, but absolutely reliable and top-of-the field for the price point. The time-honored chocolate/raspberry pairing works very well here - their nice, fruity 70% dark is a good base for the tartness of the raspberries. Texturally the freeze-dried raspberry bits are a little odd, but more interesting than off-putting, and not overly fussy. That might be a mood thing, though. I'm kind of fickle when it comes to textures in my chocolate. And the fruit/chocolate ratio is spot on. 

Recommend

A quick note about the company: With US headquarters in D.C., Divine chocolate is 45% owned by the Kuapa Kokoo fair-trade cocao farmer's co-op in Ghana, supporting transparent, accountable, and democratic business operations. Their misson broadly encompasses supporting cacao farmers in earning a fair living for themselves and their families, empowering women in Ghana to participate across all areas of the industry, and to support environmentally friendly cacao cultivation. Originally launched in the '90s to be the first fair-trade brand in the UK to compete with mass-produced chocolate, Divine has been thriving ever since, finally coming to the US as recently as 2007. 


With love,
 - Kat 

One More Maine Point: Equal Exchange Lemon Ginger Dark

This seems like a slightly redundant post on my part, because it concerns another trip to Maine. Yes, I actually drove up to Maine again within two weeks of my previous visit with Kat. (It only seemed like a bad idea while I was in the middle of the 9-hour drive. After that things shaped up nicely.) My good friend Stevie, who is a mutual friend of my siblings, was visiting me in the Hudson Valley, and we decided to drive up there again and say hi to the 4H clan. There were adventures a-plenty; we stayed up late talking about everything ranging from hypothetical dilemmas (would you want to know if you lived in The Matrix?) to bean-hole-bean-pit-beans; we jumped in the river; we ate Thai food; we bought coffee in two different coffee shops within twenty minutes; we had a major caffeine crash on the way back from Maine (fortunately, not a literal one); we BOUGHT CHOCOLATE.

It actually felt like a painfully brief visit, just like the previous one had. The working schedule of a professional musician is a very strange one, and it's always subject to last-minute changes and overhauls. A musician can't maintain any kind of professional reliability if they turn down work, which means that essentially nothing is more important than taking whatever gigs you can. This led to an all-too-short visit both times, since I had a gig the first time, and a rehearsal the second time. It's the career I've chosen, but it sometimes seems like a very brutal one. That's a story for an entirely different blog, though.

I bought several different bars of Chocolate in Maine, but this was the most interesting one:

Item: Organic Lemon Ginger Dark Chocolate with Black Pepper

Made By: Equal Exchange Chocolates
Made In: Switzerland
Purchase Price: Approx $4

Cacao Percentage: 55

Review: 

First of all, I should say that I don't usually consider 55% chocolate to be 'dark'. I typically think of anything above 70% as being dark, because anything below that can be overwhelmingly sweet. (Not to say that it always is overwhelmingly sweet. I do appreciate lighter chocolates.) I prefer for chocolates which are marketed as 'dark' to have a hearty, meal-like quality that's closer to black coffee than a Snickers Bar. That being said, I was taken aback at first by how sweet this bar was. It's definitely candy; no hearty meal here. There's a lot of candied Ginger in the bar, as well two different types of cane sugar. Sweetness like that is slightly off-putting to me at first, but after I've had a piece or two I usually warm up to it, and that's just what happened here. After taking a bite, it seems like the ginger and the lemon are almost perfectly balanced; for a second it seems like the lemon might be the dominant flavor, but then the taste of the lemon completely dies in the after-taste, and you're left with nothing but candied ginger. The chocolate flavor is not strong enough; this should be a 65% bar.

The texture is complicated, which can be bad, but in this case it works out pretty nicely. There are chewy/crunchy bits of candied ginger throughout, as well as smaller, less noticeable bits of black pepper. It's slightly distracting, but I don't mind it too much.

This is very good chocolate for the price, and I think they could have gotten something very special out of it if they had upped the percentage a little bit. Recommended, especially for fans of candy-esque chocolate.

-Will

To All Maine Points: Extra Virgin Olive Oil and Sourdough Truffles

Hello, and welcome!

You’ve found your way into our repository of all things chocolate.

Who are we? We are Will and Kat – a brother and sister duo reporting in from opposite sides of the continent (New York and Texas, respectively). We share many interests: classic science fiction novels, sleeping in, traveling, breakfast tacos, talking philosophy until 3 in the morning, our other two siblings… and finding that perfect bar of blissfully dark chocolate.

We eat a lot of chocolate. We try bars, truffles, and other confections. We’ll pick them up from grocery stores, friends, bookstores, airport gift shops, high-end chocolate stores, and gas stations. Every once in a while we’ll stumble across a delightful chocolate oasis that merits a little more personal attention (Fruition Chocolate comes to mind. Or Lucky Chocolate - bring back the goat cheese truffle!!!). And, since we do all this stuff anyway, it just makes sense to keep all our findings in one place, and that place is here.

I (Kat) am going to kick things off by singing the blues a little. One thing I've never had to do before this year, that sucks beyond belief, is spend an entire summer away from all of my siblings. 

It is a lonely, off-center feeling when you realize that your family is so far away. There are lots of little peripheral realizations that accompany the feeling: that you can't just hop in the car and drive down for the weekend. That you are no longer anyone's primary emergency contact. That if the zombie apocalypse went down tomorrow you would probably never see them again.That they can't commiserate about the awful Texas weather and the Blue Bell famine. That they've probably forgotten what decent enchiladas even taste like (poor souls). All those little things just hint at the core of the issue, though, which is simply that they are a long way away from me.

I want them to be here. I want us to all live in the same city again. I want us all to talk on a weekly or even daily basis. I want to lie on the floor and watch Star Trek and throw popcorn at each other and talk about stupid things and important things and funny things and nerdy things and delicious things until all hours. I miss them all terribly with something remarkably akin to homesickness. 

So, frustrated, heartsick, and off-balance, I hopped on an airplane two weeks ago and flew the East Coast to get my sibling fix. 

What wonders a long weekend can work on a weary soul. It was three days worthy of our goofy collective; with a late-night diner visit, great music, traipsing through the woods, campfires, goats, good food, the most delightful group of people known to human kind, and chocolate. Lots of chocolate. 

 

 

After a not-long-enough day and a half in Maine visiting with Mignon and Forrest, Will and I had to head back to New York so he could play a gig Saturday evening, but on the way back we made the obligatory stop at the Fruition chocolate outpost in the bustling little town of Woodstock, NY. We chatted with the resident chocolatier, munched on some roasted cacao beans, and perused the selection. Although I spent about $100 on great chocolate to bring back with me to Texas, I wasted no time in sharing these little gems with Will.

It's quite likely that soon the four of us will be living in four different states, spread from one end of this continent to the other. From here on out, with jobs, friends, obligations, and eventually houses, spouses, children, and other delightful complications, it will only get harder to get us all in the same place, but I find immense comfort in knowing that wherever, and whenever that is, magic will happen, and my spirit and faith in humanity will be renewed.


Item: Extra Virgin Olive Oil and Sourdough Truffles

Made By: Fruition Chocolate
Made In: Shokan, NY
Purchased At: Fruition Chocolate - Woodstock, NY
Purchase Price: (They don't have this on the website - will call for this later).

Review: With sourdough crumbs from the lovely local Bread Alone Bakery & Cafe, this delightful creation is a child of the Hudson Valley. The outside is crackly and intriguing, with the barest hint of tangy, salty sourdough. The inside is all smooth, powerful cocoa flavor, with a clean, slick barely-there olive-oil finish. The interior of the truffle is just a little sweeter than I generally prefer, but is nicely offset by the sourdough crumbs on the outside. Very well crafted, unusual truffle, with major bonus points for creative flavors. Don't come to this one for dessert. 

Highly recommend