Uptown: You get to travel all over the country in your role as Chef on Assignment for Johnson & Wales. What are you seeing in the way of food trends that may be coming our way?
PR: Different regions of the country tend to pick up on various trends at their own pace and with their own regional spin, such as we saw with the organic and the farm-to-table trends a few years ago. The trends tend to start on the West Coast, then slingshot to big cities like New York and Chicago, and then radiate their way out to other cities where chefs or savvy food businesses make them their own. In the south, Birmingham (Ala.) has recently been very influential, as well as Charleston and also Chapel Hill. Charlotte has also gotten on board, albeit later than the leading food towns, with its growing participation in the Slow Food Movement as well as the growth of local farmers markets and food growers. But we’re in danger of missing what promises to be the next big trend, perhaps one of the most exciting developments in years. I’m talking about the food cart phenomenon.

Uptown: What on earth is the food cart phenomenon? Are you talking about taco trucks?
PR: Taco trucks are a tiny tip of the iceberg. I’m really talking about mobile food trucks inside of retro-fitted carts, complete with cooking gear, grills, ovens and the like. These are movable feasts capable of turning out a limited menu, but they do it extremely well. Let me give you some perspective. In Portland, Oregon, which is probably the epicenter of the food cart scene in the U.S., there are over 250 food carts, featuring every sort of food imaginable. Wood-fired pizza trucks, Korean fusion taco trucks (imagine a carne asada taco garnished with kim chee – it’s fantastic!), French fried potato trucks that also serve poutine (the national potato dish of Canada – crispy, twice-fried potatoes covered with fresh cheese curds and brown gravy. Hey, don’t knock it until you’ve tried it. Yes, it’s a gut bomb but it sure tastes good!), health food cart, wild and crazy food carts, dessert trucks, smoothie carts, Cuban sandwich carts, crepe trucks, and on and on. Portland has even designated empty parking lots, licensing some of these food cart operators to permanently park there. In other words, they’ve created a number of “food cart courts,” which become instant festivals for anyone looking for fun and fellow food freaks. During business hours you see a lot of businessmen eating at the carts – it’s the new power lunch forum.

Uptown: Sounds like fun – when are we going to see those here?
PR: Well, currently we have one food cart here that could be competitive in Portland. That’s the Harvest Moon Grille, which could hold its own anywhere, especially with their amazing pork and grits <editor’s note: see page __ in this issue for a story about this cart>.  The problem is that the folks who issue permits are worried about crime and, probably, also about the unfair competitive advantage that low-overhead carts present to what we call brick and mortar restaurants. It’s a delicate balance to make something like a food cart scene work. There were probably a few negative incidents around some of the taco trucks awhile back and that kind of soured the authorities on the idea of food carts in general. But the other side of the coin is that these food carts are fabulous entrepreneur laboratories, maybe the first step to a later incarnation as a true brick and mortar restaurant. This is what happened in Portland, as the food carts there have become part of the cultural identity for the city, highlighting the creativity and diversity of the area. There’s so much excitement and buzz about the carts there that some of the trucks move to different locations every night and Twitter to their followers, who show up en masse, like a spontaneous rave or happening. We have nothing like that here yet.

Uptown: Do you see something like that ever happening here?
PR: I’m not sure. In my six years living in Charlotte I’ve seen a growing interest in food and such, but we’re also somewhat conservative and don’t really like to take too many out-of-the-box chances. But I could see it happening in areas of town like NoDa and, if we get the Center City year-round farmers market we’ve been hearing about, it could be an ideal location for something like a food cart court. Once the city makes it easier for the start-up cart operations to do business we could see all that latent creativity come to fruition.

Uptown: Yes, but do you think it will really happen?
PR: Let me put it this way: If we don’t do it first, Atlanta probably will and then we’ll just be playing catch-up, still waiting for the next wave. I’m convinced that this is the biggest wave, the one we’ve been waiting for. It’s already happening in L.A., Chicago and New York City. In fact, some of the brick and mortar restaurants in Los Angeles and New York are now reverse engineering it – they’re sending out their own food carts to capitalize on the interest and also to allow them to make some fun foods that they don’t do in their restaurants. I hope we catch this wave soon so I don’t have to go to Atlanta or one of those other cities for my kim chee taco. I’m telling you, though, it’s worth the drive.

Every chef, to one extent or another, is on a mission – mostly to feed people tasty food, to make them happy. But in recent times a number of chefs have realized they can have a greater impact and do something fulfilling for themselves as well as for those around them, and maybe even for the planet.

Johnson & Wales University, as well as other culinary schools, is an incubator for training the next generation of socially responsible chefs. But, in order to become one, it helps to have met one. Two faculty members at JWU, Robert Brener and Paul Malcolm (though all the instructors at JWU are on board with them) have taken on the challenge of modeling how to make a difference in the world for their students by heading up two major green initiatives at the school. One is the development of a community garden to provide some of the food cooked at the school, and the other is an important supporting project for the garden – a composting program that converts kitchen scraps into a high-potency natural fertilizer.
Uptown Magazine sat down with the chefs to find out more about what’s behind all the extra work they’ve taken on. Here’s what they had to say:

Uptown: You both have pretty full schedules – teaching, culinary coaching and team competitions, and families. Why did you take on such big projects as composting and community gardening? What’s the fire in your belly that’s compelling you to take this on?

Robert Brener: My passion, and I think it’s true for Paul, as well, comes from the desire to make a difference.  We hope to create a better world for our young children ¬ Paul’s kids, Griffin, Rory, and Jillian, and my son, Nathan.  Teaching in the College of Culinary Arts allows us to make an impact on an eager audience comprised of future leaders.  To me, that’s pretty compelling in itself!

Uptown: What was the biggest challenge in getting these projects off the ground? How did you get your colleagues and the university to support you on this?

Paul Malcolm: For the composting, we recycled 5-gallon buckets from the baking and pastry labs for two years and ran a successful composting program. During those two years we proved that we could also make it work in our culinary labs.  We remove 140 pounds of green matter from eight culinary labs every week.  What makes it work is that we run it through the combined efforts of our entire community of students and faculty.  During that time there certainly were those who posed serious questions of practicality and wondered about acceptance by the student body, as well as the faculty.  What we learned, though, was that both groups – students and faculty – not only were intrigued, but wanted to do everything they could to make it a lasting, sustainable project for our campus.
Brener: The challenges were many. Trying to create a beautiful garden has enough obstacles in the best of circumstances, but we’re growing our garden on top of a concrete slab, next to the train tracks, in a gravel parking lot.  We have no water source on site yet, and we started with no funding. But we have established a sustainable water system by creating planters that preserve water for the plants, we’ve held fundraisers, and applied for and just received a state grant.  Our greatest hurdle, however, is misconception.  Many do not understand the word “sustainable.”  Really, what we are simply trying to do is raise a heightened awareness of the world, our world.  After all, we rely on the earth for everything, not just for good food.

Uptown: These are pilot projects run at a culinary school. What do you think the implications are for those working in restaurants and food service businesses? How feasible are they and, in a larger sense, what are you modeling in terms of the ethical responsibilities of working chefs and even householders?
Brener: I worked in Munich, Germany, where sustainable waste management has been in the kitchen for decades, and I also lived and worked in Ireland, where most foods were local.  I recall having to let our duck sit overnight before butchery to allow the meat to relax, and our amuse of lemon-essence goat cheese being delivered that day from three miles down the road.  That’s fresh, local and sustainable. That’s the kind of vision that chefs can bring to a community and it’s exciting to be a link in that chain. So now, it’s important to enroll the next generation of culinary professionals into carrying it deeper into their communities.

Malcolm: I grew up in Colorado, working in restaurants since I was 12.  Eating locally grown foods became a reality for me when the many kitchens that I worked in were frequented by local foragers on a regular basis.  The flavors and variety were so much better than the commercial products provided by our vendors.  Later, I moved to Vermont to attend New England Culinary Institute and the lifestyle of the Vermonters was incredibly appealing.  If we didn’t know where it came from, we usually didn’t eat it.  Since moving to Charlotte, I’ve assisted with several farm to fork dinners, some of them held right in the fields where the produce was grown.  So next, Bobby and I plan to incorporate the gardens into all of the culinary labs and are currently working with the other colleges at Johnson & Wales to use the garden as a community learning environment, utilizing the ideas created by Chef Alice Waters in her Edible School Yard program in Berkeley, California.

Uptown: If others want to follow in your footsteps, how can they get the help and information they need to get the ball rolling?

Brener: Anyone interested in getting involved should contact either me or Paul, or contact Mecklenburg County Solid Waste Management.

Uptown: Is this just the tip of the iceberg? What future initiatives do you see coming in terms of stewardship and green activities from the culinary community? What still needs to be done to make a difference, both locally and globally?

Brener: Uptown is, for us, just the beginning of the project. We hope to develop internships and apprenticeships on local farms in addition to establishing a presence at local community gardens and farmers markets.  Education and awareness are our most important goals, so we intend to conduct workshops and provide green management assistance to community gardens who might be interested.  I’m also the adviser to our student organization known as The Co-op.  It is a co-op style group that has been the driving force behind the project.  They have just completed a very successful inaugural year culminating in their green symposium entitled, “Gastro Green: Sustainability in the Food Service Industry.”  We hope to continue programs like this and to reach out to Charlotte uptown in the city’s efforts to establish itself as a green energy center.  There are many misconceptions about our project.   If there is one statement that conveys our message, it’s that little things can make a difference, for sure, but a life change is also necessary to make a real difference.

To help or get more information about these projects at Johnson and Wales contact 
Robert Brenner or Paul Malcolm

~ Peter Reinhart

Grateful Growers Farm, which owns and operates Harvest Moon, is famous for humanely raising its own pigs and for having some of the best pork in the universe, so I was surprised when Cassie Parsons, one of the farm’s founders and head chef of The Harvest Moon Grille, steered me away from a pork dish and toward a steak and mushroom quesadilla.
“It’s the best item on the menu today,” she encouraged.

The menu of the moment doesn’t always match the menu on the website due to constant changes and what looks best at the farmers markets that particular week or day.
It’s hard enough to find someone who actually looks at you when you order your food, let alone takes the time to shake your hand and describe where your food came from, so I was already falling in love with this cart. When she’s not working the grill inside the cart, Parsons is out front with a warm smile, greeting every customer that comes to the window. So, while a young chef named Adam manned the grill, Cassie explained where and how my food had been grown. She told me that culinary students who work for her visit local farmers markets, help pick out the food, and participate in deciding what they’re going to make that week.

“One of the best parts of the cart is the connection it creates for students, who are able to experience the simple joy of finding good products and sharing them with the community through our cart,” Parsons said.

A sticker on the bumper of the truck that pulls the cart reads, “No farm, no food.”  It was just a simple bumper sticker, but loaded with implications. Like any other business, the cart has to make money by selling a product; this cart offers more than a simple meal. Everything has been grown or sourced with care, and then cooked with the same respect. According to Parsons, the animals are never pumped with drugs or made to eat things unnatural to them. Vegetables and other produce used in the Grille’s menu are kept far away from chemicals or pesticides while being grown. The food you get from the cart essentially comes straight from the earth to your plate, or, as Parsons puts it, “No middle man necessary.”

My steak and mushroom quesadilla was handed to me in a small white box. The powerful aroma jabbed me in the face as I opened the box, with a woodsy scent from the mushrooms perfuming the seasoned steak. The melted cheese enrobed what Parsons described as, “top round that has been brined for three days, then braised slowly.” Along with the mushrooms and caramelized onions, the ingredients blended together between two golden-brown tortilla shells – an olfactory bomb that tasted as good as it smelled.
Is this food trying to make a statement?

“Just because we work in the middle of the city doesn’t mean farm-fresh food should be out of reach,” Parsons said.

Over coffee it became evident that Cassie Parsons is the type of person who gives you a genuine smile and looks into your eyes when she talks. She is confident, but not boastful, and is comfortable in her own skin. She speaks with passion and conviction and clearly loves her job. But this wasn’t always the case. She moved to Charlotte 14 years ago and worked as a chef at a high-end steak restaurant, but, she soon realized she wasn’t satisfied with the quality of food it was serving. It didn’t take long for her to see how rising food costs caused compromises in quality at most restaurants. She decided she didn’t want to be a part of this cycle anymore so she started her own organic garden to grow produce she could sell to local chefs. While many of her friends thought it was a beautiful idea, the chefs didn’t bite. Organic products weren’t yet mainstream, and the extra cost couldn’t be justified.

She decided she had to keep fighting, especially because of her concern about the relentless loss of farmland. According to Parsons, in the past 19 years more than half of North Carolina’s farmland, 9 million acres, has been paved over. The idea of the Grateful Growers Farm had been gestating in the back of Parson’s mind for a number of years.
“All I wanted to do was make really great food, eat well, and provide for my friends.”

She grabbed hold of that simple concept and ran with it. After a lot of hard work she eventually got a grant from an organization that seemed thrilled by her innovativeness. Parsons had cleared the first obstacle, and with her partner, Natalie Veres, was able to start Grateful Growers. And thus, the 10-acre farm they now enjoy, in Lincoln County, was born in December 2004.
In addition to the hogs they’re famous for, they also raise close to 500 ducks a year, as well as a handful of chickens and turkeys for personal use. They also grow about 40 pounds of shiitake mushrooms annually. In addition to Peres and Parsons, the staff on the farm includes one part-time employee helping with farm work, a part-time bookkeeper, a part-time sales associate, and several volunteers who staff the tables at farmers markets.

After a few years of selling their farm-raised pork, chicken and other products to chefs and farmers market patrons, they decided, during the summer of 2009, to create The Harvest Moon Grille. From Monday through Thursday, just a walk away from anywhere in uptown, they cook and serve organic food, sourced from more than a dozen farms and local businesses. Parsons is delighted with the response, especially because The Harvest Moon Grille runs well with only one full-time and four part-time employees. She told me, “This little cart has created a true connection between the growers, the guests who get to enjoy their products, and the employees.”

In so doing, The Harvest Moon Grille has unintentionally become a symbol of possibility in Charlotte’s streets, stirring up the tastebuds, and perhaps the imaginations, of everyday consumers, offering farm-fresh meals in a city environment. As our cities grow ever taller, businesses such as The Harvest Moon Grille remind us that we all started with the soil. “No farm, no food.” Indeed.

~ Emily Jones

Harvest Moon Grille
11:30 a.m.-2:30 p.m.
Tuesday and Thursday in Uptown Charlotte at Trade and Tryon Streets next to the Bank of America building.
Monday and Wednesday, in uptown Charlotte at the Gateway Village (901 W. Trade St.) across from the Doubletree Hotel
Check its website regularly for menu updates:

Are our graduates staying in Charlotte, or are they moving away once they’ve earned degrees?
JWU alumni data suggests that they are finding gainful employment and many of them are staying in the area. We also have evidence that some have come back after testing the waters elsewhere. Joshua Cain ’06, executive pastry chef, Ritz Carlton in uptown Charlotte, relocated to Charlotte after working as a pastry chef in Georgia. Shane Pearson owns Savor on Morehead Street. Our grads are showing entrepreneurship. Senior Stephanie Goldstein recently opened Tasty Yo, a yogurt shop in NoDa. Our students and graduates are working in area hotels, CRVA and Levine Museum of the New South, just to name a few. JWU has strong relationships with Harpers restaurants, Bissell Companies, Marriott, Hilton and Compass Group.  Graduate relocation decisions are influenced by opportunities available in their fields. Charlotte continues to offer reasonable opportunities for our students.

Are we providing enough opportunities for recent graduates? What can we do to improve?
The hospitality industry has been affected by the economy with some restaurant closures, low hotel occupancy, but no major chains went under. There is optimism in the air in part due to the upcoming Spring Expo/on-campus recruiting. Thirty-seven employers are coming to campus for the Spring Expo to hire students for internships/jobs, including: Darden Restaurants, Biltmore Company and Kiawah Island Golf Resort. As the financial sector returns to health, we should see more opportunities for our College of Business students. We have an aggressive plan for getting students on internships in their senior year for 2010-2011. The opening of Ritz Carlton, Springhill by Marriott in Ballantyne, Aria, Taste, Siemens, Electrolux…all created/are creating new opportunities for our students and graduates. The opening of the NASCAR Hall of Fame and new ownership of the Bobcats are indicators of stability and hold promise for the future.

Who are our biggest competitors for undergraduate and graduate applicants, and how do we compare?
There is intense regional competition – fabulous schools in Charlotte and the region, good institutions that contribute to the supply of talent. Availability of talent attracts start-ups and entices others to relocate to the region. JWU has added value to our accounting program by aligning with the Institute of Management Accountants. The program prepares students to sit for the certification exam. The certification prepares students for career advancement. Demand for our culinary and baking & pastry program continues to be strong with the baking and pastry program oversubscribed.

How do our tuition costs compare with our competitors?
The Charlotte area continues to be a great value for education. Plenty of choices for graduate and undergraduate education, and regional institutions that offer great value, in terms of tuition, cost of living and quality of life. Private schools tend to be more expensive than public institutions, and at JWU we continue to make education affordable by making adjustments to expenditures and passing the savings on to students in the form of increased institutional aid (scholarships). This academic year, JWU gave out $17 million in the form of institutional grants, and we anticipate spending $20 million of our funds in scholarships to our students.

Are we conscious of the large number of college-age students in the area, and what does Charlotte offer them that makes us a draw for applicants? What does Charlotte still lack, and where do we lag as far as higher-education resources and selling points?
A draw for applicants? A robust local and regional economy that presents employment opportunities while students are enrolled and after graduation is important for some. (The Ritz Carlton, NASCAR Hall of Fame, Aloft Hotel, Aria, etc.)  New cultural attractions such as new museums (Wells Fargo Cultural Campus); increased retail in uptown; well-developed transportation network; and the fact we live in a safe community all contribute to providing a good experience. More opportunities for students? Heavily discounted tickets at sporting events such as the Bobcats, Checkers and Knights games. The groups partner with JWU Student Affairs to help boost attendance. What does Charlotte lack? A medical school at UNCC, to complement the hospital system. Charlotte needs more college student gathering places that are not alcohol dependent. Center City Partners is working on this with its Vision 2020 planning. JWU lit a spark for more activity when we opened and Charlotte should keep working on creating a friendly, younger generation-focused city environment…more eclectic life…more color, more vibrancy and more character.

What trends can we expect to see in nearby colleges and graduates in the next few years?
Increased synergy/partnerships with the N.C. Research Campus in Kannapolis, graduate education (law school, new business programs), and a JWU online four-year food service management degree. You will also see increased applications for graduate and professional school as long as employment remains tight, as well as large enrollments at community colleges, as people look to update and improve their skills.

~ Clay Whittaker

Ah, chocolate. Decadent, creamy and rich. It is no wonder people say, “Forget love … I’d rather fall in chocolate.” Chocolate is the taste that has fueled the palates and imaginations of people around the world for centuries. The ancients called it Elixir of the Gods, and many people today would resoundingly agree.

Long ago, a magical tree grew in what is today Mexico. The ancient Mayan and Aztec civilizations used beans from the tree as money, and cacao beans from the trees’ pods were brewed into a coveted drink. It is said that Montezuma II, Emperor of the Aztecs, was served whipped frothy chocolate in a golden goblet, which he ate with a golden spoon. When the fierce Spanish conqueror Cortes opened the doors to the Aztec treasury, he expected to find gold and jewels, but instead found mounds and mounds of cocoa beans. Cortes brought chocolate and the knowledge of how to prepare it back to Europe, and a few decades later, cocoa mixed with milk and sugar became Europe’s most fashionable drink. The advent of the machine age created chocolate as we know it today, separating the components of the beans, and the technology allowing the creation of the chocolate bar in 1847. Chocolate producers have never looked back, with each generation of chocolate producers bringing more innovation to this ancient gift of nature.

Unlike money, chocolate really does grow on trees. The Theobroma cacao tree, specifically, grows in tropical regions 20 degrees north and 20 degrees south of the Equator. Pods grow directly from the trunk of the tree, and each pod is filled with about forty beans protected by a sweet, sticky pulp. The seeds and pulp are scooped out and fermented together for several days to develop the flavor. The beans are then are dried and roasted. Various methods are used to create different styles of products.

For the past few centuries, large companies have dominated the production of chocolate. These companies invented and perfected methods of producing high-quality chocolate. Nestle, Lindt, Godiva, and Valrhona are examples. It’s big business. About $42 billion of chocolate is consumed annually, and cocoa beans are traded as futures on the stock exchange.
This is an almost revolutionary period in the rich history of chocolate. In the past 20 years, worldwide consumption of chocolate has doubled. Chocolate-loving consumers have reached new levels of sophistication and are demanding, and getting, more from their chocolate experience. Chocolate lovers are chasing intense flavor experiences and seeking out the highest-quality chocolate available, and often looking for local producers.

I brought back a box of handmade chocolates from San Francisco a couple of weeks ago and shared it with my fellow instructors at Johnson & Wales University. We gathered around the box like groupies at a rock concert, tasting, talking about and sharing each exotic piece. Lavender-infused, chili- spiced, salted caramel-flavored bites of incredibly good chocolate, made for an amazing taste experience. This is one of the most exciting trends in chocolate, the combination of excellent-quality chocolate with exciting spices and seasonings.
Amy Felder, Johnson & Wales instructor and author of “Savory Sweets,” is a master of exploring the delicate balance between sweet and savory flavors in desserts. She’s on a mission to find just the right amount of sweet and just the right amount of savory flavors to create exciting, vibrant flavors. Felder thinks of chocolate as a big, bold flavor and likens chocolate to a “bright red oil painting with jagged edges.” Felder prefers to use flavors with enough character to stand up to the chocolate, like ginger and cumin. The habanera chili-spiced chocolate I adored from that San Francisco box makes me think she’s right on.

Consumers are also demanding locally made chocolate. Leslie Vilhelmsen, owner of the Charlotte Chocolate Company, is helping meet that demand. After falling in love with chocolate as a teenager, she spent 25 years as a licensed Customs House broker. After leaving that job, Vilhelmsen began hosting neighborhood teas and serving chocolate, really good chocolate that was a huge hit with her guests. With encouragement from friends, she decided to follow her heart and start a chocolate-making company. Vilhelmsen got serious and studied with some of the best chocolatiers in America. She has developed a line of chocolates for special events and often customizes chocolates for businesses. Vilhelmsen even created one just for Charlotte, a molded chocolate with the imprint of the trolley. Vilhelmsen calls chocolate a “little luxury for oneself,” and she delights in handcrafting that bit of luxury for her customers. Next up is perfecting an old family recipe for a nutty chocolate bar, which she hints is “happiness in a bar.”

At a dinner at Bonterra Dining and Wine Room, I fell hard for the handcrafted chocolates served there.  Produced by husband-and-wife team Joal Fischer and Deborah Langsam of Barking Dog Chocolatiers in Charlotte, these are gorgeous chocolates with intriguing flavors. I fell even harder when I learned that this couple donates all profits from the candy to the community. Seventy percent of the price of the chocolates goes to local charities, including SupportWorks, a self-help, nonprofit clearinghouse Fischer founded to help people find medical information and support. They also support Friendship Trays and NC MedAssist. This is chocolate with a conscience. Fischer is a retired pediatrician, and Langsam is a retired professor of biology (currently a fiber artist as well) who, along the way, fell in love with chocolate. The pair spent vacations immersed in chocolate, traveling and studying. After a course at the Ecole Ritz Escoffier in Paris, Fischer says, “It was all over … we were totally hooked.” The science appealed, as well as the meditative aspects of creating chocolate. Fischer chuckles, “Slow food? There isn’t anything much slower than chocolate!” The couple recently created a chocolate laboratory at their home, with 50 to 200 pounds of chocolate on hand at any given time. Purists about their ingredients, Fischer comments that “the quality of the groceries used is critical, because great ingredients simply work and taste better.” They source freshly ground spices and select the appropriate chocolate for each flavor, choosing among eight brands. They have painstakingly created their own recipes, with the goal of creating chocolate that is perfectly balanced, with chocolate and flavorings in harmony. Their mission, they say, is to make people smile, and they have certainly achieved that goal, on many levels.

Just like other food these days, people want to know where their chocolate comes from. Traditional chocolate products are often a blend of regions, as chocolate tastes different from different places, but there is a growing interest in single-origin chocolate. Geoff Blount is a certified executive pastry chef and instructor at Central Piedmont Community College. He’s also headed out this month to try out for a coveted spot on the United States Culinary Olympic Pastry team. Blount recently returned from a visit to the Waialua Estate Cacao Plantation, on the Hawaiian island of Oahu, where he tasted cacao from the pod. Blount came back raving about the experience of seeing the origin of this chocolate, grown, made and produced on American soil. Blount says he is definitely seeing an increase in interest in single-origin, “micro-roast” chocolates on the market.

A new generation of chocolate lovers is diving into the science of making chocolate, and into the art of creating fabulous flavors. Ron Pehoski, instructor at Johnson & Wales University, is teaching a chocolate class for eager students. Pehoski believes this is a particularly exciting time for chocolate lovers. He comments that “anything goes in chocolate right now.” He’s tasted bacon-filled chocolates, chocolates with wine-flavored centers, and even an assortment of chocolates seasoned with five kinds of salt. Watch a chocolate class, and the science is evident. Chocolate is tricky to handle, and students work hard to master the technical skills of tempering (melting) and handling chocolate to ensure that the final product is attractive and delicious. Chocolatiers study and practice for years before they are adept enough at the practice to make truly excellent chocolates, much less before they can create signature flavors.

It’s an exciting time to try something new in chocolate. Eat locally, or branch out and try some of the exotic new flavors on the market. Think of it as research. And what enjoyable research it is.

~ Catherine Rabb

Contact Information:
Charlotte Chocolate Company, Leslie Vilhelmsen
www.charlottechocolate.com
704-577-4772

Barking Dog Chocolates, Deborah Langsam and Joal Fischer
www.woofwoofwoofwoof.org
704 333-1595

Central Piedmont Community College
www.cpcc.edu

Johnson & Wales University
International Baking and Pastry Institute
www.jwu.edu

A little “taste” of chocolate……
After beans are roasted, they are shelled, to expose the centers, called nibs. These nibs are ground into a smooth liquid called chocolate liquor (even though it doesn’t contain any alcohol). It is then cooled and formed into solid blocks. Chocolate liquor is the basis for all chocolate, and has only two parts, the cocoa solids that give the characteristic strong dark flavor, and cocoa butter, which translates to a smooth mouth feel.

Unsweetened Chocolate:
Contains no sugar so it’s about 99% cocoa liquor, and has a very bitter taste.

Semi-sweet or bittersweet chocolate:
These types of chocolate contain sugar, with semi-sweet a bit more than bittersweet. Sugar contents vary by producer, however.

Milk Chocolate:
In the U.S., milk chocolate must contain a minimum of 10% chocolate liquor, but in practice the percentage is often higher, and 12% milk solids. It’s different in Europe, where the minimum for chocolate liquor is 30%.

Couverture:
A term for high-quality chocolate that is suitable for candy making.

White chocolate:
It really isn’t chocolate at all because it contains no cocoa solids. It’s made from cocoa butter (the fat from the cocoa beans, sugar, milk and usually vanilla). The hot new trend is to color cocoa butter, and colors from pastels to vibrant jewel tones are all the rage.