Dark Chocolate - Oh, Demon of Deliciousness!

This has to be one of my most-favorite guilty pleasures of all. Deep, dark, rich, taste-bud electrifying, salivary gland enticing, pleasure-inducing flavors ever created on this planet. Dark Chocolate.

The name alone oozes of sinful goodness. Growing up allergic to chocolate, I ate a lot of White Chocolate (which we all know, is not actually Chocolate at all due to its lack of Cocoa Solids). Then as the allergies subsided, my taste buds were introduced to the most common and average of Chocolates here in the US - Milk Chocolate; a sweet, tasty confection not to be ignored. But oh, you Dark Chocolate, you!

So what is it? What is Chocolate and why the obsession? Deep in the tropical jungles of South America, the Cacao Tree bears large green fruit pods. These 6-12 inch pods weigh about a pound each. Embedding in the pulpy white flesh are about 60 seeds known as beans. These beans are 40-50% fat... a delicious fat known as Cocoa Butter.

These beans are intensely bitter and require fermentation to develop their flavor. Next, these little unassuming beans are dried, cleaned, and finally roasted. Once the shells are removed we have cacao nibs which are ground and turning into a pure chocolate liquid known as chocolate liquor. [My mouth is watering just typing this!] Separate the fat (cocoa butter) from the chocolate liquor and the what remains is cocoa solids. The ratio of cocoa butter to cocoa solids is what defines our chocolate.

Unsweetened or Baker's Chocolate is Pure Chocolate Liquor. But start adding sweeteners and other fats (usually milk) and world begins to engulf the possibilities. In a nutshell, about 25% Cocoa Solids is required for Milk Chocolate (milk being an added fat) and a minimum of 35% Cocoa Solids is required for Dark Chocolate.

But enough science and history... taste it. Savor it. Crave it. If you don't know the difference you can conduct a very simple test. M&Ms. They now make a Dark Chocolate version and the flavor between this and their original formula is night and day.

Regular M&Ms (bring back Tan!) are as delicious as ever. But I've begun to find them ubiquitous, appearing everywhere from ice cream toppings to cupcake decorations, turning batter into faux chocolate chip cookies, living in places it doesn't belong, like trail mix and all sorts other products. I have grown tired of this 'melt in your mouth, not in your hands' snack.

But bite crunch into a new Dark Chocolate M&M and holy smokes. This IS the difference between Milk Chocolate and Dark Chocolate.

So dig through your kids Halloween Haul tonight and find some Dark Chocolate. Try it. Your grown-up taste buds will dance, your eyes will roll, a deep sigh will emanate from the most-inner core of your being. Return will never be an option.

July 17 - On the Verge of a New Life Chapter?

I've always viewed my life as a series of chapters. Each one containing a different version of me as the lead character. I break it up like this:

1963-1971: Family Years
1971-1979: Single Parent Years (Philadelphia)
1979-1991: Long Island Years
1991-2001: Married Years (Los Angeles-Straight)
2001-present: Gay LA (Single)

Interestingly, my work careers seemed to have followed a similar path:

1979-1991: US Navy and Music Retail
1991-2005: ABC/Kane Productions and DreamWorks (Legal)
2005-present: DreamWorks Animation (Production)

So what am I getting at? Well, over the past couple years, I've become increasingly fascinated and have fallen in love with FOOD. It started when someone showed me that cooking could be as simple as heading for the fridge, grabbing some ingredients and whipping up a meal. My culinary journey had begun.

Then came the exploding popularity of Food Network. Alton Brown's "Good Eats", "Unwrapped", Jamie Oliver's "The Naked Chef"... and then the competitions, Bravo's "Top Chef", Gordon Ramsey's "Hell's Kitchen", "Iron Chef"... and then came BBC America's "Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares" and "Last Restaurant Standing" followed by The Travel Channel's "Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations" and "Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern."

With all of this, I have become a 'Foodie"! I love it, I wanna taste it, try it, savor it. I am hooked and now find food to be one of life's greatest pleasures. Love Sushi and Thai the most, but cook at home as well (I love you, Crock Pot) and have gotten better pots and a cutting board of wood, and Mark actually gave me a Knife Skills class. This is beginning to feel like the start of something else.

So again, where am I going with this? Well, over the past year or so, thoughts of running a restaurant have permeated my soft grey matter and - I know, it's hard, very hard, most restaurants fail - now I hope that one day I can partner with a Chef to make this dream come true. (Interestingly, I don't desire being a Chef, but then again, I'd prefer being the Producer over the Director - I guess it's the same thing).

So is this a new chapter? Perhaps. The current one does not yet feel fully written, but who knows... after a few more pages, it might be time!