Apart from this uphill battle of the bulge, which means no frivolous lunches, I usually eat at home on weeknights, or at least try my best to do so. Anyway, I was at a friend's house on Sunday night, when the topic about chocolate came up. One of the expats there mentioned that Lindt has a new range of dark chocolate, with cocoa from all over..... 65% from Madagascar, 70% from ??? and 75% from Cuba. Ever since I read that dark chocolate is GOOD for you, I have no guilt at all occasionally indulging in some. So, as I made my way to pre book my new Harry Potter book at neighbourhood bookstore, after doing so I headed to Bangsar Village to pick up my fruit for lunch AND a bar of Lindt. I chose the 65% Madagascar, coz I don't really like it TOO bitter. 70% is about my limit. The 85% one is a bit too dark for me. Much like a dementor from Azkaban.
Which brings me to my next point. In Delia Smith's How To Cook series, when she was teaching about chocolate, she said, one of the tests of a good chocolate is the snapping sound when you break it off. I think I beg to differ, as that particular test depends on the temperature of the chocolate. I think if the chocolate is from the fridge, of course the snap sound will be louder. So I tried with the 65% madagascar. Sure enough, there was no snap sound at all, coz it was room temperature, and in Malaysia, you know what THAT is.
Has anyone out there found a cost viable, dark chocolate with reasonable cocoa content that can be used for baking? Actually I hear our local cocoa is of very high standard, and companies like KLK are making chocolate for export.
16 comments:
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Hey FBB, I always use Van Houten cooking chocolate. I find it quite intensely chocolatey and doesn't have a waxy taste compared to some of the other cooking chocolates available here. I think its about 60%-65% if I'm not mistaken.
i like the HP connection to chocolate.
at first, i thought the lindt chocs that you can buy off supermarket shelves were so-so only, i.e. that's the stuff they export but keep the best brands for themselves (those luxury choc making countries i.e.). then hor, i tried the lindt excellence hazelnut... and i was hooked! i didn't get the >snap< sound either, it was more like a >fold<
Aah gone are the days when I used to queue up like an idiot kid just to get that first copy from Kino (hubby: you stay in MPO season tickets queue while I'll run to queue up in Kino! We'll meet up at Oh-Eight Hundred-Hours, Copy?) and gloat about it to all my other friends who didn't get a copy because they were too stupid to pre-order. Guess what. I forgot to pre-order this time.
Dunno much abt cooking chocolate. I just eat the finished stuff.
I won't mind buying local chocs but how I wish they'll label the cocoa mass in their chocs then I know what I'm getting into.
Before I got my Valrhona supply, I used Droste which was cheaper than Lindt. Other alternative is Callebaut which is popular among the hoteliers.
so is the lindt 1 better or the japanese brand better ar?..i once bought the 99% and bought it to work..i made everyone spit it out..god knows how i manage to finish the whole block.
Hey FBB, although you mentioned that your life is boring, but at least your baking skills compensate that. We can't bake you know? (Well, most of us la).
your life is boring? sure? i thought kids can excite your life... lol
Thank goodness you have some floggers in your life to give you some excitement and to take illicit pics of! ROFL...
lucky u dun eat out so often like some people, then we can be assured that u will continue to treat/entertain us with yr only from fbb cake and dementor tales !
Hm.. actually I find some local chocolate nicer.. Just not a Van Houten fan. (I think this harry porter movie is the best out of the rest... love the fight scenes!)
Hahaha...you had to point him out.
I guess I am some what like you, I rarely go out to eat. And I really can't eat that kind of chocolate...
Quality mah, FBB. Not quantity. A small piece of Godiva is miles better than an entire bar of Kandos, no?
kat, def i am a proponent of quality over quantity!!! kandos???omigosh, that's like eating soap. it was disgusting.
kay, point who out???
teckiee, which brand of local choc do you find nicer leh?
team bsg, well, when i say i dont eat out often, i mean i dont eat out as often as you guys lah...jackson eats out twice or 3 times a day!!!!
wmw, roll eyes.
mei yen, yup yup, kids provide a different kind of excitement.
jason, maybe i exaggerated la. i think i live quite a happening life, compared with my married peers.
nipples, 99% ah? might as well just go eat pure cocoa powder leh. some brands of jap ones are really good.
boo, where to buy callebaut?
lyrical, ooh, i prepaid 88.80 for my HP at Czip Lee, my favourite local bookstore when to my horror i found out about the 69.90 in tesco etc. anyway, to my pleasant surprise, they honored the 69.90, and gave me RM20 voucher, plus goodie bag, so i actually got it at 68.80 plus freebies!!!! good hor.
hl - yar, there goes the snap theory.
paps, does van houten label their cocoa content? chang tung sells a pretty good bitter couverture, quite reasonably priced, but as boo says, they dont label the cocoa content.
babekl, noted. so terror la you.
hey i got my HP in Czip Lee too, but without the vouchers lor. Maybe it's becoz I didn't pre-book and just walked in hor. But I'm still happy. :-D
i was trying to look for this madagascar 65% dark chocolate in the supermarket, but too bad, I didnt manage to find it anywhere.
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