Chocolate and Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies. These are the type of treats that you either absolutely love or hate. What can be described as a glorified whoopie pie, these cookie sandwiches combined two of my favorite flavors into one delectable dessert bomb. The dense, not-too-sweet cookies are the perfect foil for the ridiculously rich peanut butter filling.

Here is a great desert recipe along with some original food ideas for those special occasions. Enjoy.

In this years Cocoa of Excellence competition in Paris, 14 of the 50 cocoa’s that were judged were from W. Africa.  Now, many, many more were submitted, but only 50 get entered.  Most of them were trying to deliver something other than conventional West African flavor profile, and many did just that.  I tasted each and every one of them – some were better than others.   However, there’s currently a very vivid fine flavor profile that exists in many W. African countries already, predominately appealing to consumers in Europe and Japan – I’d hate to see the entirety of W. African flavors shift to something else (not that I think there’s any danger of that happening, however the breadth of flavors across the world i think is quite marvelous, and to see them shrink would be less than ideal).

Here is some information about the rich history and diversity of chocolate flavors and gourmet profiles.
It gives great context to the variety of taste and the richness of the chocolate palette.

Holiday Gift Guide: Cookbook Corner

By Megan McArdle

Dec 16 2011, 4:45 PM ET 29

After I posted the Kitchen Gift Guide, several readers asked me for cookbook recommendations.  Though I included a few of these in the gift guide, i thought it might be nice to expand the list all in one place.  Here are my go-to’s for broad, general cooking:

1.  Betty Crocker 1950 Picture Cookbook  Absolutely gloriously retro.  There are 7 basic food groups instead of four, the recipes use butter instead of oil, and there are helpful tips on stretching your meat dollar with rice and noodles and cream sauce until it’s practically transparent.  I wouldn’t make all of the recipes in the book–I’ve never dared brave the appetizer’s section–but it’s still my go to for basic baking and comfort foods like meatloaf and Mac and Cheese.  And the “tips for housewives” are good for hours of priceless merriment.  

This are great ideas for holiday gifts.It’s still not too late to get your shoopping done so go for it.

A Christmas treat that is as easy to make as it is delightful to receive.

The recipe

Chop 225g of fine dark chocolate into small pieces about the size of gravel, then put it into a heatproof china or glass bowl. Pour 135ml of double cream into a small saucepan and heat gently. As the cream approaches the boil, remove from the heat and pour over the chopped chocolate, stirring slowly until melted. Put the mixture in the fridge for an hour to chill. Remove heaped tablespoons of the mixture and roll very gently into balls or small logs. Drop into cocoa powder and roll them around gently to cover, then remove and serve. Makes 15 large truffles

This is another scrumptious chocolate truffle recipe for your chocolate enjoyment.

This is a very good video that shows you the process of manufacturing chocolate using the basic ingredients.

Have a look, you could be opening your own chocolate business.