Home Grown Choclate Bars

Imagine if you could just walk outside and pick a chocolate bar from a tree. That childhood dream  is sort of coming true  for artisanal candy makers. It seems some chocoholics are going the extra mile to make their own bars. This is a new trend and certainly exciting. Whenever you want customized candy you can have it. It's not quite that  chocolate bar  from a chocolate bar  tree but almost.

Kim Severson got to interview the chocolatiers in yesterday's New York Times Food section. It was the Chocolate Issue where almost every article was cocoa centric. Making your own candy is nothing new however chocolate candy making is. It's attracting a number of different people, from parents wanting to give their allergy plagued children treats that haven't been made in factories where there are dairy or nuts to artesans who have experimented with creating other complicated foodstuffs from scratch.It is expensive. Chocolate  making usually costs about $500 to start and the ingredients, namely cocoa  beans, can be hard to find.Candy makers also need an electric Indian wet grinder. This is usually employed for grinding spices and looks sort of like a small food processor.This too is expensive but does get the job done.Then there's getting the actual cocoa beans . These too can be pricey as well. One chocolate maker, Jeffrey Hoffmeister of Seattle went one step further and bought coca orchids that later produce the bean.


The process itself is relatively easy The hulls are cracked and blown off with a simple blow dryer. This leaves the nibs which are then roasted..Raw cacao beans are roasted, similar to coffee beans. At this point, according to Ms. Severson they smell more like peanut butter.They  and sugar put into the wet grinder where they're ground to a paste. This is a 24 hour process ending in a silky batter that is then poured into molds and left to harden.Some coco meisters add their own spin.Scott Witherow who started making his own bars and then expanded to a candy shop, gave his a Southern spin by subbing in brown sugar for white. He also elevated the oft hated white chocolate to another level with the addition of buttermilk.Some chocolate makers add bacon , whole peppercorns and other unusual  ingredients to make the bars different . However  it's the taste of the pure  just made  chocolate that's heavenly and should be appreciated.

Artesenal chocolate is heavenly. It is fresh made,without any preservatives marring the flavor. If you love chocolate and are adventurous, you can make it yourself. Imagine a worldl full of custom made chocolate bars , right from your kitchen.