FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Pure Sweet Decadence

Chocolate. Can anything be more luxurious and delicious? Doubtful, but then again I'm a self-proclaimed chocoholic. Mile-high pies, big fluffy and creamy desserts ... you can keep 'em; fruit tarts, push 'em aside -- just give me plain old chocolate. My favorite way of consuming this "food of the gods" is straight, in the form of a candy bar or, better yet, cut off a block of pure dark semi-sweet. Indeed, when making desserts that contain chocolate I often buy more than is required knowing some will be consumed during preparation. This penchant for chocolate is nothing new to me; I grew up with it. And through genes or action, like my father before me I am unconsciously passing the love of chocolate onto my young son, Isaac. Just the other day, in fact, when asked what "treat" he would like in his lunchbox he replied simply "just a little candy bar."

Chocolate wasn't always sweet and of course didn't originate in the form of a block. These were European innovations -- without the added sugar, chocolate is actually very bitter. If you've ever mistakenly eaten unsweetened bakers chocolate then you understand this completely. The word chocolate, in fact, is derived from the Aztec xocolatl, meaning "bitter water." The Aztecs consumed chocolate in the form of a beverage, which was made by pounding together raw cocoa pods and spices and infusing it into water. Indeed, as its name suggested the beverage was undoubtedly very bitter water. None the less, as is today, many thought that cocoa had aphrodisiac properties; the Aztec king Montezuma is believed to have drank up to fifty servings of the bitter concoction each day from golden goblets.

What makes chocolate so seemingly addictive is not only the tangible things like its decadent flavor and melt-in-your-mouth texture, but also the things that are not so easy to detect -- chocolate's actual makeup. For starters it contains caffeine, which is common enough. But it also contains other unseen substances such as phenylethylamine, which is a sort of natural amphetamine and anti-depressant that is also produced in the brain during times of pleasure (hence the dubious phrase "chocolate is better than sex"). Among other things chocolate also contains anandamide, which produces feelings of calm and well being, like an extremely mild drug. The paradox of this is that despite the energy and euphoric-inducing effects of chocolate, the popularity of desserts bearing names such as "Death by Chocolate" continue to soar. The phrase was first coined by the extremely talented chef/restaurateur Marcel Desaulnier at his restaurant The Trellis in Williamsburg, Virginia, his latest book is entitled Desserts to Die For.

Hmmm ... so on one side chocolate is shrouded in aphrodisiac mythology, and even said to offer somewhat of an anti-depressant and euphoric "high" making life worth living. While on the flip side it is insinuated that chocolate is so rich and decadent that it can cause death, or at least is worth dying for. Though it may be delicious, I personally don't feel comfortable eating a food whose title blatantly implies that doing so may be fatal. But then again I tend to take things a little too literally.

What is also unique about chocolate is its fat -- cocoa butter. Cocoa butter is vegetable fat yet it is solid at room temperature, which is usually a characteristic of animal fats; vegetable fats are generally liquid at room temperature. Cocoa butter is also expensive, and because of this many inferior brand chocolates have substituted a less expensive vegetable fat for a portion of the cocoa butter. Many of the added fats also act as stabilizers; they melt at a higher temperature than cocoa butter, thus it is easier to be stored and transported. But as with many things that are altered, substituting another fat for real cocoa butter often brings a loss of quality, most notably flavor and the feel it leaves in one's mouth -- fats other than cocoa butter will often leave a waxy feeling in your mouth. The best and most accurate (not to mention pleasurable) way of testing the quality of chocolate is to do it the old fashioned way ... taste it. There are a few basic elements that should be apparent in fine chocolate: how quickly it melts in your mouth (it should melt relatively quickly), the smoothness of the chocolate as it melts, the intensity of its flavor, and any waxy feel or undesirable after taste.