Some chocolate experts say white chocolate is not chocolate at all, just a confectionery aimed at kids. But that’s not true.

Cacao fruit is the source of both cacao mass (you have probably learned to appreciate 75% of your bar being made of that) and also, cacao butter.

White chocolate bars are usually 35% pure cacao butter (in nice white chocolate bars it should be listed as the first of the ingredients), and have no cacao mass at all – which is why they are so pale a shade.

The other ingredients for making white chocolate are: Milk or cream powder, sugar, emulsifier (usually Soy Lecithin), and vanilla or other spices.

White chocolate would contain not less than 20% by weight of cacao fat, a minimum of 3.5% percent by weight of milk fat, and at least 14% by weight of total milk solids, and it may contain quite a bit of sugar – up to 55%.

Valrhona, the high-quality supplier for chocolate makers, provides a relatively low-sugar version of white chocolate. They accurately describe their Ivoire white chocolate “[it] reveals aromas of warm milk enhanced by delicate vanilla notes.” Their 40% cacao butter product claims to have “distinctive flavor, both mild and chocolate-y, unveils notes of caramel and vanilla enhanced with a touch of malt.”

A recent trend in artisanal chocolate is hand-crafted white chocolate bars with exciting additions like berries, coffee nibs, spices, pistachios and other nuts.

The inclusions add texture and flavours that make the experience of eating white chocolate much more interesting and pleasurable.

Mini white chocolate bar with coffee nibs, by IKA

Already in last October, The Chocolate Journalist AKA Sharon Terenzi has visited The London Chocolate Show, UK’s largest event dedicated to chocolate, and reported about the artisanal redemption of white chocolate:

“…white chocolate is slowly but steadily transitioning from a cheap candy to a fine food to be savored just like dark chocolate… it can be turned into an intriguing delicacy with the addition of crunchiness (nuts, cocoa nibs) and flavors (spices, teas).”

White chocolate is quite sweet, which is why snobs sneer, but we find it hard to see a problem here… are Financiers, Mille-Feuille, Macarons not sweet? Indulgence can be luxurious, too.

Speaking of patisserie pleasures, we take this opportunity to share Ika’s recipe for
White Chocolate & Strawberry Sablé Fingers.

This recipe was published also in cooperation with Pascale Perez- Rubin, one of Israel’s leading recipe book authors and food writers, who also styled and photographed this sumptuous picture.

This month she has agreed to follow another French tradition, by answering the Proust Questionnaire,
AKA the Bernard Pivot questions, made very popular also by Actors Guild host James Lipton.

Here is Ika spilling her beans:

1. What is your idea of perfect happiness?

Looking at the sunset on a lounger on a sandy beach, holding a glass of Sancerre wine.

2. What is your greatest fear?

Not making that trip around the world in 80 days. Or more.

3. What is the trait you most deplore in yourself?

Impatience.

4. What is the trait you most deplore in others?

Miserliness.

5. Which living person do you most admire?

My sister in law.

6. What is your greatest extravagance?

A trip to Hawaii when I was 18.

7. What is your current state of mind?

When will this August end already?

8. What do you consider the most overrated virtue?

Self-confidence.

9. On what occasion do you lie?

Can I lie as an answer to this question?

10. What do you most dislike about your appearance?

My hips.

11. Which living person do you most despise?

So many human-rights crushing-dictators out there these days… But Assad.

12. What is the quality you most like in a man?

Sense of Humor.

13. What is the quality you most like in a woman?

Creativity.

14. Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

What was I going to say??

15. What or who is the greatest love of your life?

Chocolate & The Sea.

16. When and where were you happiest?

The day I opened my shop. But diving in the ocean in Australia is also an extremely happy memory.

17. Which talent would you most like to have?

For languages. I would love to be fluent in 7 languages at least.

18. If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

Be more patient.

19. What do you consider your greatest achievement?

Being included in the Le Club des Croqueurs de Chocolat guide, with gold tablette rating.

20. If you were to die and come back as a person or a thing, what would it be?

Jack Sparrow – Pirate of the Caribbean.

21. Where would you most like to live?

Manhattan, Paris, London, Tokyo, Sydney, and many other places.

22. What is your most treasured possession?

My chocolate Tempering machine. It’s possible that I am still paying for it.

23. What do you regard as the lowest depth of misery?

Losing someone close to you.

24. What is your favorite occupation?

Chit-chatting over plates of food.

25. What is your most marked characteristic?

Determination.

26. What do you most value in your friends?

Them being there when needed.

27. Who are your favorite writers?

Ian McEwan, Meir Shalev.

28. Who is your hero of fiction?

Peter Pan.

29. Which historical figure do you most identify with?

Lou Andreas-Salomé, a Russian-born psychoanalyst and author, who had close relationships with Rilke, Freud, and Nietzsche (quite a complicated one, with the latter).

30. Who are your heroes in real life?

Breakthrough entrepreneurs.

31. What are your favorite names?

Inbar, Offri.

32. What is it that you most dislike?

Malice.

33. What is your greatest regret?

Quitting piano lessons.

34. How would you like to die?

In my sleep, following a three-star rated Michelin dinner.

35. What is your motto?

Chocolate is the soul’s super-food.

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This month, while working towards the 2017 International Chocolate Awards winners ceremony, we share some tips and behind-the-scenes insight, to help you judge the quality of chocolate, just like the jury members of international competitions, and writers of guides like Le Club des Croqueurs de Chocolat.

Professional Chocolate Tasting Experts

From these guides you can learn which chocolate ateliers around the world make the best pralines and chocolate desserts.
You can also go kinda crazy, and obviously very hungry, from reading the wonderfully crafted reviews.
These reviews can teach you the key judgment criteria  – because taste is just one element of quality chocolate (yes indeed!).

Le Club des Croqueurs de Chocolat, publishes the leading guide to the most remarkable chocolate in the world.
They rate the top chocolatiers in France, Belgium and globally (ÉTRANGER category).
The Club is over 30 years old, and has 150 members, most of them pastry chefs, restaurateurs, journalists. Some are experts in other feields, like historians and photographers. What they all share is a demonstrable passion for chocolate. It is a close-knit organisation that take itself – and chocolate – very seriously.
They gather for tasting every other month, each time they focus on a different theme, such as chocolates flavored with tea, fruit and alcohol pralines, etc.

A rising force in the chocolate world is George Bernardini, who publishes The Chocolate Tester – The Reference Standard.

Bernardini writes personal reviews of over 4,000 chocolates, made by 550 brands from over 70 countries.
He ranks chocolatiers from all over the world, awarding them with “Cocoa Pods”
–  from 1 to 6 Pods, like Michelin Guide awards ‘Stars’ restaurants internationally.

The “Eurovision” Contest of The Chocolate World

A major event for the chocolate business is The International Chocolate Awards.
The organisation is based in London, where the annual Chocolate Show takes place every autumn.

The competition has started taking place also in France, Peru, and Japan, as more and more people gain knowledge in the art of chocolate, and the significance of terroir.

The organisation Founder and Judging Director is Martin Christy, also Founder and Editor of fine chocolate review website Seventy%. His purpose and life’s work is to raise awareness of the quality and sourcing of chocolate, being “a complex, ancient, beneficial and spiritual food”.

Christy was joined by Dr. Maricel E. Presilla, a culinary historian, author and chef specializing in the cuisines of Latin America and Spain. Her book The New Taste of Chocolate: A Cultural and Natural History of Cacao with Recipes is treasured by all leading chocolatiers.

Monica Meschini, the celebrated Italian chocolate/tea taster and Sommelier, completes the founding trio of the Internbational Chocolate Awards.

What judges are mainly looking for is subtlety of taste and textures.

The Grand Jury members taste the competing chocolates anonymously. They are served pralines in small cups, with the description of the sample.

They do a lot of tasting in a very short time, of hundreds of chocolates from all over the world.

According to the press, there were more than 1,000 products registered for the event, including more than 650 chocolate bars.
They won’t get an ounce of pity from us, though.

After they taste, they give a score from 1 to 5 in four areas:

1. Quality of the ingredients
2. Preparation and technique
3. Creativity (and innovation)
4. Taste.

Judges give positive and negative comments considering those categories. Then they count the scores and determine the winning chocolates in each category.

Chocolate tasting and rating – how to judge chocolate like a pro?

With your eyes, your nose, and then your tongue.

First, look attentively:

Is the shape perfect? Too perfect to be hand-made?
Investigate further – is the decoration elegant, clean, and does it dispense some clues about the filling?
Can you see the lightness of the chocolate artist’s hand on this praline?

Before taking it into your mouth, stop over at the tip of your nose: bring the chocolate close to your nose, and smell it (yes, just like you start with wine). Quality chocolate have hints of flavours, that originate in the ground where the cocoa was grown (like fruit, and even smoky Papua New Guinea dried lava), and from the manufacturing process.

Finally, place the chocolate on the tongue, and let it melt slowly, naturally. While it melts on your tongue, try to recognize all the flavours you feel.
Search for flavour nuances.

Pralines Tasting

When tasting a chocolate praline, take only half a bite and look at the filling of the half that’s left on your finger.
Look at the layers, the textures of the filling.
Pay special attention to the thickness of the praline’s coating layer. If it’s slender, you can be sure you are tasting a superior quality praline.

Between different bites, it’s good to drink some water and even eat something neutral like bread, to refresh your taste buds (like some people do when they eat Sushi).

Low quality industrial chocolate and pralines will have familiar candy-like chemical flavors. You might recognize the taste of commercial vanilla extract, or feel there is too much sugar added.

The International Awards and winners are presented before a huge audience at the London Chocolate Show. This year it will take place under the beautiful art-deco glass arched ceiling at Olympia, 13-15 October.

In next month’s post Ika will share stories from the London show, as well as photos from the world’s most fabulous chocolate event – Le Salon du Chocolat 2017 in Paris (of course).

“I used to work in a radio station for many years as a sound technician. I can’t possibly describe how much music means to me. I flew four hours to Barcelona from Tel Aviv and back last week just for a Sting concert.”

As usual, Ika’s answers are just a prelude for a longer story: “His voice fills me with hope. Sting has been an inspiration for me ever since high school. In general, I feel that music is instrumental to my work. On the sound job I learned how to mix and balance sensory experiences. But the most important lesson sound engineering taught me is how to be patient while working. It wasn’t an easy lesson to learn, let me tell you,” and she goes on…

What’s the most memorable concert you have ever attended?

“It was a Tosca performance at the magnificent Sydney Opera House.”

Surely even just entering the building is a hugely inspiring experience: The pure curving shapes rise across the harbor render a heroic artistic achievement.

Savoring Splendor

Another magnificent opera building, though completely different in its Baroque style, is the famous Opéra Garnier. We mention it here because the building is said to have been the inspiration for a luxurious popular cake – the Opera Cake.

Gâteau opéra is an elaborate almond sponge cake with a coffee and chocolate filling and icing (Grande Larrousse Gastronomique).

Cyriaque Gavillon claimed he had invented the cake in 1955, while working as a Pastery Chef at La Maison Dalloyau (established in Versailles in 1682); Gavillon’s wife Andrée supposedly named it after the Garnier Opera building.

The idea behind this dessert is that all of the flavours of the cake should be tasted in just one bite.

And what is a praline, if not pleasure concentrated into one rich chocolate-y bite?

Pâtisserie Expressions

On the night before flying to the Barcelona Sting concert, we visited a new temporary exhibition here in Tel Aviv: The artist Anat Hutzler created eight unique chocolate desserts, each inspired by a song or an album she loves. Anat had let the words and melodies inspire color and taste combinations, textures, compositions, under the title FoodPlay.

“Behind every act of creation there is inspiration, igniting passion.”

Above: inspired by Abbey Road: Pralines filled with bittersweet English Breakfast Tea Ganache, crossing strips of homemade vanilla marzipan. Every band member has a different shell.
Did you guess that John is made of white chocolate?

The Sweet Sound of Sting

What do you listen to when you work?

“I’d like to have been able to tell you that I put on an opera CD early every morning at the chocolatery, when I start my long day at work,” Ika says. “But really, I only listen to a couple of uplifting songs on my iPhone, before the craziness of the workday tasks and calls take over.”

Here is her favorite Sting song, à propos de #MarchMadness