Makin' Chocolate

Long time, no see, I know. But, this entire week, I'll be working on some very special chocolates. These will no doubt be my swansong for the year. I'm pulling out all the stops and going VERY fancy indeed.

This morning, when I plugged in the giant fridge (used for setting chocolates), I went through all my chocolate molds. I'm definitely going to count them all at some point. I must have close to 200 by now, albeit some are duplicates for large orders (remember the 300 butterflies I did for that wedding in 2005?).

Well, one of the molds I haven't used in a few years is my turtle mold. They're large and in charge. I don't simply pour the chocolate into the mold and fill it with caramel and pecans. I paint the inside of what would be the turtle shell in colors befitting a stylish turtle. They're so large that I call them my Galapago Turtles. This year, I'll be making them for a big corporate gift order for the holidays. Be assured that I'll be snapping photos the whole time.

The weather has a definitive snap in the air (it was 31 degrees F outside at 7 am) and I've got the heat set to chocolate-making temperature.

Fall is the time of year when I feel like I awaken from the sluggishness of the hot months. Some folks are affected by the sun's disappearance, but I'm not one of them. I enjoy sweater weather and the crunch of leaves beneath my feet. I also eagerly await making new chocolate fillings and the surprise of how the chocolates look when they're unmolded.

A tall fan of my chocolate is my dear friend Richard Factor. He's immortalized me and the chocolates once again in his blog about the venerable Tom Lehrer. If you don't know who Tom Lehrer is, you might want to ask your parents. My step-dad, Dave, is a big fan of the incredibly witty singing comedian from Harvard. This is a lightweight Wikipedia entry of the legendary satirist.

Off I go, to paint chocolate molds in the most artistic ways. Have a lovely Fall day (in this hemisphere, otherwise, have a lovely seasonal day wherever you might be!).