Chocolates For Your Valentine

Air Date:
Heard On The Larry Meiller Show

Valentine’s Day is right around the corner, and there are few gifts more welcome than wonderful gourmet chocolates. Larry Meiller finds out how wonderful chocolates are made, and how best to enjoy them.

Featured in this Show

  • Chocolate Is A Treat Alone, Or Well-Paired with Other Flavors

    There are few gifts more welcome than a lovely assortment of delicious and beautiful chocolates. And with Valentine’s Day this week, there are going to be a lot of chocolates bought, offered, and eaten.

    Gail Ambrosius is the owner of Gail Ambrosius Chocolatier in Madison. She shared advice for how to eat chocolate in order to get the most out of the experience. “I like to slow it down,” Ambrosius said. “I like it to be very mindful, because there is so much flavor in chocolate.”

    Ambrosius acknowledged that she knows “a lot of people are just eager to get to the chocolate. They just pop the whole thing in their mouth, and they get just as much enjoyment, I’m sure. But for me, I like to make it last; I like to savor it.”

    If you want to taste chocolate like a professional does, follow the steps that Ambrosius goes through: “I take one small bite, really kind of get the feeling of the chocolate in my mouth, what kind of flavors am I experiencing, and then (Im) just really savoring it,” she said. Let it melt on your tongue slowly, and enjoy. And then take another little bite and make that last as long as possible, too!”

    Pure, single-source chocolates are always a treat, but many chocolatiers create a variety of flavor combinations. To decide what might pair well, Ambrosius said that she often takes note of combinations that chefs use in cooking for inspiration, often thinking, “’Well that’s an interesting pair. How would it taste with chocolate?’”

    But when considering new flavor combinations, Ambrosius said, “It really all starts with the chocolate. I taste the chocolate just on its own and I really think about what the chocolate’s trying to tell me as far as what flavors it might like.”

    Sometimes it’s a case of finding what complements the chocolate, and other times, it’s what contrasts with the taste. Ambrosius said that her business creates seasonal choices, like passion fruit and sour cherry options for Valentine’s Day. The passion fruit is quite tart, she explained, so the milk chocolate surrounding the fruit purée softens that edge.

    When asked if there was ever a flavor combination that didn’t work as well as she had hoped, Ambrosius pointed to a chocolate and basil experiment: “That was ‘interesting.’ That’s a good word for it.”

Episode Credits

  • Larry Meiller Host
  • Judith Siers-Poisson Producer
  • Gail Ambrosius Guest

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