Serena the Chocolate Lady

Eating chocolate properly is an important step to appreciating chocolate. Most people eat far too fast, you need to slow down there simply no way to discover more than 400 flavor compounds if the chocolate is in and out of the mouth in less than 10 seconds. Food should arrive in the stomach in a liquid form. How often does that actually happen?

Once you slow down and truly enjoy the chocolate, you'll be able to investigate brands you have been eating from an entire new perspective.

You probably never considered whether you eat chocolate properly. I'd been a devout chocolate lover for years. It never entered my mind that I was not eating it properly. I recently discovered there is actually published guidelines to assist you in such a task. I realize that what I've been doing is all wrong, fortunately having an imperfect technique didn't appear to affect either my love for chocolate or how much I enjoyed it. Once I began to use the correct procedure it made all the difference in the world.

First of all chocolate taste best when eaten on an empty stomach. The next step is for people who are eating more than one kind of chocolate in a single setting if you haven't done this yet I encourage you to splurge it's time to cross off the bucket list. You'll need a few different chocolates for this experiment probably several brands are those who variety percentages of Cocoa. Line them up from the highest to the darkest white chocolate first (which has no cocoa in it at all) followed by milk chocolate than family dark chocolate chocolate should be eaten lightest to darkest based on the amount of cocoa in each one cocoa flavor is quite concentrated so starting with the dark chocolate could overpower your taste buds.

Now you're ready to begin the actual tasting. Pick up the first chocolate. Observe it as you would a work of fine art taking the time to examine its beauty and perfection this step should last somewhere from 10 to 20 seconds the appreciation of the ink encounter should cause your savory glands to start working which helps you to taste the chocolate more fully.

Because chocolate starts to melt at 94°F this step also begins the melting process which helps release the aromas into the air gently wave the chocolate before your nose as you inhale the many tantalizing aromas. 90% of everything you taste comes from your sense of smell, so if you skip this step you'll miss considerable part of the experience.

Slowly placed the chocolate on your tongue allowing your lips to sense the gentle softness of the chocolate texture. Let it sit in your mouth a few seconds and begin to melt on your tongue as you start to choose swirl the chocolate around the entire mouth.

The idea is to allow all your mouth to experience the chocolate. Some research claims that the time has for sounds of taste buds salt, sour, bitter and sweet so, the chocolate will simulate unique flavor senses in each zone. Yet more recent research suggests that the entire tounge taste most of the flavors and there is taste buds on the soft palate and upper epiglottis as well. Why take chances though swirled the chocolate around for your own benefit zone or no zones chocolate has more than four flavor compounds Once you slow down and focus you'll start to notice more of them.

Continue chewing as you swirl but, not swallow just yet. Take a moment to press the chocolate into the roof of your mouth, savoring one last moment the melting and flavor euphoria. Once you've completed that step, you can at last swallow.

Before indulging in your next chocolate rinse your mouth thoroughly with water, tea or wine in preparation for your palate for the next unique experience. Be prepared for a wide variety of flavors such as spice, peppers, mango, pineapple, raspberry, cream, espresso, blueberry, lavender, almond, coffee and even tobacco. As your palate develops you will be able to identify beans by (single origin ) country based on their flavors. In general for each country Africa, Asia, Caribbean, Mexico/ Central America and South America.

I guess in part rather than saying "slow down and smell the flowers", I say "slow down and taste your chocolate"

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