Jennifer Hemmerdinger, Multimedia Communicator
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Resume
  • Clips
  • Photography
  • Video/Audio
  • About
  • Contact

TCHO and Ghiradelli, My First San Francisco Experience

3/19/2013

0 Comments

 
Picture
Sea Salt Caramel Hot Cocoa at Ghiradelli
Who doesn't love chocolate? Nearly all of us do and if you tell me otherwise...well I think you have to be lying. 

This past weekend I had the opportunity to be in San Francisco, California. It was my first trip ever to California so it was very exciting. As I always do when I travel, I like to embrace the local culture and people as much as possible. 

One thing that is hard to miss in San Francisco are the Ghiradelli cafes. The cafe is simply the best combination of a chocolate store and ice cream bar. If you don't believe me, take a peak at their menu here. Who can't resist a sea salt caramel hot cocoa? I know I couldn't. So I decided to take a rest and enjoy some time in the chocolate store. 

Not only did I have the sea salt caramel hot cocoa, which is amazing by the way, I also indulged in some Ghiradelli Rocky Road ice cream. It was quite possibly the most heavenly 30 minutes of my day. And of course I couldn't leave the story without some goodies for the road. Fortunately, they had a "buy three, get one free" deal on their chocolate bars. You just can't have enough chocolate. 

But before I made it to Ghiradelli I really wanted to take a tour of a chocolate factory. I had my eyes set on a Ghiradelli factory tour but quickly found out that it has been closed for quite some time. 

A suggestion from a friend led me to TCHO, the organic "new American" chocolate company, located at Pier 17. I was able to get on the 2 p.m. free factory tour. 

The tour was led by a young woman who talked for nearly 40 minutes about the history of the company including how their chocolate is made. The group of about 30 watched several videos and was able to touch some of the coca beans. 

The actual tour of the factory is short and if they are in production mode (which they were when I was there) it can be very loud. Nonetheless, I was able to see chocolate spewing from pipes in the ceilings all the way through to the bars being individually wrapped. Yes, that's right, they individually wrap their chocolate bars. 

TCHO is about obsession--whether that's making a better world, making the best chocolate or innovating--that is their tagline. And they are unique. Just their name comes from the phonetic spelling for the first syllable of chocolate.

They market their products as fair trade, organic and ones based on pure flavors of cacao. 

Once the nearly hour long tour/lecture was completed it was chocolate tasting time! As someone who hasn't had the opportunity to taste chocolate as a chocolatier would, the sampling was quite different.

The group wraps around a large industrial size metal table where there are a half dozen different flavors of their chocolate. The tour guide told us the proper way to taste chocolate is through several steps and not just shoving it in your mouth.

First you need to heat it up in your hand. Then bring it to your ear and crack it in half to make sure it has that perfect crack. Bring the chocolate to your nose and smell it. Really drink it in. Finally, you can eat the chocolate but it's best to suck on it to really taste all of the flavors instead of rapidly chewing it. 

That may seem like a lot of steps if you haven't eaten chocolate in such a way, but it was actually an interesting exercise and incorporated all of your senses. Give it a try. 

Once the tasting was done, it was time to shop! Beware, TCHO is not cheap, however if you do the tour you get a 10% discount. 

By the end of my San Francisco experience I had a bag full of TCHO and Ghiradelli to bring back to Washington, D.C., so that I could continue to enjoy the amazing chocolate. 
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Will Travel For Food 

    About Me

    I have been a vegetarian for more than two decades. I love to introduce new vegetarian foods and recipes to friends and family. If you have something fun to share please contact me.

    Instagram

    Archives

    February 2016
    July 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    November 2012
    October 2011
    May 2011
    February 2011
    September 2010
    August 2010
    July 2010
    May 2010
    February 2010
    December 2009
    November 2009
    October 2009

    Categories

    All
    Affordable Housing
    Aloo Dum
    Apartments
    Birthday
    Boston
    Boston Vegan Association
    Boston Vegetarian Food Festival
    British
    Brunch
    Canada
    Carbon Footprint
    Cheesecake
    Chocolate
    Christmas
    Commensal
    Country Life Vegetarian Buffet
    Couscous
    Cycling
    Daal
    Dc
    Dc Food Festival
    Dog Food
    Dupont Circle
    Expensive
    Falafel
    Food
    Food Festival
    Food Sampling
    Garlic
    Gluten-free
    Grocery List
    Healthy Living
    Holiday
    Holidays
    Hummus
    Indian
    Inspirational
    Italian Ministroni
    Jitterbeans
    Jobs
    John Strelecky
    Keene
    Kramer's Cafe
    Labor Market
    Le Vegetarien
    Lifestyle
    Light
    Local
    Low Fat
    Low-fat
    Magog
    Montreal
    Nashua Telegraph
    Nh
    Non-dairy Chocolate
    Obesity
    Pasta
    Peanut Butter
    Peanuts
    Quinoa
    Raita
    Recipes
    Refreshing
    Restaurant Review
    Restaurants
    Samples
    San Francisco
    Smoothie
    Soy
    Spiced Vegetables
    Spicy
    Strawberry Soup
    Subs
    Summer
    Sunday Brunch
    Sweets
    Thanksgiving
    Tofu
    Tofu Turkey
    Trader Joes
    Trader Joe\'s
    Treats
    Vegan
    Vegan Desserts
    Vegan Potluck Dinner
    Vegans
    Vegan Treats
    Vegetarian
    Vegetarian Buffet
    Vegetarian Cookbook
    Vendors
    Washington
    Whole Foods

    RSS Feed

✕