It makes us happy, it makes us fat. Well, not if you eat it properly.. Haha.
It seduces us and reduces us to behaving like children in a sweet shop!
It can even, according to the BMJ, lower blood pressure and reduce the risk of heart disease and strokes.
So rejoice, all fellow lovers of the cocoa beans!
Many have told us:
Once you taste GODIVA chocolate, you know that it’s delicious. For real.
We agreed 🙂
GODIVA, a name that embodied the timeless qualities of passion, style, sensuality and modern boldness. Named after Lady Godiva by the chocolatier, with great legends, a lady on the horseback. It’s on their logo if you noticed, this is well-known as one of the creators of the world’s most elegant, hand-crafted chocolates, originated in Brussels, Belgium.
“To us, chocolate making is a real art. It starts with the most precious ingredient – the cocoa bean, which grows on trees in large cocoa pods.” – GODIVA Chocolatier
Established since 1926 in Brussels by Joseph Draps, GODIVA Chocolatier has become one of the most prestigious chocolate brands in the world. The recipes of their founder and unique chocolate making process remain the secret of GODIVA superior quality, leading to GODIVA’s appointment as the official supplier to the Royal Court of Belgium!
For over 80 years, from New York to Hong Kong, GODIVA Chocolatier has been bringing the best of Belgium to the world. It was really an honour & delight to join GODIVA’s very own Chef Philippe Daue, GODIVA’s Chef Chocolatier – Pacific Rim & China for a unique Chocolate School Session!
Before the class begins, Chef Philippe was telling us about the real way of savouring your chocolate, instead of just popping them into your mouth and munch them in quick seconds. Else, any great chocolate would be a waste!
Do you know the ways of “Savouring Fine Chocolate”? asked Chef Philippe. Here’s how:
1. See – Observe the packaging. Good qualiy chocolate will be packaged with great quality material. The bar should have a radiant and consistent gloss, without white or grey marks. The colour should be appealing
2. Hear – Break the piece in half. It should resonate with a resounding and satisfying “Snap!” and exhibit a fine gradient along the broken edge
3. Smell – Smell especially at the break point. There should be a strong, intense and pleasant cocoa aroma. If the chocolate or the room is too cold, lightly rub the chocolate with the fingers to release all aromas.
4. Taste – Place the chocolate on the tongue. Let it melt. Chew it only to break it into small enough pieces that it begins to melt on its own. This allow the cocoa butter to evenly distribute in the mouth which mutes any bitterness in the chocolate.
As the chocolate melts, concentrate on the flavours that are enveloping your tongue. Melting will release more volatile compounds for you to smell. Close your eyes, enjoying this moment of bliss, and bask in contentment 🙂
After that, Chef Philippe demonstrated on how to make our own Chocolate Truffles!
And we were led to our respective work stations to make our own with guidances from the chefs 🙂
Dried fruits and nuts for decorations
Fun times with chocolate begins!
Here’s Chris and his melted chocolate 🙂
Time to fill in the mould – first step of truffles making
Fatboybakes – the pro baker in action! 🙂
My turn! My turn!
Truffles Collection – the utmost sensation of smoothness and crunchiness.
FYI, truffles are traditionally made with a chocolate ganache centre coated in chocolate, icing sugar, cocoa powder or chopped toasted nuts. This time we coated ours with toasted nuts for the extra crunch.
Here’s the simple steps of Godiva Chocolate taking Shape!
- Melting the chocolate
- Tempering the chocolate
- Melting the chocolate shells in
- Filling with Godiva ganaches
- Closing the shells
- De-molding the chocolate pralines
- Decorating the Godiva pralines
- Enjoying your creation!
These may look and sounds easy, but each steps of chocolate creation requires a lot of patience. And knocking. Haha! As we were told that most of the time will be spent on knocking out the excess bubbles/ air so that a perfect praline could be formed.
Piping in GODIVA ganache into the coated mould
Perfect pralines knocked out from the moulds
Time to coat them with toasted nuts! Hello Chef Chris 🙂
We were also taught how to make simple chocolate disc with the choco pipes that we filled and decorate them with dried fruits & nuts.
As the workshop finishes, Godiva surprised us with a gift to take home with us as well.
Their GODIVA Chocolate Gold Collection: a colourful palette loaded with five most loved GODIVA chocolate ingredients: hazelnut pralinés, ganaches, carrés, caramels and nuts chocolate series. Love them all!
Through this GODIVA Chocolate School Session, we’ve learnt to appreciate chocolate more and after all the steps we’ve been through with Chef Philippe, we somehow thought chocolate tasted yummier than ever with GODIVA!
Go get your chocolates from GODIVA from their existing retail outlet.
For more info, please visit: http://www.godiva.my/
