I really like sweets and try to incorporate things that are sweet into every facet of my life. I do a lot of events for my clients at my main gig, and sweets and chocolate often make their way into my client work in one way or another. So this past weekend, I was at an event that I organized for one of my clients, English tea boutique Whittard of Chelsea, that featured desserts made with Whittard's green teas. The recipes were developed especially for the event by the pastry chef at Boston's revered South End Buttery.

Lee Napoli, the Buttery's pastry chef, was kind enough to supply the event attendees with all of the recipes for the green tea dessert menu that she created. The Green Earl Grey truffles were really fabulous, and demonstrate a concept in truffle-making that can be replicated with many different kinds of flavors and interesting ingredients. Here's the recipe that she gave me for the truffles:

Green Earl Grey Truffles

• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 cup Whittard Green Earl Grey tea leaves
• 1 pound chopped dark chocolate
• cocoa powder

Place tea leaves and heavy cream in a medium saucepan. Scald heavy cream and tea. Remove from heat and cover with plastic wrap. Let the tea steep in the cream for 30 minutes. Strain out tea leaves and rescald cream. Pour hot mixture over chocolate and whisk until chocolate is fully melted and smooth. Chill chocolate mixture to set.

Scoop chocolate mixture with teaspoon or mini ice cream scoop. Roll each scoop in cocoa to finish.

A quick note on scalding: Scalding is when you heat a liquid - most often milk or cream - until it almost boils. Here's the best practice for scalding from my own experience: Use cream that's at room temperature or close to room temperature to minimize the potential for burning (big temperature differences will give you a higher chance of burning). Use low to medium low heat and stir pretty much constantly. The cream is scalded once small bubbles appear at the edges of the surface.

Steeping the tea in the cream is a flavor infusion method that can be used as the basis for lots of fun experimentation in truffle-making. The recipe above uses Earl Grey green tea, but you can infuse many different flavors into your truffle ganache by steeping the raw ingredients in the cream as it scalds. Here are a few of the ingredients that I've infused this way:

• black tea
  
• lavender
  
• apples (but this one's tricky, because the acidity of the apples can curdle the cream if the apples are too tart, or if the cream is heated too quickly.)
  
• cardamom pods
  
• coffee beans
  
• dried chili peppers and cinnamon bark
  
• vanilla beans
  

Recipe above provided by Lee Napoli of the South End Buttery.

Pairing red wines and pure dark chocolate can be tricky – in general, I’ve found that big, medium to full-bodied, jammy reds work well, while tart, light-bodied reds do not (though there are always exceptions). Even before you taste, you can often pick out a red that will go well with chocolate purely by smell. Sweet aromas of ripe, sweet fruits such as cherries and raspberries as well as rich aromas of cocoa, black plums, and dried figs are tell-tale signs of good pairing potential.

These past few months I've had the great pleasure of working with Belgium's Cote d'Or to develop some interesting wine and spirit pairings for their Experiences line and their Petits. It's been quite an enlightening task thus far. My favorite bar in the Cote d'Or line is the Noir 70%. Here are a some tasting notes for the Noir 70% as well as a Shiraz and a Zinfandel blend that make extremely interesting pairings:

Cote d'Or Noir 70%: A real asset to the Cote d'Or line, this 70% is nicely-balanced with a smooth, even texture, a strong snap, and aromas of red fruits that open into flavors of raspberries and cherries as the chocolate melts.

2005 Three Valleys Zinfandel/Sonoma County

2004 Brokenwood Rayner Vineyard Shiraz

Chocolate is an interesting and intricate as wine - if not more so. Fully tasting chocolate requires a bit of patience and concentration; for best results, expect to tap into all 5 senses. Today I found an excellent 13 step guide to tasting chocolate at wikiHow.

Just to give you an idea of how detailed this guide is, you don't actually put the chocolate into your mouth until step 9:

9. Place the chocolate on the tongue and allow it to arrive at body temperature. Let it melt. This step is crucial, for it allows the cocoa butter to distribute evenly in the mouth, which mutes any astringencies or bitterness in the chocolate.

10. Observe the taste and texture. As the chocolate melts, concentrate on the flavors that are enveloping your tongue. Melting will release more volatile compounds for you to smell. Close your eyes, take notes, enjoy this moment of bliss, and bask in contentment. Texture can be the most obvious clue about the quality of a chocolate. Low quality chocolates will have a grainy almost cement like texture. Revisit when the time comes. Link.

I find that chocolate tasting is all about the experience. The point is not to do it 'right,' but to enjoy it, experience it in a whole different way, and to learn something new.

I used to teach a fabulous class called "Crafting with Chocolate." Seems like Tasty Show readers are really into chocolate sculpture, so I've decided to post my in-depth directions on how to make a gorgeous marbled chocolate box - that is, a box made of solid chocolate.

Download Chocolate Sculpture Directions
Download Tempering Chocolate Directions

So, the above instructions deal specifically with sculptured chocolate boxes, but here's the secret: the same sculpting principles can be used with other designs as well.

And finally, email me pics of your sculptures and I'll post them!