April 2019 - Dark Matters Chocolate Reviews

For years I have enjoyed both baking, creating recipes and watching cooking shows especially if the show included chocolate recipes. As the instructions for the recipes often go “use good quality 70% chocolate” and as a viewer I would be all “ohhh chocolate!”. Nowadays after reviewing hundreds of craft chocolate bars I am left thinking “Yes, but what chocolate and why only 70%?”. Sure, 70% helps standardize recipes with viewers and readers are easily able to locate 70% chocolate to bake with, but thanks to the continuing rise of craft chocolate/specialty chocolate now there is a larger variety of high-quality, single-origin and varied percentages chocolate out there to work with. Many makers now have both their own craft chocolate baking items for both home bakers and professionals to purchase which is elevating baking to another level.

A huge thank you to Jael Rattigan of French Broad Chocolate, Sam Maruta of Marou Chocolate, Lawren Askinosie of Askinosie Chocolate, Joanna Brennan of Pump Street Bakery and Pump Street Chocolate, chocolatier Steph Shafer of Bella Sophia Chocolates, Mackenzie Rivers of Map Chocolate, Lauren Heineck of WKND Chocolate and Well Tempered Podcast and chef Caroline Schiff of ParadigmSchiff for sharing their time, expertise and experience in regards to the topics involved with craft chocolate products and baking.

Over the next couple of blog posts we will take a look at a wide variety of baking with craft chocolate topics including the ways single-origin craft chocolate affects recipe creation and existing recipes, inspiration for products, product lines, obstacles for getting bakers/chefs to use craft chocolate, the enjoyment of baking with craft/specialty chocolate, where makers would like to see craft chocolate baking evolve to in the future and more!

(Be sure to check out the Maison Marou Brownie recipe at the end of this post). Continue reading “Baking with Craft Chocolate Part 1”

Paul John Kearins is both a chocolatier and pastry chef, and if you follow his Instagram stories (you know who you are!) he is a bit of a comedian as well. Paul works at the Purple Feather Cafe in Provincetown and runs his own chocolate business, Chocolatasm. (Let’s just say you “need” his buttermilk bonbons in your life! One of my personal favorite bonbons of all time!).

I’ve actually been wanting to interview Paul for almost a year and a half, but the timing never seemed right until now. Good people are worth the wait and what a pleasure it’s been to interview Paul officially after our long-time online/direct message interactions!

Did I mention Paul uses craft chocolate in his bonbons and bars? Find out how he started using craft chocolate in his creations, tips on pairing chocolate with wine, how a growing social media following impacts his life and more in my interview with a true flavor master, Paul John Kearins.

Paul John Kearins of Chocolatasm

Victoria Cooksey: What is your first memory of chocolate?

Paul John Kearins: My first memory of chocolate was an Easter egg I received as a small child. It was a milk chocolate egg filled with chocolate buttons and I remember there being the smell of the carton and the chocolate combined. I can conjure that nostalgia just by thinking about it. The carton revealed part of the Easter egg wrapped in deep purple foil and I remember opening the foil ever so gently and eating the buttons and then reassembling the two halves of the egg and re-wrapping it in the foil. I guess I didn’t want the magic to end and that is something I still have to some degree. Continue reading “Interview with Paul John Kearins of Chocolatasm”