Yesterday was a quite lovely afternoon. I went with my friend Lydia and Brentan to the open house at the Taza chocolate factory in Somerville and went on a tour of their factory. It was very cool, and although I've been to a brewery, a winery, and a tea factory, making organic chocolate is a bit different. And it was a smaller place, where they still do a lot of the work by hand--including wrapping all of the chocolate. The chocolate is all made in a traditional way, stone ground, and it is all dark chocolate, they don't use any milk! And quite delicious. Our tour guide explained that they don't conch the cocoa beans which makes their chocolate have a nice, authentic texture. Oh yum, I'm just remembering it so well, I want to eat some of the chocolate I bought! They sell their chocolate all over the Boston area, and I would recommend trying it if you never have. It's all made locally at thier cool factory!After the tour, and tasting more chocolate, we went upstairs to visit Albertine Press, a cute little letterpress printing shop, which is in the same building. They had about 7-8 letterpress machines, and did a little demo on how they work. Very cool. I love the aestheic of letterpress, and it was so cool seeing it in action. It makes me want to become a printer. So how much do you think a letterpress machine costs? I bought a cute card that I can use soon!
A lovely review! Please keep posting.
ReplyDeleteYou used the word "conch" in reference to cocoa beans. Is that a typo, or a term used in processing?
Hello!
ReplyDeleteConching is a process that most chocolate makers use to give the chocolate a silky texture. I'm not exactly sure how it works, but it basically grinds the chocolate more and makes it really smooth. The cool thing about the Taza chocolate is that it is kinda gritty.