Photo Courtesy of Thompson Poole Photography

Wine, food, and chocolate – the sweet indulgences of life. Join us this spring at one of our upcoming tasting events.

Saturday, April 21
Chocolate Tasting
2pm – 4pm
Driftwood, TX at Salt Lick Cellars

Saturday, April 28
Austin Food & Wine Festival – Grand Tasting Pavilion
11am – 1:30pm and 4:15pm – 5:45pm
Austin, TX at Auditorium Shores

Sunday, April 29
Austin Food & Wine Festival – Grand Tasting Pavilion
1:15pm – 4pm
Austin, TX at Auditorium Shores

Saturday, May 5
Lavender Fest
10am – 6pm
Stonewall, TX at Becker Vineyard

Thursday, May 10
Farm to Plate benefiting The Sustainable Food Center of Austin
6:30pm – 9:30pm
Austin, TX at Barr Mansion

The name “truffle” is French, and means “a small mushroom.” These chocolate delights were given this name because of their resemblance to the luxurious fungus found in the French Perigord region and the Piedmont area of Italy.

A chocolate truffle is a confection made of a round ganache center, often flavored, and typically covered with a thin, hard shell of milk, dark or white chocolate. Ganache is a velvety smooth combination of solid chocolate and cream. When cooked at just the right temperature, the chocolate cream mixture cools to form a rich and firm ganache with an intense & luxurious chocolate flavor.

Like the original truffle, chocolate truffles have become synonymous with luxury, as well as a sumptuous taste experience.

Legend states that the chocolate truffle was created in the kitchen of French culinary giant Auguste Escoffier during the 1920s. One day, when his stagiaire (apprentice) attempted to make pastry cream, he accidentally poured hot cream into a bowl of chocolate chunks rather than in the bowl of sugared eggs. As the mixture cooled, he found that he could work the chocolate mixture with his hands to form bumpy, lopsided balls. After rolling the new creation in cocoa powder, he was struck by their resemblance to the small mushrooms which grew wild in the French forests. Thus, the truffle was born.

The chocolate truffle quickly became populate throughout Europe, North America, and the Far East, each area creating its own variation, recipe, & method. Since that time, the French chocolate truffles have come to represent the finest and most luxurious chocolates available.

Delysia Chocolatier’s truffles are handmade in the traditional process of that created in Auguste’s kitchen over 90 years ago. Our truffles are handmade, each created with the utmost care and attention to detail. We use the finest quality chocolate and the freshest ingredients so you can enjoy truffles near perfection.

Easter Basket Cupcakes

1 dozen cupcakes
1 bag jelly beans
2 cups white icing
Sweetened coconut, colored with green food coloring
White pipe cleaner or red licorice
Colored ribbon(s)

1. First, frost the cupcakes with white icing. Bend a pipe cleaner or a piece of red licorice into an arch and push the ends into the sides of each cupcake.
2. Shake the shredded coconut in a stainless steel bowl. Sprinkle on food coloring bit by bit, mixing vigorously to distribute the color.
3. Place a pinch of shredded coconut on each iced cupcake. Now place three jelly beans on the “nest” of coconut.
4. Tie a small ribbon bow on the pipe cleaner or licorice handle at a jaunty angle.
5. Put one cupcake basket by each place setting at Easter brunch or give them as gifts.

Melted Crayon Eggs

White eggs
Tongs
Empty egg carton
Crayons




1. Hard-boil white eggs. Remove them from the hot water with tongs or a slotted spoon, dry them, and rest them in an empty egg carton or on plastic bottle caps (an adult’s job).
2. Color them with the crayons’ tips or remove the paper coverings and use the crayons’ sides. For a speckled effect, grate a crayon and sprinkle the bits over the eggs. The waxy eggs are very slippery, so take care when turning them to color the underside.
3. When you’re done coloring, leave them to dry for about an hour.

Egg Scramble

1. To set up, first select one person to start off as the Bunny. The remaining players are the Eggs, who quietly (so the Bunny doesn’t overhear) each select an everyday color for themselves.
2. Next, decide on a home base for the Eggs, a starting point for the Bunny (about 10 to 15 feet away from the Eggs’ home base), and a round-trip course for the players to run, such as to a tree and back or once around the house. Have the Bunny and the Eggs gather at their starting points.
3. To play, the Bunny begins calling out colors. As soon as he calls a player’s color, that Egg takes off through the course, with the Bunny in pursuit. If the Bunny manages to tag the Egg before she can make it back to her home base, the players swap places and the Eggs all select new hues. If not, the Bunny tries again with another color.

Who knows, taking part in one (or all) of these activities may just bring out the kid you, helping you to rediscover the joy of simplicity, wonder and excitement. Happy Easter!

Spicy Smoothie

1 cup yogurt
1 tsp chopped fresh ginger
1 medium banana
1 tsp ground cardamom
1 TBS honey
1 TBS cocoa powder
3 TBS water (to cover)

Combine all of the ingredients in a blender. Mix on medium speed for one minute.

Raspberries with Yogurt and Chocolate

Fresh raspberries
Low-fat raspberry or chocolate yogurt
Dark chocolate bar

Spoon a serving of the yogurt of your choice into a bowl. Top with the raspberries. Grate the dark chocolate on top to garnish.

Rich Chocolate Banana Smoothie

2 bananas (frozen is better)
1 TBS cocoa powder
1-2 tsp maple syrup or honey
Milk (to cover)

Combine all ingredients in a blender, and blend until smooth.

Tip: When choosing cocoa powder and/or a dark chocolate bar, look for options that are natural, contain few ingredients, and whose first ingredient is chocolate. Doing this will provide more flavor and health benefits to your dessert!

718 W. 29th St.
Austin, TX 78705
(512) 474-6679

www.breedandco.com

Springtime goodies for instant happiness. Our Easter Truffle Collection includes peanut butter, white chocolate, and marshmallow.

Our Easter Truffle Collection is available on our Online Shop.

1209 East 11th Street
Austin, TX 78702
(512) 628-0168
www.hillsidefarmacy.com

211 Mercer Street
Dripping Springs, TX 78620
(512) 858-9463
www.drippinwine.com

Image Courtesy of Thompson Poole Photography

It doesn’t look like chocolate, it doesn’t taste like chocolate, yet its name leads us to presume that it is chocolate. We naturally accept that this must be the case, because that’s what it has always been called.

But is white chocolate really chocolate?

Technically, the answer is no. In order for a product to be “chocolate” it must contain chocolate liquor (or cocoa solids). Even though white chocolate doesn’t contain this, it does have a connection to the cacao bean. This connection is found in one of white chocolate’s main ingredients, cocoa butter, and is probably the reason for allowance of the word chocolate in its name.

When making chocolate the following occurs:

1. Cacao beans are shelled and roasted.
2. The core is ground into a paste, which is chocolate liquor.
3. Chocolate liquor is the base of all chocolate products, and it is treated differently depending on its intended use.

o When processing it for cocoa butter it is refined to a very small size
o When processing it for chocolate products the size can be a little larger

Since the focus here is on white chocolate and cocoa butter, the next steps for regular chocolate aren’t of much concern; however, the final step in making cocoa butter for white chocolate is:

4. A certain percentage of cocoa butter is removed from the chocolate liquor, and this can be kept in liquid or molded form.

Cocoa butter can then be mixed with milk, sugar, and some additional flavors, and the resulting product is white chocolate.

Despite white chocolate’s lack of cocoa solids, it is capable of being used and treated as regular chocolate – Delysia Chocolatier’s white chocolate truffles, bark, and molded chocolate are but a few examples.

So just because white chocolate isn’t technically chocolate, who says it can’t be enjoyed as if it were?

Delysia Chocolatier has been invited by Ask.com to be featured at their SXSW SugarRush Lounge at the Courtyard Marriott Downtown Hotel. We will be there today from 4pm to 5pm.

SXSW badge holders visiting the SugarRush Lounge will be encouraged to tweet a vote for their favorite dessert by simply using the hashtag #AskSugarRush. For badge holders not on Twitter, they will be able to vote for Delysia at the event. Out of Austin’s top ten dessert vendors, including Delysia, that will be showcased at the SugarRush Lounge this weekend, there will be one winner based on Twitter and event votes. The winner with the most votes will receive a full page ad promoting its business and dessert in the Austin American Statesman.

Delysia is very excited about the opportunity to be featured in the Ask SugarRush Lounge, and we look forward to connecting with you on Saturday! Please remember to vote for Delysia after stopping by our table to enjoy a taste of one of our Handmade Chocolate Truffles.

Our truffles are made in the traditional Parisian style, each preservative-free with no mass production. We use fine quality chocolate and only the freshest ingredients so you can enjoy truffles near perfection. A few of the truffles being featured at the SugarRush Lounge include:

• Cigar Truffle
  Robust, aromatic, and settling, this award winning truffle (1st place at the Texas Chocolate Festival) creates a taste of bittersweet chocolate with a delayed smoky, tingling finish.

• Wasabi Raspberry Truffle
  Spicy but sweet, this two-time award winning truffle (1st place at the Texas Chocolate Festival) has a taste of the sweetness of the raspberry chocolate on the start and quickly changes to a slight burn on the finish from the wasabi.

• ‘The Salt Lick’ Habanero BBQ Sauce Truffle
  The taste of Salt Lick BBQ enrobed in chocolate, we take The Salt Lick BBQ’s world famous habanero BBQ sauce and blend it with a 60% dark chocolate ganache.

• Cabernet Sauvignon Truffle
  Fruitful austerity, our award winning Cabernet Sauvignon truffle (1st place at the Texas Chocolate Festival) features Becker Vineyards Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon blended with 60% dark chocolate and dried cherries for added texture.

• Sweet Tea Vodka with Orange Peel White Chocolate Truffle
  Richly complex and heavily sweet, we blend Deep Eddy’s Sweet Tea Vodka with white chocolate spiked with orange peel – a perfectly sweet and refreshing truffle for a hot Austin day.

• Firecracker Truffle
  Explosive and spicy hot, this special truffle has been created especially for the SugarRush Lounge and is inspired by Austin’s music scene. This truffle takes our best selling cayenne truffle and adds the complexity of pop rocks. Experience the essence of Austin as you taste the dark chocolate, slowly sense the popping sensation of pop rocks, and finish with the delayed burn of cayenne.