Clients are getting a taste for the technique of being smeared liberally in the stuff. And while eating chocolate to excess can have an unwelcome effect on the skin, beauty experts here say external application can work wonders. The locals call it chocolate therapy, a treatment if you like. It brings fantastic results.

The secret, the experts say, is in the purported anti-ageing properties of the chocolate. It's said to be particularly good for conditions like dry skin. Tanvi, chocolate therapy client, saying: "I love chocolate. What better could I ask for than a chocolate pedicure. I think everyone should have a chocolate pedicure because at the end of the day it feels awesome, as in, before my skin feels like it was really dry and now I can feel the difference already."

The big question is - what happens to the chocolate once it's been used. You never know, there could be quite an appetite for recycling.

It's a hot trend in both cooking and in food products. It's a taste Americans have gotten used to and they're now enjoying that combination. Among the many renditions of the fad: Earth & Vine Provisions' $7 papaya orange habanero preserves; fruity salsas like D.L. Jardine's peach-, pineapple-, raspberry- and mango-flavored varieties for $6 a pop; Dufour Pastry Kitchens' crispy pomegranate pastry with roasted red peppers; and savory peanut snacks with a sweet touch, like Buffalo Bill's sweet Cajun peanut mix and The Peanut Roaster's lemon lime almonds .

The gourmet chocolate industry began tapping into the very same idea with fervor at least two years ago and continues to do so, infusing chocolates dark and light with fiery spices like chili, pepper, wasabi, cardamom and cumin. It probably satisfies people a little bit more. Sometimes when you want something to snack on, you don't know if you're [craving] sweet or spicy. This way both urges are fulfilled in one shot. Along similar lines are products like jams, dressings, cookies and sorbets incorporating exotic citrus fruits that are sugary and sour at the same time. Among the favorite flavors: blood orange, key lime and clementine.

This year's NASFT winner for outstanding dessert was a blood-orange sorbet by Ciao Bella Gelato Co. Key lime has popped up not only in cookies, cakes and chocolates but in dessert sauces and even salad dressing. Another sexy taste that has proven its staying power, in part because of all the buzz about its high-antioxidant content and heart-health benefits: pomegranate — in everything from juices and flavored waters to dressings and grilling sauces.

Also big: sparkling juices made from the fruit, like a new one from Kristian Regale, as well as other drinks and eats.
Nabisco may have introduced Fig Newton cookies decades ago and gourmet restaurants have been experimenting with the fruit for years, but now interest in other "fig"-ments of the imagination is spiking. Bonne Maman's latest offering to the jam-and-jelly world is fig preserves, and the company says people are using it enthusiastically, in more than just Christmas pudding.

The company says fig jams are the fastest-growing segment of the preserves market, and attributes the upswing to exposure in restaurants and on cooking shows like those on the Food Network. Still ballooning is the organic and all-natural market. Supermarket chains like Whole Foods Market, Trader Joe's and Wild Oats are booming, as are smaller, regional gourmet groceries — driving more mainstream chains like Safeway to launch a set of organic "Lifestyle" stores to compete. Other businesses — including Wal-Mart, Costco, drugstores, card shops and even gas-station convenience stores — are investing more in organic and other specialty food product lines too.

A new grain that's been isolated and trademarked as Salba to make Salba Smart chips that taste a lot like the regular tortilla sort but are touted as having healthier elements like Omega-3 and flax.

Cheeses continue to be a burgeoning area, with market growth at 27 percent between 2003 and 2005. Sheep's milk and blue are in the cheesy popular crowd at the moment. Others imported from Egypt and across the Middle East are edging their way into dairy aisles and onto restaurant menus, too, particularly the creamy or mild types. To go with your cheese, you might want to brew a cuppa instead of pouring a glass-a, because there are almost as many exotic teas out there as there are cheeses.

Indian food also keeps gaining ground year after year, again because of the E word ... exposure. The fascination with Indian culture and Bollywood doesn't hurt either. And Middle Eastern eats are becoming a bit more mainstream, beyond hummus and falafel. Indian is a very big, growing category because it's a healthy cuisine, particularly for people who are vegetarian, that still gives you a lot of flavor and taste.

All this fancy schmancy stuff is fine, but does the average American really buy into it or care? There is some research suggesting that in fact "Joe" does, at least moderately: Specialty food — defined by the industry as that of high quality and limited quantity — comprises 8.2 percent of all food sold in the U.S. and is currently a $34.77 billion industry, according to NASFT.

Large urban markets aren't the only regions to snap up sophisticated treats. Smaller affluent cities like Austin, Texas, and Des Moines, Iowa, as well as plenty of suburban neighborhoods, have jumped aboard too.

If you don't like drinking your tea out of a bottle, there's good news. POM's iced teas are not only refreshing and delicious, but come packaged in 13.5-ounce glass tumblers, which are reusable. They also have secure snap-on lids so they are ready to enjoy anywhere. Add that to the antioxidant factor and you have a real winner.

And while the product is completely portable, the selection of exotic blends are just as impressive. There wasn't a miss in the bunch. These teas are a real treat. POM Pomegranate teas can be found in most grocery stores as well as in Whole Food Markets and Wild Oats, along with some area convenience stores.

Unilever, the company behind Wall's, Magnum and Carte Dor, has submitted an application to produce the protein using GM technology. The Food Standards Agency is consulting on whether to allow the technology, which is already approved in the US. The eel-like pout fish lives at the bottom of the North Atlantic and is able to survive extremely low temperatures, due to a naturally occurring protein in its blood called an ice-structuring protein.

These proteins which can be found in fish, plants and insects protect organisms from tissue damage in very cold conditions by lowering the temperature at which ice crystals grow and by changing the size and shape of the ice crystals. But rather than extracting the protein from the fish - which Unilever said would be "not sustainable or economically feasible" - the company has developed a way of making the protein in the factory.

The process uses genetically modified yeast to make the protein in large sealed vats. The genetically modifed yeast is already used in the production of some other foods including cheese. No genetically modified material would be present in the final product, Unilever stresses in its application to the FSA and the level of the ice-structuring protein in the ice-cream will not account for more than 0.01% of the weight.

The manufacturing process has already been approved in some other countries including the US where it has been used to make ice-cream which has half the fat and 30% fewer calories than normal. Low-fat ice-cream could be made using GM technology An application to use the new technology has been lodged with the Food Standards Agency which is inviting comment. The FSA said the consultation period was open until 10 July.

"Before any new food product can be introduced on the European market, it must be rigorously assessed for safety. "In the UK, the assessment of novel foods is carried out by an independent committee of scientists appointed by the Food Standards Agency, the Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes (ACNFP)." Reprinted from the BBC

The ocean pout lives at the bottom of the sea

Experts say it may help lower blood pressure and even fight certain cancers, although the research is still preliminary. But beware those extra calories if you're swilling a daily dose. The near blood-red drink is cropping up all over, from chic cocktail lounges to humble neighborhood delis.

Sales of refrigerated pomegranate juice soared from zero in 2001 to more than $63 million in 2005, according to A.C. Nielsen, the market research firm. Moving beyond the martinis that appeared a few years back, the tart juice is now sold in blends, combined with everything from mango to lychee green tea.

At the Latimer Delicatessen near Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, four pomegranate blends rub bottles with lowbrow colas and sports drinks. Running from $2 to $4 a bottle, the pom is not cheap. The mover behind the juicy surge is Pom Wonderful, which helped create the U.S. market for the drink when its 6,000 acres of pomegranates started bearing fruit in 2002. Stewart and Lynda Resnick, owners of the Philadelphia area's Franklin Mint, also manage Pom Wonderful through their parent company, Roll International, based in Los Angeles.

Apparently, everyone already knows about antioxidants and wants to imbibe as much as possible, or at least Pom Wonderful's ad campaign makes it seem that way. For those feeling left out, antioxidants are natural substances in plants and foods that protect cells from marauding oxygen molecules called free radicals. Antioxidants stop free radicals from attacking LDL, or "bad" cholesterol, and combining with cells to form plaque that hardens arteries. By

Research has shown that people whose diets are rich in fruits and vegetables have a lower incidence of cardiovascular disease and certain cancers. A small, 19-person study by scientists at Israel's Rambam Medical Center in Haifa showed that pomegranate juice lowered systolic blood pressure, the upper reading, by 21 percent and prevented thickening of the arteries for the 10 subjects who drank about two ounces of pomegranate juice daily for up to three years. At least half a dozen other studies by the Israeli group and others show similar effects in mice and humans. Some were funded by a foundation run by the Resnicks, owners of Pom Wonderful.

Several studies also show that antioxidants in food may help prevent prostate cancer. One study of pomegranate juice, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences in 2005, found that it reduced tumor size by as much as half in mice. More research is needed to gauge the effects on humans.

Pomegranates pack more than five times the antioxidants of green tea, and are especially loaded with a potent type called polyphenols. Long-term studies of antioxidants also suggest that taking antioxidants in pill form is less effective than eating them in whole foods. "It's worth incorporating pomegranate juice into the diet on a regular basis as part of your armament to prevent chronic disease, and it's good for both men and women," said Lisa Hark, director of nutrition education at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

Hark said pomegranate juice and other antioxidant-rich foods should be part of a prevention arsenal, but they're not a cure. "I can't see pomegranate juice reversing heart disease - it's not going to break up plaque." And not all pom drinks pack the same antioxidant punch. For the biggest wallop, look for pomegranate high in the ingredient list or mixed with other antioxidant brews, such as green tea.

Hark also cautions that consumers should balance the healthful benefits of pomegranate juice against the calories it contains. One 16-ounce bottle of Pom Wonderful contains 320 calories - more than a Hershey's bar. Hark said drinking one bottle gives you the same calories you would get in more than five servings of fresh fruit. She recommends diluting the pure juice and drinking four ounces a day to save on cost and calories. Sparkling water makes a refreshing spritzer and won't add calories.

Pomegranates have a fabled history. In Greek mythology, when Persephone was tricked into eating six pomegranate seeds during a stint in Hades, she condemned Earth to six months of infertility each year, explaining the seasons. Many ancient foods now are getting reviewed. "We've rediscovered that food has medicinal qualities," said Ara DerMarderosian, a professor of medicinal chemistry at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia who has studied folk remedies for nearly half a century.

His group has studied medicinal effects of cranberries and blueberries and has turned to pomegranate juice. The scientist, who is first-generation Armenian, said he had been eating pomegranates for years and recommended eating the seeds whole from fresh fruit.

"My mother would labor over these for a long time when I was a kid, and then we kids would devour them in a minute," DerMarderosian said. Reprinted from Philly.com By Erika Engelhaupt For The Inquirer

That will show you that all talk of wine and food pairing isn’t hooey. Maybe no one believes in firm wine and food rules but there are still bad combinations that sour any palate and they often include sweets, especially chocolate.

Matching wines and chocolates is easy in some ways because the overriding principle is sweetness. In other wine-food matches, chefs and drinkers worry over acidity, fruitiness or oak. With chocolate and wine, sweetness rules. And only one element can win; if food is the sweeter, the wine loses. You can spoil the flavor of the wine. If the dessert is sweeter, the wine is sour.

Over the years a few wines, usually fortified, sweet and sparkling, have proven successful. Ports, muscats, rosi Champagnes and the sweet Banyuls of Provence manage to trump most chocolates. But not all. The secret is in knowing that chocolates have different levels of sweetness. Chocolate and wine can be a grand gourmet indulgence or fool’s gold for gourmands who want too much of two good things and spoil both. Consider it from the chocolate’s point of view and look for a wine that’s sweeter.

White chocolate: The less real chocolate, cocoa powder, butter and liquor, in a candy, the more sugar, so white chocolate is barely a chocolate at all and calls for the sweetest wines. Look for late harvest white wines, tawny port, Sauternes, muscats and moscatos, the richest sherries and other wines with high residual sugar.

Milk chocolate: America’s favorite chocolate is creamy and heavier on sugar than cocoa. Rieslings, muscats, lighter merlots and pinot noirs.

Dark and bittersweet chocolate (over 50 percent cocoa): These chocolates have minimal sugar, very earthy roasted tones and a concentrated fruit. Marsala, port and dark muscats work, but you can experiment with dry reds, especially cabernet sauvignon and zinfandel. This is one place where you should welcome the trend to overripe reds, picked with higher sugar that makes higher alcohol wines (more than 14 percent). Ultimately, they should work, because there’s always been a hint of chocolate and cocoa in some of the best reds, a richness that develops from the earthiness of the grapes, and aging in barrels and bottles.

Most often we want chocolate and wine. Matching them up is a delightful exercise that makes a great excuse for a party. Set out three or four wines and three or four grades of chocolate and let your guests experiment. If they don’t succeed, follow up with a sure winner: espresso.

The rhubarb plant is a perennial and may be cut in the spring through the fall. To ensure continued growth of the red stocks (vegetable), the flower and seed stalks should be cut soon after they have bloomed. Curiously enough, the upper part of the stock is considered poisonous until the flowering starts. The leaves themselves are always poisonous. To be on the safe side, wait until the plant has flowered before cutting it to use in desserts, and use the reddest part of the stock.

Thousands of years ago rhubarb was used for medical treatments. Medicine men of China prescribed rhubarb root to Empires for numerous ailments. It was considered a potent drug to be taken in great moderation. One ruler of China attempted to commit suicide by consuming large quantities of rhubarb.

Today it may be used as a laxative, in the treatment of jaundice, gastro and menstrual disorders, conjunctivitis, traumatic injuries, superficial superlative sores, and ulcers. It can also be applied externally to thermal burns. In addition, it aids in digestive activity from the first bite. Its strong tangy bitter attribute stimulates the taste buds and gives the oral cavity a sense of cleansing, preparing it to taste the anticipated food. The bottom line is that research indications that rhubarb has numerous health benefits.

Believe it or not, rhubarb has uses other than culinary and medical. It can be used to clean pots and pans, to create hair color for light or golden brown, as an insecticide, paint and paper. You may investigate these uses on your own, but most prefer to use rhubarb for desserts.

The tangy flavor of rhubarb allows it to be mixed with several other fruits. The traditional combination is strawberry and rhubarb. Other recipes combine mango with rhubarb. Just about any fruit would do well. The combinations are endless and worth a try.

Rhubarb Plant

Rhubarb Pie

Frozen ice creams and sorbets infused with herbs and spices are hot in restaurants from coast to coast. For at least a decade, top chefs have been piquing palates with frozen flavor combinations such as grapefruit-tarragon and cucumber-dill, and using them as both desserts and as elements of non-sweet courses, such as seared tuna drizzled with sesame oil and served with a tiny scoop of wasabi sorbet.

Even if you despise the idea of tuna and sorbet on the same plate, you can tap into the trend with an unusual flavor intended solely for dessert. The reason you should even bother is that some of these flavors are spectacular. Imagine the puckery sweetness of lime sorbet made from fresh-squeezed limes, spiked with a surprising note of grassy cilantro. The cilantro-lime sorbet is addictive. So is the plum sorbet with its warm undertone of spicy star anise, a Chinese spice that is sold whole -- they resemble little wooden stars -- in Asian food stores.

Green tea ice cream, a staple in Chinese and Japanese restaurants, is easy to make at home, too. You'll need to visit an Asian store for Japanese green tea powder. It's a strong instant version of green tea used by the Japanese to make both hot and iced tea.

Plum and Star Anise Sorbet

Chris, an eighth-grader from Broken Arrow's Centennial Middle School, sailed through the competition's first four rounds Wednesday but faltered in Round Five, which started shortly after noon Thursday and was aired on ESPN.
When he heard his first word of the day, Chris looked perplexed. He asked for a definition, which left him shaking his head. Then he asked for the language of origin. Finally, he asked whether the word could be pronounced any other ways.

When the pronouncer said no, Chris rolled his eyes, paused and gave it his best shot: T-I-R-O-N-I. The bell rang, signaling his mistake. Chris leaves Washington with a handful of attractive prizes. He came in 30th, along with 14 other spellers, and will walk away from the bee with $250. In addition, he'll receive a commemorative watch, a Webster's Third New International Dictionary on CD-ROM, plus a few other items, such as a T-shirt, a baseball cap and a duffel bag from Franklin Electronic Publishers.

For Krogh, a former farmer turned auctioneer and factory worker, the project is a way to keep a hand in agriculture. He is part of a small but growing number of Iowa entrepreneurs developing niche food products. Krogh, 47, first made corn cob jelly for an Exira High School assignment. His classmates kidded him when he carried a bucket of corn cobs to class, but he had the last laugh. Years later and no longer farming, he was looking for another source of income. He decided to make the jelly again after he was unable to find the product in local grocery stores. Relatives and friends who tasted Krogh's sweetened spread encouraged him to produce it for commercial sale.

He tapped the Food Processing Center at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, which runs a program that helps food entrepreneurs develop their ieas into marketable products. Krogh already had perfected his product. The University of Nebraska center helped him develop business and marketing plans. His parents, Charles and Charlotte Krogh of Exira, provided financial backing, and Frank Spillers, co-owner of Global Horizons Training and Consulting in Atlantic, helped Krogh develop the business.

Krogh uses red corn cobs, as well as white ones, to make jelly. He boils the cobs and uses extracted liquid to flavor and color the jelly. A 15-pound bag of cobs can yield enough extract for 150 8-ounce jars of jelly, he said.
The former farmer knows it will take time and patience to build the business, but he believes he has a unique product. Visit the DesMoines Register to read the full story.

The Three Rivers Wine Trail of Minnesota includes seven wineries and vineyards that wind from Chisago City down to Lake City, along the Mississippi, Cannon and St. Croix rivers. The promotional campaign is meant to trumpet the state's growing wine industry -- now with 19 wineries throughout the state -- and to convince tourists to make a day, or weekend, of traveling from winery to winery.

Collectively, the wineries are producing brochures to promote themselves as a trail, and will each have live music the weekend of June 10 and 11 as the official kickoff of the trail. Similar trails in other states have helped brand areas as wine regions, and spurred further tourism growth. See bizjournal.com for the full story.

The company is cultivating Internet sales and operating more gift shops during the Christmas season, when See's gets half its revenue. The drive follows a failed effort 30 years ago to put See's black-and-white-tiled stores in malls from St. Louis to Houston. After 85 years in business, See's still has more than three-quarters of its 200 stores in California.

Some publicity is helping grow the business. Talk show host Ellen DeGeneres featured See's products on her Valentine's Day program. The company also had a two-day spot on the Wheel of Fortune game show, with a year's supply of See's candy offered as a prize. See's is one of the top sellers of premium chocolate candy in the US. Gourmet chocolate sales surged 14 percent in the U.S. last year to $1.6 billion, compared with less than a 1 percent rise for all chocolate to $15.2 billion,

See's successful strategy has been to operate seasonal gift shops for six weeks during November and December, in more than 30 states from Washington to Maine to Florida. By setting up kiosks in malls, See's attracts holiday shoppers as well as boosting its brand recognition, helping Web and catalog sales. The company plans to open 100 Christmastime shops this year, an increase from 90 in 2005, and to add 10 every year. See's candy has been sold year-round since 2003 at Lord & Taylor department stores in cities including New York and Boston.

Their high oil content means that like bluefish, mackerel spoil quickly and should be used as soon as they are caught or bought. Keep them on ice. ``They need to be super-fresh," says Steve Johnson, owner of Rendezvous in Central Square, Cambridge, where mackerel fillets are added to a Spanish-style fish stew with chorizo, saffron, haddock, and littleneck clams. With their manageable size and quick cooking time, mackerel are great on the grill, says Johnson. Grilling sets off the rich, sweet flavor, which stands up well to tomatoes, mustard, or soy sauce. Mackerel is also popular served as sushi or sashimi in Japanese restaurants, where it's known as saba.
Look for mackerel, typically sold whole, in fish markets with a reputation for freshness. The fish is usually abundant offshore in late spring, but the recent cool weather has lowered water temperatures and kept the mackerel from swimming close to shore. The result is a lower supply and smaller fish than usual for this time of year. Reprinted from the Boston Globe, written by Leigh Belanger.

Previous research has shown that some nutrients in food aid in glucose release and increased blood flow, which may augment cognitive performance. The current findings provide support for nutrient release via chocolate consumption to enhance cognitive performance. See Yahoo News for the full story.

The most similar offering to the McDonald’s mainstay Egg McMuffin is the sausage, egg and cheddar sandwich served on a toasted English muffin. The fare gets fancier from there, with a peppered bacon, egg and cheddar sandwich, a turkey bacon sandwich made with cholesterol-free eggs and reduced-fat white cheddar cheese, the Black Forest ham, egg and cheddar sandwich and the Eggs Florentine with baby spinach and havarti cheese.

For McDonald’s Corp., which derives about a quarter of its sales at breakfast, the encroachment of Starbucks poses a real threat. Indeed, McDonald’s introduced the Egg McMuffin in 1973. McDonald’s already has been fighting back with the introduction of premium coffee earlier this year. The Oak Brook-based chain is also testing breakfast burritos in some markets. The new Starbucks breakfast sandwiches will be available next week in 126 Chicago-area Starbucks. More Starbucks in the area will be outfitted with ovens and will have the sandwiches by the end of February.

Chicago is the fifth city to get the warm sandwiches. Seattle, where Starbucks is based, Portland, Ore., Washington, D.C., and San Francisco already have them. Priced at $2.95, the Starbucks sandwiches cost 32% more than the $2.02 Egg McMuffin. And they’ll be available at all hours, unlike McDonald’s beakfast service, which usually ends around 10:30 a.m. Also on May 31, Starbucks will start offering two warm lunch sandwiches – tomato mozzarella with basil and spinach and a southwestern turkey sandwich with pepper jack cheese. Once the Starbucks ovens are up and running next week, Starbucks also will encourage customers to warm up their pastries.