Honest it was an accident, I swear.

Let me give you a little history around the inception of this particular flavor combination, which has remained one of my favorite infused chocolate concoctions to date.

Where it all started;

Before starting the chocolate company in 1997, Jacky and I moved from San Francisco to Vermont (1990-1997) for a few years to many. During our time living and working in Vermont, we were both part of the opening team for an amazing boutique resort called Twin Farms, located outside of a small town called Barnard. Jacky and I first arrived at the property only to discover we had a huge project ahead of us, which was to get this property open and help create an exemplary culinary/guest experience all within a few frantic, detail oriented months. The pressure’s on….

My personal set of challenges was met head on with establishing how we feed our guests and what they’ll expect on such a high level. The opening team of chefs was amazing, which consisted of two British well-seasoned chefs wielding a tremendous wealth of experience and creativity when it came to plating up some chow. What I was able to take away from all of this was some wonderful culinary memories, from which to extract ideas for some of my most favorite flavor combinations while creating our fine chocolate collection.

The incubation of the tarragon grapefruit confection started at Twin Farms, inspired by a very fussy dinner the chef was concocting for some high maintenance guests. The meal required a sorbet or granite (Italian shaved ice) course to cleanse the palette from a fish course moving into a meat course. This was somewhat of a challenge as we only had a few ingredients that I thought would work well with this intermezzo. The fish was lightly seasoned with tarragon and citrus, so I decided to carry that flavor thru with a refreshing tarragon and ruby red grapefruit granita. My thoughts were to cleanse the palate without a juxtaposing flavor combination. To our surprise, the chefs, guests, and staff loved the magic of this combo, which ended up becoming a house favorite. I’ve included this recipe with our August newsletter for everyone to enjoy making at home. It’s easy.

Basically, since the inception of the granita, I decided to try my luck with tarragon infused ganache, garnished with a tender sliver of candied grapefruit peel, and then coated with 65% Madagascar single origin chocolate. This is pure, bliss.

Stay cool, enjoy the summer

Ciao- Michael

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