This is part of the original post. The cartoon and the rest of it are now on my chocolate blog.

There was a sad obit in the LA Times this weekend: Robert Steinberg, who founded Scharffen Berger chocolate, passed away.

Here’s a review at Chocolate Obsession that compares one of their bars to wine. This reviewer at Candy Addict says she prefers their milk chocolate bars to the dark chocolate. The Food Paper agrees with me on the baking chocolate, and says:

Martha Stewart and Julia Child both are fond of it.

Then there’s Pioneer Woman’s comparison baking of brownies with Baker’s,  a Betty Crocker box mix, and Scharffen-Berger chocolate, on Serious Eats. Take a look. SB won.

Still. Total hyperbole in the Times article.  People can say whatever they want, but everyone knows that the new age of chocolate started when my chocolate book, “What Do Women REALLY Want? Chocolate!,” was published, in 2004.

That was the beginning, but of course this sort of movement never does have an ending. To that purpose, I’m pleased to announce that I just bought a new domain:  chocolatecartoons.com. Read Eat it and weep. The new chocolate.

“Chocolate happens, dear.”

you’ve got my full attention.

The Drawing
I’ve done cartoons on chocolate from the very beginning of my cartoon career, even before chocolate became acceptable and not shameful! So I had a nice little stash of them before I signed a contract for my book on chocolate, but once I added them up, it was only about 30 or 40. And I needed 120 cartoons for the book, which is a fat hardback! I always planned that the book wouldn’t be just candy – kind of dry – but would include any dessert that had chocolate as the main ingredient. Still, that meant a hell of a lot of new cartoons

This is one I did just for the book, but it turned out lovely. I like the simplicity of the solid black and white, with just enough detail to make it interesting. I love the little plants in the window to get the morning sun! And the cookbooks on the shelf behind her. Plus this was SO much fun, drawing little miniature versions of all these dark delicacies.

His expression is priceless! You know he really has no interest in the food, but he is tolerant, and realizes these will probably be at the dinner table for a while.

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I found this in one of my favorite stores….the 99 Cents Store! Okay, the lineup of boxes in the window looks 20 years old and yucky, but inside, their produce is ok, so I took a chance the cereal would be, too. (Coincidentally, on very cool  open-air bus tour of Los Angeles, I met a man who has a whole blog devoted to making meals bought from the 99 Cents Stores: the 99 Cent Chef!) I’ve never tried Life cereal before – looks too much like Shredded Wheat, which I don’t like. But isn’t this a fantastic image of chocolate in the life font?

The cereal was fresh. But the taste? Just, no thanks. The cereal part is OKAY, I guess, but who’re we kidding; only the chocolate counts and it is the teeniest little morsels of chocolate that look like dirt – or something. Yet I still kept eating it til the end because the box is just so purty and chocolate-y… I’m a chocolate dork! And this just goes to show you, like my sign painter teacher at Art Center used to say: “Buy everything if it has good design.” The box reeled me in.

Candyaddict has a press release and some reviews of this and Special K chocolate cereal (which I haven’t tried, drat.) She adds:

Apparently, these aren’t truly a breakfast cereal as the companies are encouraging folks to indulge in something they’ve already been doing: late-night snacking on sweets.

I don’t know about that; with milk and a spoon on the cover I’m still thinking breakfast. When I looked it up online to see if they still make it, they do, but the photo is different: here. But it’s all java-y or something, so I can’t copy the image. It’s poorly designed now, with a generic dark-haired father and daughter, the kind that indicates, “We love all races, but we won’t commit to any.” And an ugly big heart, and a spoon.

Sorry, I don’t buy cereal with people on the box. And chocolate isn’t a group activity, either.

Severe no for Trader Joe’s Chocolate Chunk Cookies. The cookies are dry and the chocolate is not satisfying and tastes cheap. I’m Yankee thrifty, but I’m tempted to throw the rest out! Ingredients look fine (ie, no corn syrup, which I won’t eat anymore), and there’s a bit of honey, which will usually raise the rating, but not this time.

Perhaps not the most appetizing photo. From here.

Part of my bitterness is because they used to make a chocolate chunk cookie that was totally great, maybe 8 years ago. It was dense, hard, but not too hard, somewhat grainy, with good quality chocolate. (may have been Guittard’s.) All you needed was a couple to make the starving (or sad) feeling in your gut go away. ( I met a guy standing in line behind me once, buying only these cookies, and he told me he would eat the whole bag in one sitting. Ah, men, and their lucky, lucky metabolism.) A bag in the cupboard always made me feel happy. Grrr at TJ for always always dropping good food. I wrote a lyrical poem about Trader Joe’s in my other blog, here. It’s not very nice. Read more »