There are worse places to spend an 8 hour work day. I've been thinking of my past jobs, the last being one where I drank coffee, ate cupcakes and surfed the internet all day, where even the best work day can now be reflected upon as being tedious and uninspiring.
Working in a gourmet food market has many perks to someone who loves great food and amazing food stuff. Co-workers constantly offering up samples of this amazing cheese or tastes of that refreshing new wine. That in itself makes for a delicious workday. Then there are the local vendors hanging out for a few hours to chat and share tastes of their gorgeous artisanal treats. That happens pretty regularly. During the holidays this happens all day, everyday. The amount of chocolate I consumed the week of Thanksgiving was nothing short of obscene. There was one standout: gate comme des filles chocolat. Alexandra Whisnant makes the most amazing chocolates by hand. Her ganaches are infused with coffee, clementines, meyer lemon and bacon, just to name a few. The ganache is cut and hand formed, dipped in chocolate then decorated with finishes like goldleaf, glitter, decorative transfer patterns, candied lemon and bacon. She makes her boxes by hand, using heavyweight colored paper in assorted colors and a variety of decorative adhesive tapes to seal each box-an absolutely gorgeous presentation.
So the next great perk of working at Bi-Rite is being able to take advantage of the amazing cooking classes and events offered at 18 Reasons, our non-profit educational space. When I signed up for the Handmade Chocolates class I had no idea who Alexandra was, even when she was in the store last week I didn't make the connection, so I was absolutely thrilled when I showed up for class yesterday and saw the stack of her signature boxes.
Wheeee, I made these super amazing chocolates last night.
I learned how to temper chocolate, make ganache and form these gorgeous and most excellent tasting truffles. It was a good day.
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