Cacaosuyo Peru Chocolate with Grasshoppe

A couple months ago, I was gearing up for another normal Saturday afternoon photoshoot. By normal: I’d already gotten help lugging the table (that roughly 95% of my chocolate photos are staged on) next to a window, and I’d already unearthed at least half a dozen potential photo subjects (not knowing yet which 2-3 would make the final cut, because it would all depend on my mood in the next hour.)

My sister was looking out the window and asked something along the lines of, “Didn’t you say you wanted a grasshopper for pictures?”

Who me? Ok, yes me. I distinctly recall saying that. Although I’m pretty sure I was only 75% serious. (At one point I was getting rather desperate for new photo props and apparently I was even open to the unusual and alarming and unexplained.)

Our grasshoppers are no joke. They’re not small and certainly not the type of darling grasshopper that one would try to catch in their hands. They’re uh, slightly larger, with flashy orange-red spiracles, and when they’re agitated they can rub their wings together (or whatever it is they do to make that noise; I try not too get too close to them) so loudly it sounds like a rattlesnake. Or so I imagine. I also make a point not to get too close to rattlesnakes.  (But I’ve seen Youtube videos.)

Probably not two minutes later, my dad appears at the window holding up the grasshopper my sister had spotted.  It was perched on the edge of a sieve. “Did anybody need a grasshopper?”

GAME ON.

Me: “Sam, grab the camera!!!”
My brother: “What?!”
Me: “Grab the camera!! I have to get the chocolate before the grasshopper flies away!”

The first chocolate (out of the ones I’d unearthed) that remotely matched a grasshopper was my Cacaosuyo bar, which I snatched up and dashed outside with.  (No, I didn’t invite the grasshopper in. I may bring in burrs and prickly cacti for photos, but one must draw the line somewhere.) There was no time to find a dreamy setting or backdrop because the grasshopper was NOT planning on sticking around for long, so we found the first available spot to prop up a bar of chocolate. The grasshopper was gently nudged off the sieve onto the wrapper. It immediately wanted to go elsewhere, so for a few brief seconds, my dad’s official title was grasshopper wrangler, my brother was very temporarily back to being my photographer, and I was back to shaking my head at myself over the odd things I decide ought to make an appearance in a chocolate photo.

Now I wonder, whenever I see a grasshopper in the yard, if it is THE grasshopper and it is looking at me and thinking, “SHE MADE ME POSE NEXT TO CHOCOLATE AND SHE DIDN’T EVEN OFFER ME ANY! THE NERVE!” Well, not really.

That grasshopper probably went back to eating the shrubbery without a second thought, while I continued on with my photoshoot that day and ended up photographing Land (Dark Malt – Honduras), Georgia Ramon (Raspberry Rose), a Milka Oreo tower (photo here), and Moonstruck (Mayan Milk).

Cacaosuyo Peru Chocolate Unwrapped

Cacaosuyo is made in Peru; this bar won a 2016 Bronze International Chocolate Award and a Gold Peru Chocolate Award.  I purchased mine via Cocoa Runners after reading multiple glowing Cacaosuyo reviews on Instagram written by Sharon Terenzi (aka The Chocolate Journalist).

It is a two ingredient bar (cacao from the Piura region, and sugar).   Two ingredients is all it takes to craft a delicious dark chocolate worthy of multiple awards and high praise.

Not sure if anybody wants me to get their hands on any of their chocolate anymore (out of fear of what I’ll decide to photograph it with).

Hey, does anyone know if wild iguanas can be taught to stop and smile for the camera?

Exactly two things in this photo were mine.  (If you guessed one of them was the chocolate..Taza Toffee Almond & Sea Salt…aka arguably the most important thing in the photo…you’d be correct.) (The second was the vastly less exciting tan mat the almonds are resting on.)

Taza Toffee Almond and Sea Salt Stone Ground Chocolate

So that means I borrowed (with permission):

  • The blanket off somebody’s bed (Not mine.  I’m more of a flower person than a giraffe print person.  I know I’m shocking absolutely no one by saying that.)
  • The basket in my neighbor’s closet
  • The almonds in the refrigerator (actually I can’t recall if I asked permission before borrowing those…)

This photo is one of the best examples I have of being creative and finding things around you to use for photography.  With a little imagination, ‘something old and something new and something borrowed and something spotted like a giraffe’ (yes I kind of re-worked the old saying) will work just fine.

I can think of at least a dozen times I’ve come up with shots that didn’t include any of the flowers or fabric I’ve specifically purchased for my chocolate photography hobby and instead used things already lying around (or growing around), and therefore the accessories ended up being free.

A partial list of items found around the house (both inside and outside) that I have used as photography props are as follows:
(I don’t recommend the cactus unless you’re far more careful at handling them than I am):

  • Sprigs of flowering bushes and one of my shirts
  • Golden foil (chocolate wrappers!) formed into little balls + leaves + another one of my shirts
  • Baby cacti, burrs, & tree branches
  • Rope and rocks
  • Rings and scarves
  • Coffee beans and coffee mug  (I believe I may have mentioned my reusable coffee beans on multiple occasions.  They’re real troupers; they’ve posed with a myriad of coffee chocolates and survived at least one glitter shower.)
  • My butterfly wallet and some ribbon
  • Buttons, spools of thread, and a gift bag
  • A palm frond hat & zig zag brown paper packing material
  • Colored pencils and bougainvilleas
  • A napkin holder and a spare piece of fabric
  • Playing cards and glitter foam

Taza Toffee Almond Chocolate Alternate Photograph

Oh yes. And tiny little cookies.

In case you’re here for the chocolate instead of the photography prop suggestions:

Taza is a stone-ground bean-to-bar chocolate made in Massachusetts.   I’m more familiar with their round discs (my favorite is cinnamon) but the toffee is only available as a rectangle and I’m not picky as to what shape my chocolate is in.  🙂

Stone-ground (read: gritty) chocolate makes good “chomping” bars (something to chow down on rather than melt in your mouth and savor slowly).  I enjoyed the mix of chocolate and nuts and toffee; I think this chocolate would be fantastic coarsely chopped and generously added to sugar cookie dough.

Alaina Cursive Signature