I was getting ready to tell you about Thanksgiving.   (All the way back in November.  Although it’s the middle of December.  Apparently it’s taken me that long to recover.)

But first, in honor of Chocolate Covered Anything Day, I made this little collage of, well, chocolate covered everything:

Nontraditional Thanksgiving Foods & Chocolate Covered Everything

All pictures are my own.  All opinions are also my own:

Chocolate Covered Bacon:  Fun for something different.
Chocolate Covered Oreos:  Yes.  Oh yes.  Just don’t try this at home.  You might eat too many oreos.  (I didn’t, but I can see how it could happen quite easily!)
Chocolate Covered Potato Chips:  This tasted about the same as the bacon, just not as chewy.
Chocolate Covered Coconut:  Delicious.
Chocolate Covered Celery:  Nope.  Don’t do it.  (I knew it wouldn’t like it.  I did it for the picture, not because I thought it would be incredibly tasty or the next big craze.)
Chocolate Covered Apples:  Also Delicious
Chocolate Covered Pineapple: Very Delicious

Now back to Thanksgiving….

…which usually brings to mind foods like turkey, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie, cranberry sauce, and that stuff that some people cook in the turkey (and some people don’t) that some people call stuffing and some people call dressing.  My family was confusing the issue by calling it both.  Next year we should combine the two and call it “stressing”.  🙂

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Last December, while doing chocolate-related research, I stumbled across a whole new world of chocolate.

Craft chocolate.  Bean to bar chocolate.  Artisanal chocolate.  Small batch chocolate.  There are a lot of names for it, but, suffice it to say, it’s not the mass-produced chocolate commonly found on the shelves of grocery stores and convenience stores.  Instead, it is chocolate meticulously made by companies that are so small they sometimes consist of only one to two people, whose mission is not just to provide high-quality chocolate, but also an incredible chocolate experience.  (I could definitely make a hobby out of trying different flavors and collecting packaging…)

A Whole New World of Chocolate - Dick Taylor Maple Coconut

One of the first craft chocolates I happened to run across (online) was Dick Taylor.   The geographical distance between us didn’t stop me from admiring the high-quality packaging and the stunning design on the chocolate bars themselves.   The glowing reviews cemented my decision that someday, if the opportunity arose, I was going to make one of those bars mine.

Fast forward to April: There was a little extra room in a package headed my way.  I picked Dick Taylor Maple Coconut.

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