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Chocolate- I don't know about you all, but I am a chocoholic. It is my passion. I need it when I am riding the crimson wave, after a ritual, before I do my yoga, when I need to relax, when I am concentrating, heck... I need it all the time. There is a mystery about chocolate that goes way back in time. The history on the cocoa plant is incredible and although I would like to give you a history lesson on this wonderful, delectible plant, I won't for now. I will, however, bring to you the wonderful world of chocoalte.
--Love to you all, Lavender 10 Sensual Ideas 
Considered one of the most powerful aphrodisiacs and a highly sensuous, forbidden food, chocolate provides the perfect prelude to sensual, romantic "intercourse." Below is a list of our favorite ways to enjoy this fun appeteaser!
Freshly dipped chocolate covered strawberries hand feed to each other.
Melted chocolate dripped over your partner's body to be licked off slowly.
Chocolate covered peanuts or almonds and other bite size chocolates to be used as commodities for a game of strip poker.
Chocolate cake frosting for use as body paint.
Leaving sensual hints and/or notes in the "tag" of Hershey's Kisses.
Bringing a gift of a chocolate rose bouquet as an alternative to fresh roses.
Chocolate fudge, chocolate ice cream and chocolate sprinkles to be used as the ultimate chocolate human sundae!
Leaving a trail of Dove Promises from the door to the bed with a note of the events planned.
Sharing chocolate cookie dough (or the ice cream) after love-making.
Sharing an intimate moment in the nude together with the classic solid milk chocolate bar.
The Chocolate Light Bulb!
1. Make a candy love letter.
Write a love letter out of candy bar titles. Get a piece of brightly colored poster board and a bunch of your favorite candy bars. Write your love letter on the board in a contrasting colored pen. Replace key words with candy bars taped onto the poster board.
2. Chocolate bouquet.
Get your love's favorite chocolates and thick wood skewers. You'll also need a box or basket and a piece of styrofoam cut to fit inside the box or basket. Cut the skewers in half with a small saw and lightly sand down the blunt ends. Stick a chocolate on the top of each blunt end. Then stick the pointed end into the styrofoam piece. Cover the styrofoam with moss or ribbon.
3. Neverending Chocolate Box.
Get a set of boxes that fit inside of each other. The more you can get to fit inside of each other the better. Buy your love's favorite chocolates or sweets and some tissue paper. Line each box with tissue paper and place one chocolate or sweet inside of it. Then cover it with another piece of tissue paper. Keep doing this until you've filled all your boxes. If you have more chocolates than boxes, start with one chocolate in the first and more in each box following.
4. Trail of Chocolates.
Get quite a few bags of chocolates, some tissue paper and curling ribbon. Layer two pieces of tissue paper and place one handful of candy in the middle of it. Pull up the sides and tie a piece of curling ribbon around it. Repeat this until all the candy but one bag is left. Put your bags of candy in a stategic location with a love letter in front of them. Then make a trail from wherever your love will be to the candy pile. This is a great "wake-up" surprise!
5. Chocolate Roses.
Combine the classic favorites together and give your love a bouquet of chocolate roses. Attach a romantic note such as "I decided to give you these chocolate roses instead of real ones because our love is something that should be sweet and savored."
Valentine Food For Thought: A little diddley doo Cabbage always has a heart; Green beans string along.
You're such a cute tomato, Will you peas to me belong?
You've been the apple of my eye, You know how much I care;
So lettuce get together, We'd make a perfect pear.
Now, something's sure to turnip to prove you can't be beet;
So, if you carrot all for me let's let our tulips meet.
Don't squash my hopes and dreams now, Bee my honey, dear;
Or tears will fill potato's eyes, While sweet corn lends an ear. I'll cauliflower shop and say, Your dreams are parsley mine. I'll work and share my celery, So be my valentine.
Jeanne Losey
Chocolate Hazelnut Truffles 
yield: 30 - 40 truffles
stand time: 14 hours
chill time: 1 hour
9 oz semisweet chocolate, grated or chopped
3/4 cup butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup hazelnuts, finely chopped
1/4 cups chocolate sprinkles (for coating)
1/4 cup cocoa sugar (for coating)
Melt the chocolate and butter over water, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and stir in the powdered sugar, cream, and hazelnuts. Blend thoroughly but gentley. Cover and let stand at room temperature for 12 - 14 hours, without stirring.
Using a teaspoon or melon baller, scoop up the mixture and roll it into 1 inch balls. Roll half the balls in the chocolate sprinkles and half of the balls in the cocoa sugar until well coated.
Place on waxed paper lined baking sheet and chill 1 hour or until firm.
Cocoa Sugar
yield: 1 cup
1 cup powdered sugar
1 Tbsp Dutch processed cocoa
In a small bowl, combine the sugar and cocoa. Use for dusting over baked goods.
The Rules of Chocolate
If you've got melted chocolate all over your hands, you're eating it too slowly.
Chocolate covered raisins, cherries, orange slices & strawberries all count as fruit, so eat as many as you want.
The problem: How to get 2 pounds of chocolate home from the store in a hot car.
The solution: Eat it in the parking lot.
Diet tip: Eat a chocolate bar before each meal. It'll take the edge off your appetite and you'll eat less.
A nice box of chocolates can provide your total daily intake of calories in one place. Isn't that handy?
If you can't eat all your chocolate, it will keep in the freezer. But if you can't eat all your chocolate, what's wrong with you?
If calories are an issue, store your chocolate on top of the fridge. Calories are afraid of heights, and they will jump out of the chocolate to protect themselves.
Money talks. Chocolate sings.
Chocolate has many preservatives. Preservatives make you look younger.
If not for chocolate, there would be no need for control top pantyhose. An entire garment industry would be devastated.
Put "eat chocolate" at the top of your list of things to do today. That way, at least you'll get one thing done.
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Finger lickin' MMMMM Good!
Rose Petals, Stuffed and Dribbled with White Chocolate Believe it or not, gourmet rose petals are available for the purpose of cooking and are quite tasty. However, confirm that they are pesticide-free when buying or grow the roses yourself. They make a romantic garnish for salads, entres, and desserts. Experiment with different fillings.
14 large rose petals, rinse gently
1/4 cup natural cream cheese, at room temperature
4 ounces white chocolate
When purchasing rose petals, make sure they have nice large, clean petals. Wash rose petals gently and pat dry thoroughly. Prepare 14 rose petals by rolling individually around small pieces of cream cheese. Set stuffed petals about 1/4 inch apart on a baking sheet.
Temper white chocolate according to instructions above.
Place tempered white chocolate in a parchment cone (on page 215) or small pastry bag with tiny tip. Place finger on tip to hold chocolate in until ready to dribble. Quickly (before chocolate cools down) dribble white chocolate over the top of all the petals by going back and forth, covering half of each petal top. Place in the refrigerator for up to 6 hours. Because rose petals are perishable, they are best eaten within hours after preparation.
Serve on plates covered with doilies, or serve with your other favorite dessert, which could be you. Now light the candles, play some nice music, turn off the lights and place platter on table and snuggle up and enjoy taking turns feeding each other..
Yield: 2 servings
Chocolate Covered Strawberries with Champagne
Even the non-cook will love this recipe.
Purchase your favorite Champagne and chill.
Buy fresh strawberries that have their stems intact. Wash, dry and refrigerate the strawberries. (Cold strawberries will cause the chocolate to harden and there will be less dripping.)
Chocolate dip: Buy a jar or Nutella, European chocolate hazelnut spread (available in specialty and grocery stores in Atlanta as well as Harry's.) Place 1 cup of Nutella in a double boiler or fondue pot. Add 1 to 2 Tablespoons of heavy cream. Heat over low heat! Add more heavy cream as needed until the consistency of heavy cream. Serve your Valentine. Men, you can do it!
Hearts-filled-with-Love Cookies Fill these favorites with raspberry or strawberry jelly.
Sift together:
2 1/2 c flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Cream together:
1 cup shortening
1 cup sugar
Stir in:
1 well beaten egg
2 tablespoons Pet Milk
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Chill overnight before using. Roll-out dough and cut with a heart cookie cutter. Each cookie needs a top and bottom. Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes.
When cool, assemble cookies. Place a teaspoon of jelly on the bottom of a cookie, then cover with another cookie. (The tops of the cookies should be facing outward on both top and bottom.) Sprinkle with 4X Confectioner's Sugar.
Chocolate Surprise
Blend together:
1 1/2 cup plain flour
1 1/2 stick margarine
1 1/2 cup chopped nuts
Press into 9" x 13" pan. Bake for 15 minutes at 350 degrees. Cool
Cream together:
1 cup powdered sugar
1, 8 oz package of cream cheese
Fold in 9 oz. defrosted Cool Whip. Spread onto the cooled pastry layer.
Mix well:
1 large box of chocolate INSTANT pudding
Add 3 1/2 cups milk
Spread on top of the second layer.
Spread a 9 oz. container of defrosted Cool Whip on top of the third layer and refrigerate.
Frosty Chocolate Souffls prep. time: 10 minutes
freezing time: 2-4 hours
1 cup whipping cream
1 cup chocolate ice cream topping or syrup
1 Tbsp. creme do cacao
chocolate shavings, for garnish (optional)
Whip cream until very stiff.
Fold in the chocolate ice cream topping or syrup and creme do cacao thoroughly.
Turn into individual souffl cups or line muffin tins with paper cup-cake liners and fill with the mixture.
Cover and freeze until firm; 2-4 hours.
Serve frozen, topped with chocolate shavings for garnish, if desired. The Ten Muses Welcome to the Chocolate Muse
From Greek mythology, the Muses are the nine goddesses of arts and sciences who inspire it.
Daughters of Zeus, king of the gods, the Muses sang as a chorus for the other gods on Mount Olympus and attended Apollo, the god of poetry. Legend has it, the great ancient writers always called on one of the Muses before beginning to write. To the nine, we add our own Muse ~ Chocolatee, the goddess of Chocolate Prose and Poetry.
Calliope Epic Poetry
Clio History
Euterpe Lyric Poetry
Thalia Comedy:Pastoral Poetry
Melpomene: Tragedy
Terpsichore: Dancing
Erato Love: Poetry
Polyhymnia: Sacred Song
Urania: Astronomy
Chocolatee': Chocolate Inspired Writings
The 12-step chocoholics program:
NEVER BE MORE THAN 12 STEPS AWAY FROM CHOCOLATE!
Strength is the capacity to break a chocolate bar into four pieces with your bare hands - and then eat just one of the pieces.
Judith Viorst
Giving chocolate to others is an intimate form of communication, a sharing of deep, dark secrets Milton Zelman, publisher of "Chocolate News"
A chocolate in the mouth is worth two on the plate.
If it ain't chocolate, it ain't breakfast!
There's nothing better than a good friend, except a good friend with CHOCOLATE
Linda Grayson, "The Pickwick Papers"
"Liquidum non frangit jejunum." ([chocolate] liquids, amongst them, do not constitute a break in fasting.)
Cardinal Francis Maria Brancaccio of the Vatican, 1662
Chocolate: Here today .... Gone today!
Chocolate causes certain endocrine glands to secrete hormones that affect your feelings and behavior by making you happy. Therefore, it counteracts depression, in turn reducing the stress of depression. Your stress-free life helps you maintain a youthful disposition, both physically and mentally. So, eat lots of chocolate!
Elaine Sherman, Book of Divine Indulgences
Forget love-- I'd rather fall in chocolate!!!
I never met a chocolate I didn't like.
Deanna Troi in Star Trek: The Next Generation
Nobody knows the truffles I've seen!
Caramels are only a fad. Chocolate is a permanent thing Milton Snavely Hershey
A true chocolate lover finds ways to accommodate his passion and make it work with his lifestyle. One key, not just to keeping weight down and staying guilt-free, but also to keeping taste buds sharp (essential for the professionals who evaluate new products as well as judge recipes), Is being discriminating.
Julie Davis of the Los Angeles Times, 10/30/85
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Chocolate Quotes: All I really need is love, but a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt! Lucy Van Pelt (in Peanuts, by Charles M. Schulz)
Exercise is a dirty word... Every time I hear it, I wash my mouth out with chocolate.
Chocolate is good for three things. Two of 'em cannot be mentioned on public television.
"Las cosas claras y el chocolate espeso." (Ideas should be clear and chocolate thick.) Spanish proverb
Nuts just take up space where chocolate ought to be.
I don't understand why so many "so called" chocolate lovers complain about the calories in chocolate, when all true chocoholics know that it is a vegetable. It comes from the cocoa bean, beans are veggies, 'nuff said.
Chemically speaking, chocolate really is the world's perfect food. Michael Levine, nutrition researcher, as quoted in The Emperors of Chocolate: Inside the Secret World of Hershey and Mars
I could give up chocolate but I'm not a quitter.
Put the chocolate in the bag and nobody gets hurt.
A day without chocolate is a day without sunshine.
Life without chocolate is like a beach without water.
I have this theory that chocolate slows down the aging process.... It may not be true, but do I dare take the chance?
I am a serious chocoholic. For the serious chocoholic, chocolate is better than sex. If you believe that, you REALLY need to meet that special someone who can change your mind. If you HAVE met that special someone and still believe that, I REALLY NEED to know where you get your chocolate!!!
Chocolate is the best when it melts so creamy and soft in your mouth and it slides down your throat.
Don't wreck a sublime chocolate experience by feeling guilty. Chocolate isn't like premarital sex. It will not make you pregnant. And it always feels good. Lora Brody, author of Growing Up on the Chocolate Diet
Life is like a box of chocolates - you never know what you're going to get. Forrest Gump in "Forrest Gump" (1994)
If life is like a box of chocolates, then its time for me to buy another box, I seemed to have already devoured all the good ones!
Life is like a box of chocolates, the best ones are half eaten!!
In the beginning, the Lord created chocolate, and he saw that it was good. Then he separated the light from the dark, and it was better.
Chocolate - The breakfast of champions!
Carob is a brown powder made from the pulverized fruit of a Mediterranean evergreen. Some consider carob an adequate substitute for chocolate because it has some similar nutrients (calcium, phosphorus), and because it can, when combined with vegetable fat and sugar, be made to approximate the color and consistency of chocolate. Of course, the same arguments can as persuasively be made in favor of dirt. Sandra Boynton, author of Chocolate: the Consuming Passion
Chocolate in the morning is what makes moms get through their day!
If not for chocolate, there would be no need for control top pantyhose. An entire garment industry would be devasated.
Put "eat chocolate" at the top of your list of things to do today. That way, at least you'll get one thing done.
(Note: the above two entries are from "The Rules of Chocolate", author unknown. See the complete list from our Chocolate Muse page.)
Chocolate flows in deep dark, sweet waves, a river to ignite my mind and alert my senses
Chocolate doesn't make the world go around ... but it certainly makes the ride worthwhile!
Man cannot live on chocolate alone; but woman sure can.
Everything I eat should contain either garlic or chocolate, but rarely both
Researchers have discovered that chocolate produced some of the same reactions in the brain as marijuana. The researchers also discovered other similarities between the two, but can't remember what they are. Matt Lauer on NBC's Today Show, August 22
Twill make Old Women Young and Fresh; Create New Motions of the Flesh. And cause them long for you know what, If they but taste of chocolate.
from "A History of the Nature and Quality of Chocolate", James Wadworth (1768-1844)
Chocolate: luscious, lumpy. load of love......
All of the evil that people have thrust upon chocolate is really more deserved by milk chocolate, which is essentially contaminated. The closer you get to a pure chocolate liquor (the chocolate essence ground from roasted cacao beans) the purer it is, the more satisfying it is, the safer it is, and the healthier it is. Arnold Ismach, "The Darker Side of Chocolate"
... the taste of chocolate is a sensual pleasure in itself, existing in the same world as sex... For myself, I can enjoy the wicked pleasure of chocolate... entirely by myself. Furtiveness makes it better. Dr. Ruth Westheimer
Simply put... everyone has a price, mine is chocolate!
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