I consider myself a wine aficionado. Like thousands of other Americans, I cannot pass up a fine wine with dinner. But I also enjoy visiting wineries and relish tastings and the opportunity to sample different wines from around the world. And the practice of continually tasting and explaining the flavors on my tongue are translated into our lab where we do the same thing with chocolate and the drinks that we create.

I originally picked up “The House of Mondavi,” about Robert Mondavi’s iconic company, to learn how he revolutionized the wine industry in California.  But in the end, the book illustrated the rivalries and betrayals within the Mondavi family business and highlighted Mondavi’s smarts, charisma and character flaws that eventually were the company’s undoing.

Before Mondavi, California was mainly known for cheap jug wines. Mondavi founded his company in 1966 and brought to the U.S. varietal wines and superior wine-making techniques such as cold fermentation and the use of French oak barrels.

Mondavi’s story is a fascinating look at a family business that grew quickly and convinced millions of consumers to enjoy better wines than they had previously tasted. It is generally accepted that Mondavi was the catalyst behind the American movement toward the daily enjoyment of quality wine and food.

Mondavi was a brilliant, urbane salesman, but also a dysfunctional patriarch who refused to cede control of his company to his sons.  In the end, it is a very sad story. Mondavi’s sons were never able to step out of his shadow and run the company, which ultimately was sold.

The premise behind Mondavi’s lasting impact remains a critical pillar of successful business. Quality processes and techniques yield quality product. And good taste is something that can – and should - be enjoyed by everyone.  All of us in the specialty food industry owe a debt to Mondavi for helping educate people about the great potential of our unique products.  I raise my cup of coffee in tribute to Robert Mondavi.

Times are tough, companies are cutting back, employees are being laid off, and holiday parties are being cancelled.  But I always look forward to our annual holiday party for employees and their spouses and friends. And with such a small, tight-knit group of dedicated workers, it really has become a family event as we celebrate the past year and toast the new one.

The office “Fun Committee” was looking at a number of well-known Denver restaurants, all of which would have worked well for our group.  But this year has been important for Mont Blanc Gourmet; we focused on our core strengths and came up with no fewer than 10 new products. I wanted to somehow take the momentum of 2008 into the new year.

And then I had dinner at O’s Restaurant inside The Westin hotel in Westminster, where the restaurant features a unique four-course tasting menu created by an extremely talented chef, Ian Kleinman.  As a classically trained chef, Kleinman’s cooking is excellent. But he goes a step further with his tasting menus and employs principles and techniques of molecular gastronomy.  Molecular gastronomy is the practice of combining traditional cooking techniques with scientific processes.

Upon experiencing his tasting menu, I was smitten by the creativity of his dishes. And watching some of them being prepared in front of me was great fun.  I knew the restaurant would be perfect for the company party as the menu embodies all of the things that our brand and company stand for—innovation, quality, and fun.

The next morning I recounted my experience and explained how this year’s dinner could be about innovation with food, creating new products, and having fun while doing it. Things that we do daily.  We agreed to make the switch, and I knew we were in for a fantastic experience.

There still seems to be no consensus in the raging debate about the role of high fructose corn syrup in the human body and whether or not it contributes to obesity more than its counterpart sugar, or sucrose.  The latest newspaper headline is “New data: High-fructose corn syrup no worse than sugar.”  Essentially, the article says that one of the authors of the original study condemning high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) has now reversed himself.  In addition, three other independent researchers have also come out with the same conclusions.

The study has an enormous impact on product developers because eliminating HFCS is not just a question of replacing it with sugar and water.  Daily we struggle to match not just flavor (sweetness) in our products, but also mouthfeel and viscosity.  In addition, HFCS and corn syrups allow us to create more stable formulations with lower water activity and sugar-to-water ratios, ensuring a longer shelf life after the product is opened and exposed to air.

I haven’t read the studies yet, but the Mont Blanc team will be looking at them closely. I hope that the news is indeed true, as it will help us continue to develop great tasting products that help our clients maintain profit margins while serving drinks that customers love.

This summer, the Mid-Atlantic Regional Roasters Group (MARRG) held a retreat and I was fortunate enough to be invited.  Like roasters everywhere, this group of engaged coffee roasting professionals is interested in perfecting the craft surrounding quality coffee.  As most roasters know, it is quality ingredients and attention to detail during the entire process that makes a memorable cup of coffee.

As a chocolatier, I have long been interested in the many parallels between coffee and chocolate.  I wanted to illustrate to these roasters, who take their coffee so seriously, discernable differences between chocolates from different regions and then let the roasters taste for themselves how these chocolates make very different mochas.

In front of each participant I placed a plate with six pieces of dark chocolate, all with 60 percent to 70 percent cocoa content.  Cocoa content is the amount of chocolate liquor and cocoa butter present in the chocolate.  The highest quality chocolates will generally consist of chocolate liquor, cocoa butter and sugar.  The higher the percentage of cocoa, the lower the sugar content.  So in a 60 percent chocolate bar, there is less than 40 percent sugar.

I asked everyone to smell the aroma of each chocolate. The tasters breathed in deeply and commented on aromas of red fruits, such as cherry and raspberry.  Other characteristics mentioned were aromas of smoke, leather and spice.

The next test was the snap test.  If the chocolate breaks cleanly, it  has a high cocoa butter content and has been properly tempered. Chocolate that has not been tempered properly or is made with inferior ingredients tends to fold in half.  Four of the six chocolates (all the single origins) broke cleanly with a sharp crack, so we moved on to taste.

When placed on the tongue, flavors of vanilla, leather and smoke were added to those of red fruit. Did it melt in the mouth? Cocoa butter has a melting point of 98 degrees, so the higher the percentage of cocoa butter, the more easily it will melt in the mouth. In high quality chocolates containing just chocolate liquor, cocoa butter, sugar and perhaps vanilla, the melted piece should coat the tongue, leaving a smooth, clean chocolate flavor.  Lesser quality chocolates have additional ingredients that don’t melt as easily and can leave a gritty aftertaste.

We analyzed each of the six pieces. There were four single-origin chocolates from Venezuela, Sao Tome, Madagascar, and Papua New Guinea. The fifth was a well-known grocery store brand, and the sixth was a new dark chocolate bar from a well-known coffee company.  It was the least liked by the group while the Venezuelan chocolate was the favorite. Roasters said it had the best balance of flavor.

I liked the Papua New Guinea because it had a strong flavor combined with a smoky, earthy taste that reminded me of Papua New Guinea coffee.

After the tasting we made mochas using different chocolate syrups.  The different syrups, when paired with coffee, created vastly different drink profiles. And, like their coffee, each roaster preferred different drinks. Some opted for the least sweet chocolate, allowing the espresso to stand out in the drink.  Others preferred the chocolate syrup that had more sugar in it, opting for an overall sweeter drink.  And some favored the single-origin chocolate syrup that had strong red fruit notes.  They felt that those distinct flavors combined with the coffee created the mocha with the most complexity.

I enjoyed sharing my experiences working with chocolate and coffee with professionals dedicated to learning as much as possible about unique tastes, flavors, origins, and subtle differences in processing. Several roasters came up to me afterwards to tell me that they were going to take the knowledge they gained and use it in their own cafes to experiment with some of their drinks and combine them with different espresso blends.  I’m looking forward to trying their drinks.

We don’t get rush orders that often. When we do, our desire is for our clients to feel confident they will get our trademark quality products – on time.

All rush orders require special handling, but a client call in early August brought Mont Blanc a unique set of challenges. What seemed impossible is now completed and when I look back at the teamwork and dedication of the Mont Blanc team, I am proud of our combined efforts. We have an enviable staff  and have built a supply chain that – in this case – proved critical to delivering the order on time.

The Rush Order
Our Director of Sales called the office from Canada, having just met with a customer that owns a chain of fast-food restaurants.  “They have decided to add more flavored drinks to their fall menu and they need the White Chocolate.”

In five weeks.

The Challenge
“Five weeks?” asked our Project Manager. “A new product that we have never made for them before? Our time frame is constrained by the fact that we have to order new ingredients, develop and print new labels, and audit the production plant.”

The customer had approved the 18th variation of a specially formulated white chocolate we sent them for testing. The good news was they liked it enough they wanted to include it as a new drink on their fall menu. The challenging part was getting this to them within such a narrow production window. They told our sales director the white chocolate drink had already been included in a media launch for its fall drink lineup.

Bringing the Order to Life
Mont Blanc’s Project Manager is tasked with making sure we can deliver for our clients and is the coordinator between all departments. With this call, she wasted no time convening a meeting to include staff from Research and Development, Quality Assurance/Quality Control, and manufacturing. The sales director was teleconferenced in from Toronto.

Her checklist was comprehensive.

• The production plant. Our primary production plant for this company’s other products is on the East Coast since we usually supply this customer through their Eastern Canadian distribution centers.  However, the White Chocolate will be introduced on the West Coast. Mont Blanc works with nine production facilities across the country and utilizes them for economy, and, in this case, to cut down on transport time. We teleconferenced with our plant in San Francisco and determined they could make the syrup for us within our time frame.  But the customer would need to inspect and approve a different facility before any production took place. Our Director of Quality Control coordinated his schedule with the customer so the two of them could audit and approve the California plant.
• The ingredients. Mont Blanc prides itself on creating truly unique syrups for its clients. And for the White Chocolate, our R&D team had sourced an unusual vanilla. The supplier was saying it would take almost three weeks to get the product made, shipped, and delivered to the plant. Our team made a few more calls to the supplier and, eventually, worked out a plan to have our supplier produce and ship their product in the necessary time frame.
• The testing phase. Before authorizing full-scale production on any new product, R&D conducts a test run at the production plant and tastes a pilot plant sample. More telephone calls were made to the production plant. Fortunately, we had enough ingredients on hand for the test batch and the plant manager agreed to squeeze a run into the plant’s already tight schedule.
• The packaging. Although the product fits within our existing syrup packaging, new labels needed to be designed and printed.  Normally, this is a straightforward process. But the Canadian market requires bilingual labels as it caters to English and French-speaking consumers. I took charge of overseeing the translation.

The meeting adjourned after every point on the project list had been discussed. And while the team was confident we could meet their deadline, we all knew that one glitch somewhere along a very extended supply chain would throw the entire schedule off.

Delivered and Selling Out
Bringing together all of these disparate, external suppliers and coordinating within such a compressed time frame posed a real challenge. But production went off last month without a hitch and the product was delivered on time and on target.

For our client, the White Chocolate fits nicely into fall’s flavor trends and already has proven a top seller. The customer is seeing quickly the benefits of adding new menu options and is looking at a second shipment.

For us, the experience tested our supply chain and resources and – in the end – unified the team with an accomplishment that other companies would not have been able to deliver.