Advice

The last few days have been wonderful.  So wonderful, that I haven't bothered to post.  Sorry blogging world, you just aren't as great as reality.

We've been working really hard on keeping up with events.  Tons of enrobing.  My tempering skills are coming together.  My failure rate has decreased - thank god.  It's nice to do something right without having to ruin it first.

This post is going to be a little different from my previous posts - it's an internal discourse more than the day-to-day happenings you've seen.

I am consistently surprised at the kindness of strangers.  At school and home, I don't experience this reaching out - I'm surrounded by people I already know.  But here I've been adopted.  I've found a huge amount of comfort in the relationships I've developed in the last three weeks and feel like I'm part of a big family.  Everyone at SCR, friends of friends, my roommate - I can't explain how thankful and grateful I am.

This evening I went to two events.  One was a kick-off party for a project in the business school at Emory (https://newsroom.goizueta.emory.edu/gnr/2011/04/20/student-carries-wine-project-forward/)
and was hosted at a professors home.

Besides being a great event (with a great cause) and great entertainment - traditional Ethiopian dancing and Dance Truck (http://clatl.com/culturesurfing/archives/2011/05/25/dance-truck-goes-way-gay - the image tells all ) - I was able to have some amazing conversations.

I met Keith of High Road Craft Ice Cream and Sorbet.  He's got a background in both culinary school and business school.  Told him who I was, what I'm doing, and what I think I want and asked him for advice.

Advice!  So much advice!

No matter how much I love the idea of chocolate or making chocolate now - I'm going to hate it when I make the 400,000th piece.  And when I hate it, I'll realize that it isn't the chocolate that I'm in it for.  I'm in it for the people.  I'm there for the communication and relationship and development with others.

And when I hate it, I'm going to need to love it.  And the only way I'll be able to love it will be to take it back to the beginning.  To understand it from the farm it came from in Venezuela or Madagascar and the economics and anthropology that take it all the way to where I'm standing with a completed confection.  That's what I have to understand and know in order to love it on that 400,000th piece.

AND, he invited me to visit him at High Road.  I'm going to check out their facilities and talk about what happens when chocolate is applied to ice cream.  Chocolate has it's nuances when it comes to tempering and ganaches, but what about in other products?

Ended the night at White Space for another event.  It was nice to see everyone in a different environment.

Exhaustion.  Ecstatic exhaustion.