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News and Views:
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"Another Bite" Hits the Road:
A Field Trip to L. A. Burdick Chocolates
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 Yes, it was another tough assignment. Visit one of America’s preeminent chocolatiers and taste the bonbons. Just 40 miles from home, in the lovely old town of Walpole, New Hampshire, overlooking the Connecticut River, is Burdick’s, a small company founded in 1985 and dedicated to making excellent handmade chocolates.
Although you can visit Burdick’s online at www.burdickchocolate.com, or telephone them at 800-229-2419, the elegant store next to the post office in Walpole offers the delightful smells of hot chocolate, freshly baked pastries, and steaming coffee in an irresistible blend. Polished wooden cases hold dark chocolates filled with smooth ganache, caramelized nuts, fruit essence, and fine liqueurs. Burdick’s whimsical chocolate mice and penguins are made from smooth ganache enrobed in chocolate and flavored variously with orange, cinnamon, almonds, and mocha. Marzipan fruit and mosaics; honey-sweet nougat flavored with pistachios, cranberries, and lavender; and European-style pastries (including a layered hazelnut-orange cake and an Austrian linzer torte filled with Swedish lingonberries) add to the temptations.
 Consumer Reports recently rated the company among the top ranks of American chocolate makers, and it’s easy to see why. The chocolates are smooth and creamy, not overly sweet, and the flavors of the fillings are subtle and even surprising (ginger, lavender, honey, plus more traditional offerings). I had a cup of the dark, intense, thoroughly comforting hot chocolate and a slice of the hazelnut-orange cake while I plotted what to bring home to my family.
Burdick’s also has a café in Edgartown on Martha’s Vineyard and a store on Brattle Street in Cambridge, Mass., so there are other possibilities for field trips. The mother ship in Walpole has little of the bustle of the other two locations, but plenty of chocolate ambience. (That’s one thing you can’t order off the Web site). With Valentine’s Day fast approaching, I may even risk the caloric hazards of another field trip.
(photos courtesy of Burdick Chocolates)
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Gentlemen, Start Your Tomatoes
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 Although garden centers in May will be full of tomato seedlings, it can be hard to find the more unusual varieties. One new tomato sure to be in demand — as well as in short supply — is the new ‘Julia Child’, in its first year as a commercial variety. When California tomato grower Gary Ibsen asked Julia Child what type of heirloom tomato she would like to bear her name, she replied, "A tasty one, my dear." The tomato he developed is an organic beefsteak type, indeterminate (its growth continues all summer, so it needs staking or caging), and open-pollinated (you can save the seeds for next year).
Although few people besides Mr. Ibsen have tasted the new tomato, we’re willing to bet that a grower who would risk involving the name of Mrs. Child really has come up with a tasty new tomato. To order seeds online, go to www.tomatofest.com. And you’d best hurry: the seed stock this year comes from only 15 plants, so there’s a limit of one packet (20 seeds) per order. Be the first on your block . . .
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Does Anyone Really Need Ultra-Pasteurized Cream?
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Many years ago, before the consolidation of dairies into huge agri-businesses, I lived near a small dairy in Wisconsin that processed the milk from nearby dairy farms. Milk was pasteurized but not homogenized, so you could pour off the top layer of cream to use in coffee and drink the low-fat milk left in the glass jug. If I was making a dessert that required whipped cream, I’d also buy a pint jar of heavy cream. Already so thick it barely poured, the cream whipped quickly and bountifully.
Today, I am hard-pressed to find good cream. Nearly every container of cream in the dairy case is ultra-pasteurized. (We’ll call it UP.) If I pour UP half-and-half into my coffee, it forms a greasy film on top and tastes cooked, like evaporated milk. UP heavy or whipping cream takes a long time to whip, and sometimes will not whip at all; when it does, it barely increases in volume. To avoid buying UP cream, I regularly drive several miles out of my way to patronize one of the two small markets in our area that sell plain old pasteurized cream.
On the advice of Evelyn Hart of the New England Dairy and Food Council, I got on www.nationaldairycouncil.org to look for more information. I learned that pasteurization means heating milk to 145°F for 30 minutes to destroy disease-producing microorganisms. I have no argument with that, and anyway, it’s the law in every state. UP milk is created by heating milk to 280°F for at least 2 seconds, which destroys all pathogenic bacteria.
Considering that 212°F is the boiling point of water, it is no wonder that UP cream acquires a funny cooked taste at 280°F! It is also a clue about the difficulty of whipping UP cream — the high temperature may coagulate the proteins in the cream so that they can’t expand into big foamy bubbles. (Do not confuse UP cream with UHT milk or cream. UHT stands for Ultra High Temperature, a process in which milk is heated to as high as 302°F for 4 to 15 seconds and packaged in special multi-layer aseptic containers that allow it to be kept at room temperature for extended periods.)
What is the advantage of UP cream? If you are a milk producer or a grocer, you probably like UP cream. It has a shelf life of up to 28 days as long as it is refrigerated and not opened. If your stock doesn’t turn over quickly, UP cream is good for you.
What if you are a consumer? For you, there is no advantage to buying UP cream unless you want to buy it but not open it. Once opened, UP cream keeps only as long as pasteurized cream, 4 to 7 days. Given its off-taste and reluctance to whip well, UP cream doesn’t seem like much of a good deal at all.
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