Do you really want an Easter basket with jelly beans, marshmallow eggs and a chocolate bunny? Or would you rather have confections from a fine chocolatier who thinks outside the basket?

The answer may be “both”; but order early if you want to acquire these beautiful pieces of edible art from Bond Street Chocolate. They sell out!

To make these beautiful chocolate statues of Jesus and Our Lady of Guadeloupe (as well as Buddha and Moses), Bond Street Chocolate uses the finest E. Guittard’s 72% Coucher du Soleil, a dark, rich, smooth couverture chocolate with a creamy mouth feel and hints of thyme and jasmine. With all due respect, it is chocolate to pray for.

The chocolate is poured into handmade chocolate molds. The molded pieces are painstakingly hand-painted with edible gold leaf.

They are beautiful to look at, and you can keep the chocolate for up to a year as an object d’art before you have to decide whether it’s art or food.

Beautiful chocolate sculptures, embellished
with edible gold. Photo by Katherine Pollak | THE NIBBLE.

For those who want a box of classic chocolates, Bond Street Chocolate’s sophisticated bonbons are available in traditional shapes, but with anything but standard flavor combinations—several with fine spirits such as Bourbon, Cachaça, Rum and Tequila, as well as florals and herbs such as hibiscus, lavender and tea. Send a box to your favorite chocolate gourmet, but hurry, as they do sell out.

You might not be aware that March is:

- National Celery Month
- National Flour Month
- National Frozen Food Month
- National Nutrition Month
- National Noodle Month
- National Peanut Month
- National Sauce Month
- National Caffeine Awareness Month

In addition to the declaration of entire months as food holidays, almost every day of the year has its own food holiday—for example, today, March 1st, is National Peanut Butter Lover’s Day.

While we used to publish all of the holidays in this blog, they’re now part of THE NIBBLE’s Tweetstream. Sign up for them at Twitter.com.

These holidays are part of a long article on monthly food holidays that we created in 2005, and are among the most popular of the 20,000 pages on TheNibble.com. (More than a few people have begun tweeting on the same topic after seeing ours.)

It’s National Caffeine Awareness Month.
Become more aware in our Coffee Glossary. Photo by Mac Pale | SXC.

You can see the entire Food Holiday list (with an overview of how days become designated as particular food holidays), with a click-through to a related article or recipe. Or enjoy it Tweet by Tweet.

Cooking with cherries?

Using a cherry pie filling?

Try this recipe for pulled pork in a tart cherry sauce.

Montmorency (tart) cherries. Photo courtesy
Cherry Marketing Institute.

Seeking to offer tea drinkers as good an experience as their coffee lovers enjoy, Starbucks has gone “full leaf” with its Tazo line of teas, available in black, green and herbal infusions.

Full leaves, or whole leaves, make the finest tea. Many tea bags are filled with broken leaves which don’t have as much flavor. Less expensive supermarket brands use fannings, the dust (think “crumbs”) left over from processing the leaves.

Open up a tea bag from the brand you favor, shake the contents on a plate and look at them closely. If you see broken bits and fannings, you’re not getting quality tea. (That’s also why sugar and milk are required to make the drink enjoyable for many people. The finest tea can—and should—be drunk straight.)

By the way, “whole leaf” refers to black, green, oolong and white teas, made from the Camelia sinensis plant. The term doesn’t apply to herbal infusions, although as with every product, there is a range of quality of the ingredients.

Learn all about fine tea in our Tea Glossary.

The bags are now whole leaf. Photo by
Benjamin D. Esham | Wikimedia Commons.

The popular Black & White cookie has been dressed in Valentine’s Day colors (a.k.a., the Pink & White).

We think they’re a lovely gift for a deserving young lady. Find them at William Greenberg Desserts, or phone 1.800.255-8278.

Looking for more Valentine goodies for the kids?

Check out the Mickey Mouse chocolates above, and see our Best Valentine’s Gifts for Kids list, including heart-shaped cookies and brownies and the cutest mice and penguin bonbons from Burdick Chocolate, a NIBBLE top pick of the week.

The black & white goes pink & white for
Valentine’s Day. Photo courtesy
WmGreenbergDesserts.com.

To transition out of Healthy Food Month at THE NIBBLE and gird ourselves for Valentine’s carbs, we thought we’d celebrate Brandy Alexander Day—a creamy, chocolaty cocktail that was a favorite in our teenage years (when we turned 18, it was still the legal drinking age in our state). It’s dangerously good—like drinking milkshakes.

According to the Classic Cocktail Club of Milan, Italy, it was created in 1922 in London, “at the time of” the wedding of Mary, Princess Royal and Countess of Harewood to Viscount Lascelles. However happy that marriage was, we’re happy the Brandy Alexander is part of its legacy.

BRANDY ALEXANDER RECIPE

Ingredients Per Serving

- 1-1/2 ounces brandy
- 1 ounce dark creme de cacao
- 1 ounce half-and-half
- 1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg

Brandy Alexander photo courtesy EmperadorBrandy.com.

Preparation

1. Fill a shaker halfway with ice cubes.
2. Add brandy, creme de cacao and half-and-half; shake well.
3. Strain into a cocktail glass and garnish with grated nutmeg.

Haggis in its “cook-in-bag” (the
sheep’s stomach) can be found online.

In Scotland, January 25th is a national holiday that celebrates the birthday of the great romantic poet, Robert Burns, in 1759. On Burns Night, family and friends gather for an evening of good food and company—much like our Thanksgiving. A traditional Burns’ Supper is served.

Put on your best tartan, get out the bagpipe and plan your own Burns Night by gathering the crew for Scottish food and drink. Read some of Burns’ most popular poems: A Red, Red Rose; To a Louse; To a Mouse; Tam O’Shanter, Ae Fond Kiss and perhaps most appropriate to the occasion, Address to a Haggis.

FOOD IDEAS

An easier celebration might be to invite everyone for a Scotch tasting.

Isn’t this special: Rio Star Grapefruit
& Apple Mint Sushi Roll With Honey Chili
Dipping Sauce. Photo courtesy TexaSweet.

Grapefruit is in season, healthy (full of vitamins A and C, dietary fiber and lycopene) and flavorful. Go for Rio Star Grapefruit, Rio Red, Ruby Red or Star Ruby grapefruit varieties and you’ve got a beautiful color as well. Rosy Rio Star Grapefruit is a hybrid of the two reddest grapefruit varieties, Rio Red and Star Ruby grapefruit.

Grapefruit’s flavor and color work well in recipes—from cocktails to bruschetta, steamed shrimp, asparagus (or other green sides) and salads.

In fact, we have an entire menu of grapefruit recipes, from cocktails to desserts (Rio Star Mini Cheesecakes and Rio Star Grapefruit CrÚme Brûlée).

Check ‘em out and add variety, nutrition and great taste to your winter menu.

Tasty placecards: Use affix the card to a pumpkin bonbon. Photo courtesy of WeddingBee.com.

For Thanksgiving dinner, it’s easy to make place cards that are good enough to eat: Just stick a card in a bonbon (preferably, pumpkin, maple or other holiday flavor).

If you’re artistically inclined, buy tent place cards at any card shop or stationery store. Then look for candies the size of a quarter: flat chocolate turkeys or pumpkins, nonpareils or colorful white chocolate pastilles. Affix a piece of candy to the left side of each place card, using a paste of 2T confectioner’s sugar and 3 to 4 drops water. The cards add fun and anticipation from the moment people see the table. Guests can remove and eat the chocolate at the end of dinner.

For other holidays, you can attach Christmas trees, hearts, bunnies, etc. If you don’t want place cards, use chocolate place settings.

Hors d’oeuvres from GoodWives.com.

Entertaining? Plan 4 to 6 cocktail hors d’oeuvres per person if you’re following drinks with dinner; 8 to 10 pieces if it’s just a cocktail party.

Some brands of frozen hors d’oeuvres available to consumers are the same brands caterers use. They’ll cook up hot and crispy in your oven in just 7 or 8 minutes. Just try the products in advance of the event so there are no surprises. Not only do you want to be sure that the food tastes as good as it looks; different ovens produce different results, and you don’t want to experiment while guests are waiting to be fed!