Foodie Sunday: Broken Hearts and Chocolate Kisses

By Beth What a week! It’s been a long one, with many joys (Great press for my new business!) and a deeply felt sorrow, most notably the ending of a long and important friendship in my life, an ending that was not at all unexpected, but the way it went down just so very sad.  I spent some delightful time this week with one of my darling Orchestra board ladies and she gave me one of the more practical pieces of advice that I’ve ever heard. She said…”It may be heart breaking right now dear, but there comes a time, when in certain cases you just  finally have to realize that you’ve known someone for way to long”.  This particular society doyenne has been alive for 81 years, looks fabulous, hangs out with interesting and attractive younger men and still goes out to dance the tango so I’m quite certain that she is right. That being said, even though I’ve realized that I am truly ready for the relationship to be over, when it finally ended there was a huge gaping hole that needed to be filled with something.   In my case, that would be cheap chocolate.   This week I’ve eaten  but not necessarily in this order a Milky Way bar, countless squares of Ghirardelli  , a Kit Kat bar, a huge endless bowl of chocolate gelato, a few Hersheys bars,  some sort of nougat and dark chocolate dessert at a restaurant on Wednesday and Chicken and waffle flavored potato chips (not  cheap chocolate but equally as sinful). I would have sold my first and only born for a piece of my mothers chocolate mousse cake. I knew things were finally beginning to look up when I started eyeing the Green and Blacks bars at Whole Foods yesterday. At last some closure! Chocolate is not only one of the best things in the world, but it turns out one of the healthiest. To my delight it’s being called a super food along with my other favorite guilty pleasure which is great red wine. Chocolate is packed with anti- oxidants, loaded with vitamins and minerals and according to an article that I read the other day, the lovely dark variety can reduce your risk of stroke and heart disease, reduce your risk of diabetes,protect your skin from sunstroke, improve your blood flow and of course it can dramatically lift your spirits and transform even the foulest mood! For me though it’s not just the taste, but the scent I crave hence my obsession with Tom Ford's utterly luscious Tobacco Vanille, which would be my signature scent if I ever felt the need to have just one.  I’m not sure why, but the aroma of chocolate is sometimes even more pleasurable than eating it. I’m a sucker for chocolate massage oils and body scrubs but my favorite is just good old fashioned cocoa butter which I love to slather all over my body right before bed after I’ve taken a really hot bath. When Roxana Villa of Roxana Illuminated Perfumes made her first batch of chocolate mini perfumes I was truly in heaven and I’m hoping that she’ll  be able to make another edition of them soon .  These were absolutely wonderful and they made me feel like I’m wrapped in my mothers arms or even my sister who’s definitely a woman who spends a good deal of her life contemplating extraordinary chocolate and all of the things that she could bake with it.  Ellen is much more discerning then I am, but she does love Reeses Peanut Butter cups and Peanut M and M’s, choices that I have no love for which makes our life together as sisters extremely easy.  I also just remembered that she alone can bake my mother’s chocolate mousse cake, so my next act of today will be to call her and beg her to make and somehow ship me one! So my question to you is this.  When healing from a bruised and battered heart, what foods do you crave?