Michael Recchiuti's Chocolate Disasters

Yesterday the F&W staff got a big treat. San Francisco über-chocolatier Michael Recchiuti came by with tons of candies for us to taste, from his classic, epic sea salt caramels to his new dragée line (the Peanut Butter Pearls are killer) to his coming-in-October Peppermint Thins, made with multiple varieties of mint. (If you're not in the Bay Area, you can find his chocolates at recchiuti.com.) Michael also talked about this summer’s groovy Taste Project, a series of multi-sensory tastings he's doing at his factory and other sites, including an intriguing beer-and-chocolate event with Magnolia Pub (MR said his obsession of the moment is hops; I wouldn't trust anyone but him on this tasting). And there’s more: Michael is also working on the outline for a genius book based on baking disasters, and how to recover from them. “Whenever you’re baking and something goes wrong, the recipe is cross-referenced somewhere else in the book, but you have flour and egg on your hands and you can’t turn the page,” he said. As someone with plenty of stained cookbooks at home, I hope he gets to work on this book fast.