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Chocolate’s Next Conquest: India

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choco-tajIn Western tradition, a dinner guest brings a bottle of wine as a host or hostess gift.

In India, Cadbury wants to make Toblerone the gift to give – it’s a strategy for growing the chocolate market in India. And it’s working. Hershey’s and other chocolate makers have also zeroed in on India, a subcontinent ready to be conquered.

TobleroneLongCadbury’s Toblerone, with its distinctive triangular box, is the leading brand in airport duty free stores around the world. It’s considered a premium brand and Cadbury India (a division of Kraft Foods) is actively promoting it and its other premium brands, including Cadbury Silk, in India.

In a nation where gifting is a solid tradition, chocolate gifting accounts for 6 percent of India’s gifting sales. The biggest brands: Hershey’s, Ferrero Rocher, Lindt, and Cadbury, which at 70 percent dominates India’s nascent chocolate market.

So how much chocolate are we talking about? Between 2005 and 2012, India’s chocolate consumption tripled – meaning it jogged from 40 grams to about 160 grams person, or less than two 3.5-ounce chocolate bars. Undeniably, this is a meager amount. But international cocoa producers are on a mission to expand their product everywhere. And wherever sales are low, there’s room to grow.

As incomes rise in India (and elsewhere), consumers tend to trade up, especially in food and grocery items. They start buying more expensive brands, and products with higher quality, better packaging, and distinctive branding.

India has long had a love affair with sweets and gift-giving, and Indian-made chocolates do exist (Amul is the largest). But international mega-brands have aggressively pitched their chocolates as status-symbol gifts during Diwali, the Indian festival of light and the most important holiday of the year. People increasingly prefer pristinely packaged chocolates over the mithrai, traditional Indian sweets sold at shops and stands. And perhaps chocolate’s caffeine and theobromine content creates a chemically induced, feel-good habit that non-chocolate mithrai can’t provide.

Chocolate Crimes and Frivolity 

Diwali chocolate-gifting is now popular enough to spawn both counterfeit chocolate sales and luxury chocolate jewelry.

Some of the Diwali woes: Fake chocolate sold under big name brands; chocolate adulterated with minerals to increase the weight and deepen color; and gravelly texture from inferior sugar. India’s newfound passion for chocolate has inspired spurious products.

Luxury products also get a boost. One designer is selling chocolate jewelry, gilded with edible gold. Gold is the ultimate Indian status symbol, and with gold prices so high, gilded chocolate seems like a novel alternative.

But whether gilded or not, chocolate is invading India, and no one seems to mind.

Espresso-Flavored Char Shu with Java Marmalade

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Espresso is the secret ingredient in this pork recipe

Espresso is the secret ingredient in this pork recipe

You know those glazed pieces of pork hanging in Chinatown restaurant windows? This is my coffee-spiked version. It’s simple: You marinate the pork, broil it until almost done, baste with the reduced marinade, finish under the broiler, and slice when cool. Serve with hot mustard and the reduced “java marmalade.”

Espresso-Flavored Char Shu Pork with Java Marmalade

Traditional Chinese “barbecued” pork gets kicked up with coffee in the marinade. 

By Kate Heyhoe

  • 1 pork tenderloin (1 to 1-1/4 pounds)
  • 2 tablespoons instant espresso powder
  • 1/4 cup soy sauce
  • 3 tablespoons molasses
  • 2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
  • 1 tablespoon triple sec, or dry sherry (optional)
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 2 finely chopped scallions (green and white parts)
  • 1-inch piece fresh ginger, minced
  • 1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil
  • Hot Mustard, for serving (below; optional)

1. Cut the tenderloin into 2 equal-sized, short, plump pieces. Dissolve the espresso powder in the soy sauce (it’s okay if a few granules remain). In a shallow baking dish or a resealable plastic bag, combine the soy sauce mixture, molasses, hoisin, triple sec or sherry (if using), garlic, scallion, ginger, and sesame oil. Add the pork and coat completely. Marinate, refrigerated, for 2 hours to overnight, turning the pork occasionally in the marinade.

2. Preheat the broiler. Line a baking sheet with nonstick foil, or spritz regular foil with nonstick spray. Place the pork on the foil-lined baking sheet. Pour the marinade into a saucepan, bring it to a boil over medium-high heat, and boil, stirring often, until it reduces to a thick, syrupy glaze, about 5 minutes. When it cools slightly, the sauce will resemble marmalade, dense and sweet with bits of scallion, garlic, and ginger.

3. Broil the pork 5 to 7 minutes, until the top takes on color and starts to look cooked. Turn the pieces over and broil another 5 minutes. Spoon some of the thickened sauce over the pork, coating the top and all sides. Broil for another 3 to 6 minutes, until the glaze caramelizes and turns a deep mahogany color, and the pork is just cooked through. (Pork is done when the internal temperature reaches 160 degrees F. At this temperature, the interior will still be pale pink but safe to eat.)

4. Let the pork rest 10 minutes (or up to 1 hour at room temperature) before slicing. Slice the pork at an angle and overlap the slices on a plate. Accompany with dishes of the reduced “marmalade” and hot mustard, if using. (Sliced char shu is meant to be enjoyed at room temperature, and can be made a day or two before slicing and serving.)

Serves 4 as appetizers, or 2 as a meal.

Hot Mustard: Mix together 2 teaspoons each dry mustard (or Chinese powdered mustard) and water until smooth. Let the mixture rest 10 to 30 minutes before serving.

Iced Coffee Syrup, for Sparkling Coffee Spritzer

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CoffeeSyrupCaptionCoffee Spritzers, here we come!

Think coffee with cool, bubbly carbonation. These babies go down way too easy… Sweet, concentrated coffee syrup pops with iced sparkling water. Velvety vanilla undertones smooth out the drink. Are you thirsty yet?

Then let’s make coffee syrup. With the syrup and cans of carbonated water on hand, you can mix sparkling iced coffee spritzers in a snap. Tweak the flavors: add some ground cardamom, cinnamon, or cocoa powder before boiling. Serve with a twist of lemon or orange rind for an elegant mocktail, or add alcohol of choice for an iced coffee cocktail. And, if you’re not already drooling…

Iced Coffee Float: vanilla ice cream + whipped cream put this drink over the top, in all the right ways.

Tips:

  • Turbinado sugar adds hints of molasses and honey, similar to a mild brown sugar. But you can substitute with white sugar.
  • I prefer fine white sugar; the crystals are smaller and dissolve more easily in beverages than regular sugar, but either is fine as long as the sugar completely dissolves.
  • Sea salt in a syrup? Yup. It makes the other flavors shine (it’s why sea salted-caramels taste outrageously good). Use just a pinch.
  • You’ll need a paper coffee filter and a strainer of some kind. A damp filter works best: just wet with water, squeeze out excess, and place in sieve over a quart measuring cup or other large container.

CoffeeSyrupDrip

Katie Caffeine’s Iced Coffee Syrup

By Kate Heyhoe
  • 1/2 cup turbinado sugar (4 oz/112 gr)
  • 1 cup granulated white sugar (7 oz/198 gr)
  • 1/2 cup ground coffee (1.3 oz/38 gr)
  • 2 tablespoons vanilla extract
  • 1/8 teaspoon sea salt

Combine both sugars, the coffee, vanilla, and salt with 1-1/2 cups water in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce the heat and boil gently for 1 minute (WARNING: Don’t stop watching the mixture: it can boil over in a flash). Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature. Strain through a dampened coffee filter set in a sieve; this may take as long as 30 minutes. Refrigerate for up to 2 weeks. Makes about 1-3/4 cups syrup.

Sparkling Iced Coffee Spritzer:

Combine 1 part syrup to 3 parts carbonated water, or to taste. Serve over ice. Slurp it down and make another.

10 Best Coffee Quotes From *Living* People

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sew-there

10 Best Coffee Quotes from Living People –

Tired of quotes as stale as yesterday’s coffee, from dead people like Einstein and Lincoln? CaffeineAndYou.com delivers coffee quotes from living people – folks still kicking and ticking (at least for now). Don’t forget to share the fun and leave Comments about your favorites…

“Do you love a decaffeinated hazelnut-flavored coffee from Dunkin’ Donuts with plenty of sugar and skim milk? If so, please skip ahead to the next section. We’re here to talk about tasting actual coffee, not sweetened brown milk.”

– Ruth Bourdain, Comfort Me with Offal *

“In Seattle you haven’t had enough coffee until you can thread a sewing machine while it’s running.”

– Jeff Bezos

“Starbucks says they are going to start putting religious quotes on cups. The very first one will say, ‘Jesus! This cup is expensive!'”

– Conan O’Brien

“It just seems so watery…Really? That’s what people drink everyday? I don’t see the point in that.”

– Anderson Cooper in 2011, on trying coffee for the first time

“I’ll quit coffee. It won’t be easy drinking my Bailey’s straight, but I’ll get used to it. It’ll still be the best part of waking up.”

– Megan Mullally

“This is your captain speaking. Welcome aboard flight…one, from…here to there. We’ll be cruising at a height of ten feet, going up to twelve and a half feet if we see anything big. And our copilot today is a flask of coffee.”

– Eddie Izzard

“Too much coffee. Too much coffee and Gatorade. It’s a hell of a mix. If you’re ever tired in the morning, just try that mix, and tell me what you think.”

– Kevin Garnett

“I put instant coffee in a microwave oven and almost went back in time.”

– Steven Wright

“At some point, all of us start wondering how much coffee we can drink before our hearts explode.”

– Phil Broughton, Funranium Labs’ Black Blood of the Earth

“What’s silly is paying five bucks for hot milk and flavored syrup! But now I see what’s really been going on all this time! They charge you all that money because they need it for the R & D! Somewhere on the outskirts of Seattle, there’s a secret facility with higher security than Area 51, and inside there are men with poor eyesight and bad haircuts wearing white coats, and they’re trying to make the Holy Grail of all coffee drinks… the Triple Nonfat Double Bacon Five-Cheese Mocha!”

– Kevin Hearne, from Hammered

And a bonus quote to put the crema in your coffee:

“I like light green, sometimes red is fun to look at, not a fan of yellow, unless it’s in a rainbow or on a coffee mug or on a happy face.”

– Chris Kattan  🙂 

* Technically Ruth Bourdain is a parody mash-up of Ruth Reichl and Anthony Bourdain. Ruth may not be real, but the mystery writer behind her voice is, so she’s very much alive and kicking. And for more good quotes from authors and famous people (alive and dead), check out Goodreads.com.

 

Brain Candy: Sugar May Boost Coffee’s Effects

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Caffeine and glucose makes some brain tasks more efficient

MRI: Caffeine + sugar combo = more brain efficiency (seen here as neural activity), with same productive results.

Sugar + caffeine = synergy? Combo boosts memory + attention, says one study. 

Glucose and caffeine boost brain tasks: Sugar-sweetened coffee improves working memory and sustained attention, according to a study published in 2010 by University of Barcelona researchers. They found that glucose (in the form of sugar) and caffeine boost brain function more when taken together than they do separately.

Caffeine and Glucose Synergy

MRI brain scans measured forty test subjects under four conditions: coffee alone, coffee with sugar, sugar alone, and plain water. The subjects were asked to perform certain tasks associated with sustained attention and working memory. Individuals who consumed caffeine and glucose in combination showed no drop in their performance of the tasks, while the areas of the brain associated with these tasks showed reduced activity; in other words, the brain was more efficient. The brain on sugar and caffeine needs fewer resources to produce the same level of performance. Subjects who took only caffeine, glucose or water did not show the same efficiency in brain activity.

An earlier study on caffeine and glucose taken together showed improvements in attention span and declarative memory, suggesting that a combination of caffeine and glucose may benefit attention, learning and verbal memory, none of which were observed when the substances were consumed separately.

What about energy drinks? A smaller study of twenty participants measured glucose and caffeine synergy using energy drinks. Compared with a placebo, an energy drink containing caffeine, glucose, and flavored with ginseng and ginko biloba resulted in significantly improved performance on “secondary memory” and “speed of attention” tasks, but without other cognitive or mood effects. The researchers noted that glucose and caffeine taken separately would not produce the same results. They concluded there is synergy between glucose and caffeine, one that merits further investigation.

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© 2017, Kate Heyhoe and CaffeineAnd You.com. All Rights Reserved

Meet Kate

About Kate Heyhoe

I'm an author and journalist specializing in food and cooking. Caffeine Basics is my ninth book. I've written about the U.S. wine industry, international foods, shrinking your "cookprint," and cooking with kids. Great Bar Food at Home was a James Beard Award finalist, and Cooking Green: Reducing … More