10.07.10
Book Review - "Sweets: A History of Candy" By Tim Richardson
Michael Szyliowicz

Sweets and candies have been made and consumed for thousands of years, with some of the earliest evidence dating back to 8000 B.C. when honey was first used as a sweetener and added to cereals or grains. Sugar cane was domesticated between 8000 and 4000 B.C. in Papua New Guinea, and from there it spread to India and Southeast Asia. (Surprisingly, on a recent visit to PNG, I found that today there is not a strong sugar industry within the country.) Processing sugar cane into something sweet is complicated, and sugar (as we know it) was not produced until sometime between 2000 B.C. and 500 B.C. The Indians created a number of sweets with sugar, in part because the Jains, an Indian religious group who are strict vegetarians, did not want to consume honey because it came from an insect. As they perfected working with sugar, more and unusual ingredients were added to make different treats, including fruits, nuts, spices, ginger and licorice. Because sugar...

Beverages, Book Reviews, Travel
book review, candy, honey, papua new guinea, sugar cane, travel
09.23.10
Sing Sing
Michael Szyliowicz

Papua New Guinea is considered one of the most remote places on earth. The world’s second-largest island, it is home to a spectacular range of flora and fauna and is inhabited by hundreds of different tribes. These tribes have a long history of warfare, battling one another often to the death. To try to alleviate the fighting and tribal tension, the tribes created a contest, and in 1961 the first Sing Sing occurred. The contest was an attempt to gather all of the villagers from around the islands in their native costumes and have them sing and dance before judges. Sing Sing was a success, and it has continued annually every August for a single weekend. One tribe, the Huli, was so successful that money and prizes had to be eliminated. Now, each participating group receives an equal share of the money.

The costumes are astonishingly complicated, and most take hours...

Diary of a Chocolatier, Travel
dance, papua new guinea, sing sing
09.16.10
The Trifecta
Michael Szyliowicz

Papua New Guinea Cocoa

Papua New Guinea grows cacao beans, some of which are used in single-origin chocolate bars. I’ve always liked the description on Michel Cluizel’s bars hailing from Papua Nouvelle Asie, and on this trip I asked to visit a cacao farm. Boating upriver along the Karawari, we suddenly veered to the riverbank, and I was told to jump out. Scrambling up the muddy slope and following the guide, he showed me the cacao trees, some with ripe pods. The guide told me that growing cocoa in Papua New Guinea is now encouraged by the government as part of a sustainability initiative, and there are 17,000 trees under cultivation. The government provides money to grow the crops and then purchases the beans from farmers to sell to chocolate producers. We plucked a pod and returned to the boat, where we cracked it open.

It is always surprising tasting fresh cacao beans, since they don’t have a chocolate flavor but instead remind me of citrus. These beans had...

Diary of a Chocolatier, Travel
cacao beans, chocolate, citrus, papua new guinea, single origin, sugar cane
09.15.10
Papua New Guinea Coffee
Michael Szyliowicz

The Western Highlands of Papua New Guinea is where the famous PNG coffee is grown. It is all Arabica, and there are almost 100 plantations in the region growing beans. Beans are picked and sold to the local processors either in cherry form or as parchment (meaning they have not yet been cleaned completely). The beans we saw were in parchment, with dried cherries and husks mixed in. When Bonz Coffee, a local roaster, purchases the cherries from local farmers, they are sorted. They have four grades: M, 1, 2 and 2/3. The price for a kilogram of M grade parchment is 5.50 kina, dropping to 3.50 kina for grade 2/3, the lowest. For reference, at the local exchange a kina is worth about 35 cents.

Once the cherries are sorted in Mt. Hagen, they are placed inside burlap bags and sold to a company in Goroka that finishes cleaning the beans, removes the parchment and disposes of the dried pulp and debris. Bonz purchases them back in their cleaned state as green beans to roast, grind and package. Bonz has a 15-...

Diary of a Chocolatier, Travel
arabica, coffee, papua new guinea