This week, we are so fortunate to be working with Aileen, the Chocolate Lady – as she is affectionately called here at camp. In her real life, Aileen is a chocolatier. She owns two chocolate factories in Florida and over 20 chocolate stores. She is also a Camp Louise alum, and her kids now go to Airy and Louise.

Aileen spent last week at Camp Airy and this week she is here at Camp Louise teaching our campers all about chocolate. I stopped by one of her activities this morning where the girls from bunk #22 (see picture) were telling me all they had learned….

Chocolate grows on cacao trees.   Chocolate starts as little white flowers the size of your pinkie fingernail. Chocolate is actually a fruit. The cocoa bean grows in pods and there are 30-50 beans in a pod. The girls even got to see and hold a pod.

Chocolate used to be used as currency. The Mayans were the first to use the beans as a drink. The Aztecs saw that the Mayans lived longer and were smart and able to build pyramids. They attributed to this to the cocoa beans. Hernan Cortes, a Spanish explorer, brought the beans back to Spain. Be sure to ask your campers for the rest of the story.

After the brief chocolate history lesson, the campers had their first delicious activity. They put a marshmallow on the end of a pretzel rod and dipped it in the chocolate of their choice – dark, milk or white. These were then put in the fridge to get cold while the campers learned even more. Side note – most campers picked milk chocolate at this point for their pretzel marshmallow pops.

Next up – taste testing…..each camper was given 3 small pieces of chocolate – one dark, one milk and one white. They closed their eyes, put one piece of chocolate in their mouth, took two bites and swirled around to savor the taste.
They also learned that the dark chocolate cocoa bean has some health benefits, and it was far more delicious than they thought! Surprisingly, many of them loved the dark chocolate and ended up choosing it for the next activity.

For the next activity, each camper got to make her very own (small) chocolate pizza – the base was either white, milk or dark chocolate. Then, the campers added some toppings of their choice. This was definitely a highlight of the week for our campers. I am sure they are going to come home with lots of chocolate stories!

Alicia
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Today’s Birthdays

Lana – Bunk 19

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Today’s Menu

Today’s Weather

High: 86°F | Low: 66°F – A great day for a swim here at camp!