The NEWTREE Blog

Current Mood: Cool

Written by David from NEWTREE

As you know chocolate itself has been attributed many health virtues among which relaxation, stimulation, digestion and antioxidant properties. NEWTREE’s undertaking has been to put forward those qualities of chocolate.

In our products, a natural Belgian chocolate is magnified by the subtle mix of astonishing flavours with a functional ingredient.

For instance, in our range ETERNITY, we have added some natural active extracts from fruits and plants well-known for their antioxidants side. Our family range ETERNITY is currently made of 3 different flavours: Cherry, Blackcurrant and Mint, all of them combined with a high 73% cocoa content.

In ours bars with Cherry and Blackcurrant, we have simply added in our recipe a natural grape extract, while in our bar with Mint, we have added a natural green tea extract.

Both, grape and green tea, are famous for their antioxidants properties.

That’s why we called this range ETERNITY

Current Mood: Playful

In our two previous posts, we shared our tips on how to taste chocolate, as well as what foods to combine it with,  in order to reveal its aroma and taste to the fullest. Today, we propose a very interesting combination for you to experience: NEWTREE chocolate and Port wine from Portugal.

Reasons? First of all, NEWTREE is present on the Portuguese market.  Second of all, we simply love Port that comes in so many subtle varieties!

We have discovered several ways of how to combine it with many delicious flavours of NEWTREE chocolate.

Port wine, also known as Vinho do Porto or Porto, originates from the Douro Valley or Portugal. Many sommeliers in Portugal have matched it successfully with several flavours of NEWTREE chocolate that they use in their wine tastings. Here is a list of Port wines that combine well in NEWTREE, and our Portuguese team is happy to share it with you today.

Current Mood: Flirtatious

In our last blog post, we gave you some tips on how to taste and enjoy chocolate. As chocolate is to be experienced, not simply eaten, today we want to talk about how you could enhance this experience. One way of doing this is by pairing chocolate with other foods in order to reveal its aroma and taste to the fullest.

Here, we’ve listed our favorite ways to enjoy the flavors of NEWTREE.

SWEET AND SAVORY HORS D’OEUVRES

Top a toasted slice of baguette with a little bit of olive oil, a slice of brie cheese and a sliver of CASSIS ETERNITY, dark chocolate with blackcurrant.

It may seem counterintuitive, but tasting extra virgin olive oil with dark chocolate can enhance the flavor of both. Sip the olive oil, it will cleanse your palate, then nibble a piece of NOIR CACAO PLEASURE, pure 73% dark chocolate.

CHOCOLATE TREATES WITH A TWIST

Drop a piece of MENTHE ETERNITY, dark chocolate with mint, into a mug and pour rich, hot milk over it. Stir. Top with whipped cream and MENTHE ETERNITY shavings for the ultimate hot cocoa.

Use a double boiler to melt down CERISE ETERNITY, dark chocolate with cherry, and drizzle over scoops of ice cream. Top with whipped cream and shaved CERISE ETERNITY for an indulgent ice cream sundae.

Current Mood: Playful

There’s a lot written on how to taste wine, but do you know that chocolate tasting is an art and science on its own?

Chocolate should be experienced, not just eaten.

And you can experience it in so many ways! Breathe in the chocolaty aromas, gaze at the glossy brown surface, listen for the distinctive snap of a gourmet chocolate bar being broken.

Similar to wine tasting, chocolate tasting is an experience that expands far beyond taste. It engages all of your senses at once so it’s better to take time to savor chocolate in order to have a profound tasting experience.  Here are some tips:

TAKE SOME TIME TO ENJOY THE SMELL OF CHOCOLATE

The smell of gourmet chocolate can be as rich as the taste. Fresh chocolate smells sweet and well, chocolaty. Close your eyes, breathe, and take in its tempting characteristics - floral lavender, sun-ripened apricots, subtly spicy ginger.

SAVOR THE BEST FOR LAST

Avoid sensory overload by tasting small pieces. Did you know that the melting point of chocolate is the same as body temperature? Let the chocolate melt in your mouth for a few seconds and enjoy the primary flavors and aromas. Quality chocolate feels firm and will melt cleanly without waxy, sticky or grainy textures. Biting into the chocolate will release secondary flavors, but don’t stop there.

Roll the chocolate around on your tongue to awaken the four taste zones - sweet and salty (tip of the tongue), sour (sides) and bitter (back).

RINSE AND REPEAT

Cleanse your palate and indulge again! If you want to know which foods to combine chocolate with, read this post.

Current Mood: Cool

With this post, we announce the start of the March tree photo competition, with an exciting prize to be disclosed soon!

This means that NEWTREE’s fans can already start uploading their photos of March trees on our Facebook page.

To launch our  competition, our jury member Cécile Bolly has shared this beautiful photo with us. As described back in November, Cécile is a member of the jury which will vote for the best photo of each month. Cécile is also an author of a book La Magie des Arbres.

Enjoy this photo and share your photographic talent with us! Don’t forget that you have to be the author of the photos you share on our Facebook wall, and that they express the spirit of the month of March!

Photo by our jury member Cécile Bolly - not part of our competition

Current Mood: Happy

LAIT CACAO INTENSE: dark milk chocolate

There is milk chocolate, and there is dark chocolate… Some people set their preferences for only one kind and stick with it firmly! But in most cases, we like both kinds, and decide whether to go for either milk or dark chocolate perhaps depending on our mood!

How do milk and dark chocolate kinds differ from each other? As the name suggests, milk chocolate contains, well, milk! The cocoa content in milk chocolate usually differs from that in dark chocolate.  The usual cocoa content of milk chocolate varies from about 25 to 33 per cent depending on a country where it’s sold and marketed. For instance, in Europe,  the minimum content of cocoa in milk chocolate has to be 25% . Dark chocolate, in its turn, should contain at least 35% of cocoa.

NEWTREE, for example, produces very dark chocolate with as much as 73% of cocoa! Check out our Menthe Eternity, Gingembre Sexy and Poivre Rose Sexy chocolate bars in our online store www.newtree.com to indulge into this seductively dark taste. Apart from the content of cocoa, there are plenty of other criteria that determine the “milkness” or “darkness” of chocolate, but that’s the subject of a whole different blog post!

With this division of chocolate into dark and milk as the main point of departure, we want to draw your attention to an innovative product that NEWTREE has recently launched across Europe and the USA: D A R K  M I L K chocolate LAIT CACAO INTENSE.

It is milk chocolate, but with an extremely high cocoa content. The content of cocoa in our new product LAIT CACAO INTENSE is very high – 51%!! Combined with milk,  the creamy texture of this product will slowly melt in your mouth filling your taste buds with pleasurable sensations.

The characteristic milky creaminess is complimented with the natural elegance of pure vanilla.

The good news is that NEWTREE’s LAIT CACAO INTENSE bar contains 3 times more fiber and 30% less sugar than regular chocolate!!

It is dark chocolate, and it is milk chocolate. It is dark milk chocolate LAIT CACAO INTENSE. Intense pleasure guaranteed!

Current Mood: Happy

Photo by Anne Brancart, our January competition winner

Our tree photo competition that is taking place on our Facebook page, has resulted in many amazing photos of trees and nature that can be found here. Since the month of November, we’ve already selected and announced 3 winners whose beautiful photos will feature in our 2011 calendar. It’s also become a tradition to publish short stories about each of the winning photos.

To continue this tradition, here is a short post in which Anne Brancart, our winner of the January prize (a fantastic meal for two in Hertog Jan, a gastronomy restaurant in Bruges, Belgium) is talking about the mood and spirit of this beautiful photo.

EN

It’s an early morning, and it’s very cold. The fog is still dense, but as it begins to dissipate little by little, the silhouette of the tree begins to appear slowly. Because of the magnificent light, the whole atmosphere feels a bit unreal…

It’s a weekend in the country-side not far from Namur. Let’s quickly capture these magical moments on camera!

FR

C’est le petit matin, il fait très froid. Le brouillard est encore dense mais laisse apparaître de plus en plus clairement la silhouette de l’arbre. La lumière est magnifique, l’atmosphère un peu irréelle…”

Week-end en famille dans la campagne namuroise. Vite, une photo pour fixer ces instants magiques!

Current Mood: Flirtatious

With this post, we want to announce the winner of the January tree photo competition that we ran on our Facebook fan page. We decided to make this announcement in the form of a video, which, by the way, also marked the launch of the NEWTREE YouTube channel!

To stay tuned on more news about our cool company, and get a snapshot at the atmosphere in our office, simply subscribe to the channel!

For now, watch this video (in French), in which David, our Marketing Manager, announces the winner of the January tree photo competition.

The winner is Anne Brancart, the author of this beautiful photo. Congratulations, Anne!

Photo by Milène Jacquin

In this blog post, the winner of the December tree photo competition we ran on our Facebook fan page, Milène from Alsace, France, talks about her photo. Milène’s story wonderfully captures the spirit of a snowy December afternoon, which, despite the cold temperature, was full of beauty, joy,  and stunning winter landscapes. Give in to the beautiful interplay between the coldness of  a December afternoon, and the warmth of feelings. Scroll down to read the story in French.

EN

“So, what’s the story of my photo?

Actually, I am not a professional photographer, not at all! But what’s true is that I really do like taking photos from time to time. Family, friends, events, landscapes… My small camera is often with me in my bag.

The day before I took this photo, it had been snowing. It was a Saturday. Saturdays are usually quite hectic days for me, and it’s difficult to just take it easy.

The following day the sky cleared up. We decided to go sledging with the kids near the Lac Blanc, a place near us that has a sledge track.

The snow-covered fields made the landscape look magnificent. So, off we went. A couple of  snapshots of the snowy landscape. Several trips down the sledge track, and some to go back up. The kids started feeling cold, and we decided to go to a shelter on top of the hill.

There, chocolate, mulled wine, pancakes and waffles were waiting for us. The heat of the stove warmed our bodies and our hearts. The afternoon was coming to an end, and it was getting dark. It was time to go home. The light outside was becoming dim, and the sky was overcast. We realized how essential warm boots and scarves were now, even for just a short trip to our car.

The sun was setting down, and the clouds were scattered in the sky.

And here it was, a little tree, standing alone on top of the deserted sledge track, set against the soft dim light. It was the last snapshot I took before rushing to the car.

That’s the story of behind the photo of the tree!

And as for my discovery of NEWTREE, it was a friend who knows all your products by heart  – he introduced me to your chocolate. My favorite is NEWTREE CANNELLE COCOON.

Finally, thanks to NEWTREE for the great gift box, and an original idea to combine chocolate with wine!

Milène.”

FR

“L’histoire de la photo ?

En fait , je ne suis pas photographe professionnelle, loin de là. Mais il est vrai que j’aime bien prendre des photos de temps en temps. Famille, amis, évènements, paysages… J’ai très souvent un petit appareil compact dans mon sac.

La veille de la prise de la photo, il avait neigé. C’était un samedi. Mais le samedi est généralement un jour assez chargé. Pas le temps de profiter. Le lendemain le temps s’était éclairci. On décide d’emmener les enfants faire de la luge l’après midi au Lac Blanc, une station proche de chez nous, et où il y a une piste de luge.

La neige est toujours présente, le décors est magnifique. Quelques clichés des paysages enneigés.
Quelques descentes.  Autant de remontées. Les enfants commencent à avoir froid. Direction l’auberge située au sommet de la
piste.

Chocolat, vin chaud, crèpes et gauffres, tout près du poële réchauffent coeurs et corps.

L’après midi se termine. La nuit commence à tomber. Il est temps de rentrer. La lumière décroit. Le ciel se couvre de nuages sombres. Il fait froid. Bonnets écharpes et gants sont impératifs. Même pour n’aller que jusqu’à la voiture.

Dehors, le soleil se couche. Les nuages s’étirent et s’éfilochent. Et ce petit arbre, seul, au sommet de la piste désertée, sous cette lumière douce. Dernier cliché avant de m’engouffrer dans la voiture.

Voilà pour la petite histoire.

Pour ce qui est de la découverte de NEWTREE, c’est un ami connaissant par coeur toute votre gamme qui m’y a initiée. Mon préféré : NEWTREE CANNELLE COCOON.

Il me reste à remercier Newtree encore une fois pour le magnifique coffret et l’idée originale d’associer un vin à du chocolat !

Donc merci et à bientôt.

Milène”

Current Mood: Esctatic

Durbuy tree in November. Photo by schmoozy fox

As already pre-announced on this blog, NEWTREE’s love of nature has prompted us to come up with an idea to publish a calendar with beautiful trees.

Each month for the next 12 months, we will post a call for your images of trees to be shared on our Facebook fan page.

Today, we are announcing submissions of photos that portray the beauty of November trees. Catch a glimpse of the fragile forest, that has not yet succombed into its winter sleep, but is already preparing for the long winter.

What are the rules of the game? Check them out here:

* First, you need to explore and enjoy the beautiful nature around you! Catch that dim November light during the weekend, and capture the amazing color shades and tones of November foliage on your camera.

* Go to our Facebook fan page, and post your favorite photo on our wall, accompanied with text “November tree”

* It’s important that you share only a photo that YOU took, as we will need to be sure that you are the author !

* NEWTREE will select ONE photo that we like best of all out of at least first 20 submissions on Facebook.

* You can contribute photos with November trees any moment between now and November 30, 2009.

* We will reward an author of the best November photo by a nice NEWTREE chocolate gift!

* The photos that do not make it to the 2011 calendar will be kept on our Facebook fan page, as well as placed on our blog on a separate page, for everybody to enjoy!

Finally, we hope that this initiative will enable you to  enjoy the beauty of nature in November, get lots of fresh air in your lungs, and above all, have lots of fun!

For photo submissions, become our fan on Facebook, and post your favorite November tree photo on our wall!