Chocolate factory bear's day

My life is pretty hard. I am a chocolate factory bear. This is a photo of me with one of my factory friends. We both work in Chicago – that’s in the USA. I have a web blog to keep in touch with my stuffed friends. Some of these used to work with me in the down town chocolate factory – but they escaped. To do this you need an education. Not me – can’t spell nor nofuin….Chocolate factory bear

There is ONE good job where I work – that’s chocolate taster – but they NEVER give this to bears! We’ve had people tasters – but they are rubbish. There have been dog tasters – they are not much better and cat tasters who preferred mint chocolate to any other sort – odd that and pig tasters- never stayed long – something about saving their bacon. The BEST tasters are mice – but they are hard to understand- squeaks are all very well but what do they MEAN? So we have a lto of rat tasters… rats are easier to understand because their voices are deeper (than mice) but not than bears – my voice is VERY DEEP INDEED.

So, what do I do you might ask – did you? Well, I’m going to tell you anyhow – so please read on. I blend the chocolate. I guess every chocolate lover knows that there are all shades of chocolate from darkest brown imaginable (nearly nearly black) to pure white and every possible shade of brown in between. Well you perhaps haven’t’ thought about how all the in between colour of chocolate get there. That’s MY job!

Each morning when I get to work the night shift have made dark dark brown chocolate – called choc noir (French word meaning black – which it isn’t – but nearly is) and choc blanc (also French for white this time which is almost is). There are barrow loads of black and white chocolate piled as high as you can see and I’m pretty tall as you can see in my photo. (By the way the pic is taken out the back of our factory where the taster rats come out to breathe and us worker bears can sit for our 15 minutes break time).

My job is to make all the usual shades of brown chocolate. We have an official colour palette – this has every shade of brown we make (but not the browns our competitors make). I have to decide how much white (choc blanc) and how much dark dark brown (choc noir) to make the colour of say this morning. The we pile these bars into ons and melt them. You have to make sure they’re really runny before you make the blend—otherwise you end up with sort of swirly white mixed with swirl dark dark brown – which I like but my boss doesn’t!

Once its properly melted we pour the two steaming vats of molten chocolate into one enormous mixing tub and I stir. You have to stir for hours. My paws get really sore.. but that’s the job. Actually my fur gets pretty sticky too and you are NOT allowed to lick – well not inside the factory anyhow. But when you’re off on your break you can wash or lick I lick! The picture of me is after I’ve licked both paws almost entirely clean…. Otherwise that visiting penguin would never have sat so close.

He is a quality colour-checking penguin. They travel all over the world checking chocolate colour quality. Each factory is allowed to make their colours but not anyone else’s. My job is to ensure that our factory passes whenever this guy visits. Actually this is not that hard as our most popular chocolate colour is exactly the same as my fur colour. I just have to make sure that every splash of choc matches me and all is fine. It’s a tough life but I love it.