And it’s not just a blogs, I was reading a candy making book in the “for dummies” line and it was the worst of all.

The culprits? Washing and drying the strawberries. One candy shop owner actually said not to wash them. A blog entry said to just wipe them down.

 Both are really bad advice for the same reason: strawberries are grown outside… outside with the birds, wild animals and bugs. Strawberries are not grown in an hermetically sealed environments. They are gown in fields, in dirt, with chemicals (natural or man-made) to control the bugs, with birds dropping things on them from above.

I’ve washed and inspected pallets of strawberries, and I’ve seen what gets washed off of them. The amount of just dirt in unbelievable, but everything that is grown outside is visited by things that live outside and sometimes those things (the little ones) hitch a ride on the strawberries.

Does organic make a difference? Only as far as some of the pesticides go, birds, bugs and dirt are still the same.

Strawberries must be washed thoroughly and then dried completely. Washing them under cold running water for several minutes will do the job. (don’t spray too hard.. you don’t want to pulverize them, and hot water will cook them). Make sure you flip the berries to get complete coverage and rinse out under the leaves.

Drying the berries is important since any water in your chocolate will cause it to seize (get clumpy). When I’m doing a lot of berries at home I line a cookie sheet with a clean towel, or lots of paper towels, and put the freshly washed berries on the sheet. Then I put another layer of towels on top of the berries, lightly pushing down the towels between the berries. I then take the whole tray, towels and all, and put it the fridge for at least a half hour.

Just before I start dipping (while the chocolate is being tempered) I remove and hand dry each berry, with a paper towel,  putting them on a separate tray. Swap your paper towel with a  dry one as needed. Make sure there is no moisture hiding under/in the leaves as it can ruin your day.

If you look at the older posts you’ll see how to temper chocolate at home.. with this info and a little practice you’ll be dipping line a pro.

It’s August 31^th and the current Facebook fan count is 171.

Invite your friends to join our Facebook fan page and on the day the fan count crosses 2010 we will post a link for a  30% off coupon. Please note that we are tracking only the CCBerries fan page not the CCBerries Facebook application page.

Limitations: coupon link will be posted for 48 hours, discount is for a single shipment with one dozen or less strawberries, can not be combined with other offers. Discount code must be added at the first step of checkout and can not be added at a later date. Can not be combined. Not valid for phone or fax orders. Limit one per customer.

While the discount code link will only be valid for 48 hours the delivery can be scheduled for any time between when the link is posted and the end of the year (12/31/2009). As normal we can only accept order and ship to addresses inside the USA (fresh fruit would be stopped by customs inspectors). Mixed gift boxes are included but pre-discounted gift sets of 2 or more dozen strawberries are not. This promotion expires 10/31/2009, if we have not reached 2010 fans by that date the offer is void.

As usual we allow you to select the chocoalte types for the strawberries, and we allow you to select either 16 or 32 bite sized truffles. The previous version of this gift set was one of our most popular.  Truffe flavors may include Strawberry Cheesecake, Raspberry, Caramel Pecan, Tiramisu, Cappccino, Hazelnut, Key Lime, Chai Tea,  Caramel, Ammaretto, Irish Cream, Hazelnuts, Coconut, Coffee Caramel, Rum, Kahlua, Mint, White, Milk, Dark, Lemon, Apricot, Grand Orange, Champagne, and Strawberry.

A common question we are asked is if the flavors contain any alcohol: they do not, because of federal regulations limiting the amount of alcohol that can be in the products (to just 5%), it’s not worth it and as a result no alocohol is in our products.

The truffles in each box will be an assormet, because of the volumes involved we can not allow you to select the truffles included, but every box is sure to have a varied assortment.

We’ve added these new gift boxes to 35 catagories (including the undecorated catagory), so if you want them for Birthdays, Christmas, Love (romance), or just about any occasion or Holiday: there are versions to match.

As time permits we’ll be adding information on all sorts of things: everything from new products to how to do some of your own chocolate work (even tempering). We’ll also be passing on some of our own recipes just for fun.