Chocolate & Bourbon Tasting at ChocoVivo

Patricia, the owner

On Tuesday night, I went to a chocolate and bourbon tasting at ChocoVivo, as part of Yes Address LA, Sip Taste LA and EventBrite's series showcaseing local businesses around LA. I'd driven past ChocoVivo several times, since it's fairly close to my apartment, and I've always thought about going on. When I saw this event not only taking place there, but also involving chocolate and bourbon, I knew it was meant to be!

Chocolate grinder

The owner, Patricia, spoke a bit before the tasting began, first about her background - she was an accountant but hated it, and ended up quitting to open ChocoVivo after getting interested in the concept of chocolate being food rather than just candy; then she talked about how the chocolate they have is all made in Mexico, where it's stone ground, the way the Mayans and Aztecs did it. The kind of chocolate we're all used to is made using the European process of refining and conching, and that's what makes that smooth, shiny texture. Because this Mexican-made chocolate is ground, it has a grittier texture, and is more pure.

The first set of tastings came out arranged in order on a flat wooden board. First, we chewed a piece of real sugar cane, and then ate a real cacao bean, before tasting the first chocolate sample. This one was my favorite. The bourbon was really good too. The next chocolate had a raspberry flavor to it. The nibs, on the far right in the picture, were good, but apparently contained a lot of caffeine. Since it was 8 at night and I felt like being able to sleep before dawn, I only tried a couple. Before the next set, we were given a watermelon palate cleanser!

I forgot to take the picture before I ate the chocolate and drank the bourbon, oops!

The next set of bourbons were much stronger, yet still somehow smooth! The chocolates were, of course, delicious as well. It was fun to eat and drink in one order to taste what flavors come out, and then reverse the order to see how different it was!

Their menu

I was very pleased to see a lot of people buying full bars of some of the chocolate we tasted. We're definitely going to go back and try their Flight of Milk and Cookies, and some frozen hot chocolate!

Yummmm

My Skincare Routine!

I like to change up my skincare routine every once in a while, just to keep things interesting. Here's what I've been doing lately:

In the morning, I use Trilane Retinol + Vitamin C serum. I'm obsessed with retinol and vitamin C lately - they're so amazing for your skin, and this serum from Trilane has both! You get skin smoothing glowiness, plus anti-agingness! It's not greasy at all, so it's perfect to use underneath my makeup.

In the evening, I remove my makeup with Pura d'Or argan oil, using a microfiber cloth. It's so much better to use mineral oils to take off your makeup than harsh makeup removers, plus you get the benefits of a moisturizer as well!

Then I cleanse my face with my new Clarisonic Mia. I just got it a few weeks ago and already it's my favorite thing ever!

I recently added a new step - using a hyaluronic acid serum from Oz Naturals. Hyaluronic acid helps transport your moisturizer more effectively to your skin, and it's great for anti-aging (I think it's really helping with the fine lines around my eyes). (Bonus: OZ Naturals products are cruelty free!)

I let that set for a while,  then finish with Cerave moisturizer, which has been my go-to moisturizer for quite a while. It's so thick and moisturize-y!

Once a week, I use a facemask, usually some kind of Dead Sea Mud mask.

I'm offering a special readers only discount code for your very own bottle of Trilane Retinol + Vitamin C serum! Use SAVERETC to save 20% off!

Disclaimer: I received products from OZ Naturals and Trilane for reviewing purposes.

Summer Movies!

Summer is my favorite season, due in no small part to the abundance of blockbusters that come out! There are more than a handful that I'm looking forward to seeing this summer! Here are the ones I'm most excited for!

Pitch Perfect 2 (May 15) - The amazing Anna Kendrick returns to sing some more mashups with her college acapella group and just generally be perfect. I'm seeing this one tonight, and just rewatched the first one a couple days ago to get ready!

San Andreas (May 29) - A massive earthquake hits LA, aka one of my fears since moving here. Unfortunately I don't think The Rock will be around to save me like in this movie. I love disaster movies anyway, and I'm definitely going to see this one in 4D so I can really feel those earthquakes!

Jurassic World (June 12) - OMG I can't wait to see this! Jurassic Park has opened for business, against the better judgement of anyone with common sense, and predictably, and the dinosaurs go cray cray. Chris Pratt does some Chris Pratt things and presumably saves the day. New dinos abound and it's gonna be awesome!

Inside Out (June 19) - I confess I don't know a ton about this movie. But it's from Pixar and it's got Amy Poehler, so that's pretty much all you need.

Terminator: Genisys (July 1) - I love the Terminator movies, so I'm hopeful that this one can at least try to be as good as the first two. One of the trailers recently revealed a pretty big plot twist, that John Conner becomes some kind of human/machine hybrid in the future. t That's pretty crazy; let's see if it works in the context of the movie!

Ant-Man (July 17) - Marvel and Paul Rudd seems like a pretty winning combination! I saw some test footage literally like 2 or 3 years ago at Comic Con, and it looked phenomenal. I just hope this movie won't suffer from it's behind the scenes drama with director Edgar Wright leaving under mysterious circumstances.

I'm also definitely going to see these:

Tomorrowland (May 22) - So I'm not entirely sure on the plot on this one, something about Disneyland and George Clooney? Whatever, I'm in.

Entourage (June 5) - I enjoyed the TV show, okay?? It was mostly-harmless fun.

Ted 2 (June 26) - The first one was funny, right? 

Magic Mike XXL (July 1) - Do I even need to explain why?

Vacation (July 31) - I liked the original National Lampoon movies, and hopefully this one will live up to it!

Fantastic 4 (August 7) - Kind of meh about this, but as it's a Marvel movie, I will dutifully go see it.

Things I Love Thursday - Maxasorb Melatonin, Beautiful Creatures, Adovia Dead Sea Mud Mask

Vita Sciences Maxasorb Melatonin Cream!

I sometimes go through periods where it's really hard for me to fall asleep. I've tried taking melatonin pills, and that usually helps a lot. Melantonin is the thing that helps regulate your sleep cycle and is typically recommended for insomniacs.

Vita Sciences sent me their Maxasorb Melatonin Cream to try. Instead of taking a pill to get your melatonin on, you just rub it on your arms and legs before bedtime, so not only are you getting sleep help, you're also getting softer skin, since it's got aloe and vitamin E! It not only helps you fall asleep faster, it'll also help you feel less fatigued during the day, which I pretty much always do.

After putting it on, I definitely did feel sleepier faster, and I think I had deeper sleep than I would have had otherwise. It doesn't immediately make you feel tired, it's sort of gradual, which is the way falling asleep should be anyway.

Beautiful Creatures!

Beautiful Creatures is, I suppose you could say, just one in a long line of supernatural romance YA books. No vampires or werewolves here, though, just witches, or as they prefer to be called 'casters'. I read it on the plane back from the Dominican Republic, and couldn't put it down, even though I had plenty of other books, movies, games, and TV at my disposal! It's told from the perspective of Ethan, a teenager who has lived in this small Southern town his whole life when a mysterious teenage girl shows up. The girl, Lena, is from a family of casters who go good or bad when they turn 16 - no choice in the matter, they just arbitrarily are light or dark. Lena is terrified of turning dark, like her cousin did, and her uncle is desperate to keep her safe. It took a little while to get into, but once I did, I really enjoyed it. It's the first in a 4 book series called The Caster Chronicles

Adovia Purifying Dead Sea Mud Mask!

Dead Sea mud masks are so hot right now! And they should be, they're super awesome. I really like this one from Adovia. It goes on nice and thick, which I love. I want a face mask to feel like an actual mask; that's how I know it's working! This one unclogs your pores, leaving your face more youthful and clear looking! It reduces blackheads and blemishes and helps with oily skin. I definitely noticed my skin looking glowier after using it. I think this one is my new go-to face mask!

My Trip to the Dominican Republic!

We recently spent a few days in the Dominican Republic for our friends' wedding. We stayed at the Now Larimar resort in Punta Cana. It was so incredibly beautiful there! Our time in paradise was short, but we managed to cram quite a bit in and have an amazing time.

The resort was really lovely. Upon arriving, we were handed glasses of some tropical boozy beverage - the first of many drinks of our stay! Everyone we encountered was helpful and friendly (almost a little too friendly for my comfort, but maybe I'm just jaded). From the building our room was in, we could walk directly out into the pool area, and from there it was just a very short walk down to the beach! The food was plentiful - there were a buffet that was open almost all day, a beach-side grill, and several a la carte restaurants that served French, Japanese, Mexican, and steak.

At night, they held various entertainment things in the courtyard. One night there were fire jugglers and acrobatics, and another there was karaoke. During the day, there were several pools to lay by with more than enough lounge chairs and hammocks; not to mention the gorgeous beach with it's bathtub-like warm water and very few waves. There are several off-resort excursions you can do. We took a sunset cruise with the wedding group that included snorkeling, and took us to a location pretty far from the resort where we could wade around in the shoulder deep water for a while.

I've only been to the Caribbean once before, and that was on a cruise, so I didn't totally know what to expect of this trip. It made packing a bit difficult, and I ended up bringing probably more clothes and things than I needed. Here are a few of the things I would consider essential!

*Multiple swimsuits - so you can always have a fresh one while waiting for the other one or two to dry.
*Tank tops - great for throwing over swimsuit tops.
*A light shrug or cardigan - throw these over the tank tops you've already thrown on over your swimsuit, and you're ready to go to dinner!
*Several dresses - you don't need anything fancy, just something breezy that you can throw on to go to dinner, or to walk around in.
*Sunglasses - duh. But buy a cute cheap pair from Target, because they'll probably get scratched up from the sand (like mine did).
*Cash - bring singles and fives to give as tips to people that help you. Though it always made me feel like an asshole to be like, "Thanks a lot, here's one whole dollar for your trouble." But apparently it's the thing to do.
*An actual physical book - it was a little hard to read my Kindle in the bright sun, and also I worried about leaving it on my lounge chair unattended. I basically used it as a de facto purse, putting my room key and cash for tips in the pages. You barely need anything else, besides maybe sunglasses and chapstick!