Corporate Gifting

Several years ago, I wrote a blog about my job responsibility of employee recognition. Along with this task, I was also responsible for finding the perfect holiday gift to recognize our customers and thank them for our business partnership.

I really enjoyed this part of my job but was surprised each year by the difficulty of the task. I am a highly skilled shopper with YEARS of training – just ask my husband. So finding something that expressed appreciation AND would be valued by the recipient should have been a piece of cake piece of chocolate.

The difficulty was finding a gift that contained a quality product, looked festive, and could be enjoyed by many staff members, rather than a single business contact.

Van Otis offers several corporate gift options in their gift guide that will relay your company’s sincere appreciation. Each option contains handcrafted confections and/or Van Otis’ cashews and popcorn, wrapped in elegant and festive packaging. You can check out your options at www.vanotis.com or stop by the retail shop in Manchester to place an order.

Happy New Rears!

A week ago, I actually caught myself strategically thinking, “If I eat this entire tin of Christmas cookies now, they’ll no longer be a temptation.” I’m one smart cookie. Pun intended.

Many of us go from overeating during the holidays to extreme dieting beginning in early January. During the month of December, you couldn’t find an empty spot in the workplace refrigerator without shoving aside a tray of finger rolls. Now the lunch room is full of yogurt, tossed salads, and a lot of commiserating coworkers.

Healthy people know that bouncing from one extreme to the other is no way to maintain consistent health and weight. It’s important to find satisfying treats that will stave off the need to go overboard.

Van Otis Chocolates offers an all natural line of gourmet chocolate bars including milk, Cambra dark (72% cocoa), white, blueberry dark, blueberry milk, cranberry almond milk, cranberry almond dark, hazelnut milk, and hazelnut dark. I can attest that the blueberry milk chocolate bar is delicious and since it’s all natural, it doesn’t have the acidic bite that blueberry-flavored foods tend to have.

The all natural trail mix bark in milk or dark chocolate, all natural bark in milk or dark chocolate, milk chocolate-covered macadamia nuts, and mixed nuts or unsalted cashews are other wonderfully satisfying choices.

Warning: This Article May Contain Traces of Nuts

Our party hosts decided to make this past New Year’s celebration more interesting by having a wine tasting competition. Each guest was instructed to bring a covered bottle of wine from a specific country. The wine was to be accompanied by a food item and guests judged the best red, best white, and best wine/food combo. Wine-themed prizes, such as bottle openers and wine glass tags, were awarded to the winners.

This may give you the illusion of a sophisticated sort sipping expensive glasses of wine while discussing stock market trends. Honestly, it was a bunch of rural neophytes trying to branch out. Most of the crowd had a beer readied to wash away the real potential of a bad tasting vino.


There were some clear winners, and we all agreed that the food accompaniment really aided the standouts. The simplest combinations of red wine and chocolate, and one of my favorites, red wine and cashews were the best.


If you want to impress guests at your next party (or win the unfortunate set of wine glass tags that won’t wrap around your beer stein), strategically place dishes of Van Otis cashews near the conversation clusters. These cashews are extra large, giving them a well-deserved position in the appetizer category. They are also incredibly sweet; there’s no burnt or bitter aftertaste that you experience with most exaggerated shelf-life, retail nuts.

Cheers!

Like a Kid in a Candy Store

Quick…What’s the first thing you think of when you smell bread baking?

Extensive scientific research regarding the connectivity between smells and tastes to memories is available at the click of a mouse. You could dissect articles about olfactory neurons, odorant receptors, and neurosciences…snore… The fact is, smells and tastes evoke memories, and generally those memories evoke an emotion.

In this age of virtual reality, are we denying ourselves an opportunity to create sensory memories? I admit this is a heavy topic for a confectionary blog; but, consider the memory created by meeting a friend in a “chat room”. You missed an opportunity to smell a cup of coffee and see a real smile, rather than just a :0)

Van Otis Chocolates originated in 1935 and today, resides at 341 Elm Street in Manchester, New Hampshire. For over 75 years, devoted patrons have held strong memories associated with the shop’s smells, tastes, and sights. These “kid in a candy store” memories occur at age 5 and 65 because an early association was developed.

Do you have a Van Otis memory related to Easter bunnies, Swiss Fudge, or roasted cashews? Do you remember the feeling of being surrounded by display cases filled with sweet, vibrant, textured treats? Share your sensory memories with us and stop in to create more!