BELGIUM STOPS BEING BORING.

I have always found Belgium boring. After my first visit there I had to stop over at Sri Lanka to revive myself. There was so much chocolate, I began to wonder if the Belgians could come up with nothing else. They can, the came up with the Manneken Pis. Good heavens!In Brussels the EU debated for decade to arrive at the definition of chocolate.NATO is headquartered there. They make you pay for phone calls you didn't make. The list grows. But suddenly there are fantastic chocolate ideas from Belgium.Visitors to the now running SIAL Food Exhibition in Paris were unanimous in praise of the creations from New Tree.

Under the brand name "Alpha" New Tree combines pleasure, surprise, elegance, health and innovation.In the midst of many offerings of dark, organic, fair trade, sustainable farming chocolates New tree was truly way above the competition.

"Alpha" combines omega-3 by adding flax seeds.Three flavours were offered chili, dark and thyme. With crisped rice.The judges praised the chocolate for a healthy promise associated with a pleasure promise through the originality of the flavours.

A New Tree artisan said that the challenge was to create a "good balance between taste, flavor and texture."

New Tree range is quite eclectic. Their elegant range is named, REJOICE, PLEASURE, REVIVE, FORGIVENESS, VIGOR, COMFORT, SEXY and BLUSH. Each was simply and elegantly wrapped.A few months ago Ophera Winfrey endorsed New Tree chocolate in her magazine
O.If she ever becomes President, wow New Tree will really go places. Their problem will be to keep on repeating their success.

These innovations by New Tree is certainly inspiring for us artisans far away here in Indonesia. In fact we did consider adding powdered flax seeds into our chocolate to boast about omega-3. Many of our face-to-face customers are well aware of the benefits of omega-3. In Europe, tracking studies show that in 2007, 723 omega-3 products were launched. In 2005 there were 291.

New Tree is a newcomer into the chocolate arena. The company was founded by Benoit de Bruyn a biochemist in 2001.The company is now actually located in the United States.