Mocha

Coffee and chocolate combined have a complementary effect, which means drinking a mocha wakes you up and puts you in a good mood.High-quality chocolate, strong coffee, and a big mug--basic tools of the trade for Mocha, the sophisticated follow-up to Michael Turback's best-selling Hot Chocolate. Presented in a compact yet luxurious collection, Mocha offers nearly sixty recipes featuring the companionable ingredients of chocolate and coffee. Ranging from cozy cocoa concoctions to caffeinated couture combinations, recipes include hot drinks (the Triple Chocolate Maple Passion hails from Toronto, where they know how to heat things up); cold, refreshing classics (the Black-and-White Espresso Milkshake is almost a meal); creative cocktails (Chocolate-Espresso Martini, anyone?); and outrageous desserts (the Mocha-Java Cheesecake is the richest and smoothest cheesecake ever). Recipe contributors include notable chocolatiers, popular coffee purveyors, preeminent restaurant chefs, and a competitive cadre of coffeehouse baristas.

 

MICHAEL TURBACK is a graduate of Cornell's School of Hotel Administration and a veteran restaurateur of 30 years. He currently works in the gourmet and specialty food products industry and is a founding partner of The New York First Company, an online department store. He lives in Ithaca, New York.

 THE AUTHOR SCOOP

Who would you cast as yourself in a movie of your life?
When I ran my restaurant in Ithaca, NY, we would often guess who would play each of the staff if they ever filmed the story of running a restaurant.  The consensus was that Clint Eastwood would have been tapped to play me:  "Go ahead, make my day."

Have you ever met a famous person?
Guest speakers and performers who visited Cornell would often be taken out to dinner at my restaurant, so over the years I met people like George McGovern, Geraldine Ferraro, William F. Buckley, John Houseman, Douglas Edwards, Carl Sagan, John F. Kennedy Jr., Betty Freidan, Andre Tschelicheff, Al Unser, Jr., Kim Alexis, Cousin Bruce Morrow, Peter Yarrow, and Neil Sedaka, to name a few.
 
Favorite cocktail?
Smoked-Tomato Bloody Mary (Stonecat Café, Hector, NY)

Favorite dessert?
Tin Roof Sundae (Tom's Ice Cream Bowl, Zanesville, OH)

Tell me something that people might not know about you.
As a long distance runner, I've completed 109 races of marathon distance or longer (includes five 50-mile trail races).