Dear Friends,

I hope you are doing or recovering well.

Another week starts and why don't we make it addictive with a chocolate therapy?

"What a wretched life a lady's maid leads! From morning till night working, sweating and toiling, and after all one's done there's nothing for oneself! I've been beating this for half an hour, And now the chocolate's ready; yet though my tongue's hanging out, must I just stand and smell it? Aren't my tastes just like yours?
O dearest ladies, You have the substance and I only the smell!
Damnit, I'm going to try it."

These words come from Despina, the servant in Cosi Fan Tutte. When Mozart and Da Ponte wrote the opera in 1789, the world was changing, people were fighting against inequality, a revolution was happening. But two years before, when they wrote Don Giovanni, they would have never imagined such a change.

It took only two weeks to our world to change. So let's just get high on chocolate.

Anne Mourier's Emergency Fund for Artists has raised $7000 in a 4 days. Thank you very much to you who have donated. Artists has been rewarded already.
You can still donate or apply. Pure chocolate.

Lucien Chef Ambition gives more cooking free online classes this week with a very special guest from Paris: Les Editions de l'Epure, a marvelous independent book publisher, with an even more marvelous collections of cookbooks.

Below check out the recipes and ingredients you need: it includes a fabulous Chocolate Cake, flourless and not baked!

And the bone on the chocolate cake goes to my beautiful lover Stephen Morrison - who is behind the camera during cooking classes - is making small dogs sculptures to keep you company during the confinement. You can get yours for $300 with 20% going to Food Bank for NYC.

Oh, and before I let you go into your trip, your weekly mandatory french lesson:

be sure "de ne pas être chocolat" - an expression that means "don't get ripped off".

Coronarely yours,
Lucien Zayan
Director

MORE UPDATES

Lucien Chef Ambition Instagram Live Cooking Classes
at 1pm EST
Tuesday March 31, Thursday April 2, Saturday April
Prepare your ingredients, the grocery list is here
This week, all the recipes come from Les Editions de l'Epure
a marvelous independent publisher (French and English)
Check out Dog Sculptures by Stephen Morrison to keep you company during your confinement.
Invisible Dog Artist Anne Mourier creates a fund for artists in need.
Join NY federal, state and local elected officials and freelancer advocates for a briefing on the impact of COVID-19 and advocacy for economic relief for artists, freelancers, and gig workers.
You cannot say anymore "I missed it, it was sold out" 1,2,4,5,6,7,8...

Huge hug to Marc Streit, director of Zurïch Moves, his festival was supposed to start today