Back in San Diego, CA the Pearsons ‘break ‘n bite’ together with their new favorite bar: Fortunato No. 4.
One too hot for The Smithsonian to handle.
They asked a friend to approach The Smithsonian with a proposal for an unveiling of Fortunato No. 4 after it hosted an all-day symposium, Chocolate: From Mayan Worship to Modern Wonder, in October 2010.
The institution’s phenomenal archives & research history, as well as the fact that Marañón presents an America story that – considering chocolate’s reach – effects the Western Hemisphere both in its front & back yards, seemed a perfect & proper fit. They felt it truly belongs there & it’d be a coup for the Smithsonian too (political pun unintended, of course).
That was precisely the problem.
The Smithsonian declined on the grounds that it’s too political! The Pearsons keep this memo in their office as both proof & as a trophy to hang on the wall.
Outside their picture window, they can see & hear the Pacific waves roll in at a steady cadence to the chocolate meltdown known as their Fortunato No. 4.
Chocolypse Now. Gringo always could surf. He sailed to the New World on tides of hope & possibility in the first place. The smell of victory was, is & forever will be chocolate. Pakal, Ahuitzotl, Nezahualcoyotl, Cortés, Blackbeard, Washington & Patton all savored that.
Every time an appreciator around the world rips open their wrapper & snaps off a piece, they can make out that the sound of ‘bite me’ has a brand new ring.
It re-affirms that chocolate is the elixir of human ingenuity.
