Featured artist: Marie Meszaros

Creating the beauty on shiny and matte brown surfaces and decorative sculptures, chocolate artisan Marie Meszaros takes the chocolates deliciously prepared by her mother, Mary Jane Meszaros and adds an artistic touch.  “I am really picky about the stripes, the contrast and how I place them on the chocolates”, stated Marie.

Not only does Marie have to keep the temperature of her chocolate canvas at a constant 66 degrees, the humidity under 55 percent and adheres to a time limit on how long the cocoa butter colors will accept and fuse to chocolates but her colors have to be tempered in a machine and used before they cool.  They also have to be marked to recognize what is inside each one for packing later.  Ms. Meszaros also works with chocolate clay that she makes herself.

Surrounded by the tools of the trade such as cutters, piping bags, parchment paper, a cooling tunnel, a cocoa butter temper machine and  polycarbonate molds just to mention a few, I was enthralled with the making of this art.

Originally from Cleveland Ohio, she and her mother have opened a shop called Mary Jane’s Fine Chocolates on Scottsville Road and are doing well making traditional favorites in milk, dark and white chocolates, such as peanut butter melts, French mints, almond bark, chocolate covered strawberries, and a variety of assorted truffles as well as unique varieties not found elsewhere in Bowling Green.  Even their fillings of high quality products are made in the store, so mistakes are costly and Ms. Meszaros is very attentive to her craft and said, “I really enjoy doing this even though it is quite labor intensive”.

Marie had instructional classes under Elaine Gonzalez for “Artistry in Chocolate” and graduated from the University of Wisconsin in Madison at the Ecole Chocolat Professional School of Chocolate Arts.  Through this two years of training and trial and error she has perfected many beauties some of which were created to represent our area such as their Lost River, Cave Shrimp, Bowling Creams, White Squirrels and Cave Critter candies.

Mary Jane said, “Even as a child Marie has always been creating something”.  In addition to the candies, Marie also created their logo and all of their packaging that artfully displays their chocolates. “I have always loved Norman Rockwell’s works so after pouring over ads I made our logo image like his art”.

You can contact Marie by email at:  mrieski.bene@gmail.com or visit her at their store at 1640 Scottsville Road.

About the author: Ronnie Jaggers is a seasoned sculptor, fine artist and master crafter. Her work can be seen on ChiseledFeaturesStudio.com. She reminds other artists “Trust the beauty of your art, for if you see the beauty, others will too.” To be considered for the featured artist call Ronnie at 791-3505 or email ChiseledFeaturesStudio@yahoo.com