Carving monuments out of chocolate

Master chocolatier Chef Adelbert Bucher shapes and moulds chocolate and takes care of every detail to ensure that his creations are flawless masterpieces.

   The chocolate maker from Switzerland was in the City to recreate Vidhana Soudha in milky white chocolate.

Adelbert Bucher is traversing a few cities across the country and recreating its historical monuments in chocolate.

“The Taj Mahal fascinates me the most. It’s a magnificent structure and its charm is incomparable. I have never visited the Taj Mahal but I will do so someday,” says Adelbert who thinks Indian sweets are too sweet, “there’s so much sugar and milk added in all the Indian sweets. I think there should be some balance,” he adds.

Recalling his favourite
Indian dish, that he once tasted in a restaurant in Singapore, Adelbert says, “I find Indian food too spicy. I just cannot take too much spice but there was this one dish - mutton layered with spinach. That was something I relished. It looked like the spinach had soaked up all the spice. It was just perfect,” he beams.

Adelbert manages to snatch very little time to sightsee the cities he visits.   
Adelbert’s skill lies in the detailing. He thoroughly researches the monument before he begins to recreate it.

“I source the history, site map and its measurements must be accurate,” he insists.
Adelbert’s recreation of the Vidhana Soudha measures eight feet long and two inch wide. It consumed nothing less than 400 kgs of chocolate.

“I have been working on this for the last four months. The domes, pillars and the many tiny windows are indeed tough to replicate. We spent hours moulding, cutting and making sure that nothing goes out of place,” he says. Adelbert hasn’t visited the Vidhana Soudha but gets a glimpse of it whenever he travels to and from the airport.
“The domes of the Vidhana Soudha resemble the pagodas. There’s an international finish to some of the structures in India,” he says. 

The benefits of chocolate are immense, “it’s all good as long as it’s consumed in limited quantities. The best chocolate I’ve tasted so far are from Switzerland. The chocolate you get in the US are rough but those that you get in Switzerland are smooth, shiny and silky. The cocoa and where it’s grown matter a great deal,” he observes.
Among the other replicas Adelbert has created are Emirates Towers in Dubai and the Blue Mosque  in Istanbul.