As a free­lance food and nutri­tion writer, I often am invit­ed to food indus­try events. Today’s field trip was to a lunch spon­sored by McCormick®, the folks whose spices you prob­a­bly have in your kitchen. Each year, McCormick joins with cooks to cre­ate the McCormick® Fla­vor Fore­cast, a snap­shot of tastes for the new year. My favorite fla­vor pair­ing for 2008 is chile pep­per and cocoa, the com­bi­na­tion found in Mex­i­can mole sauce (and in my choco­late chip cook­ies to which I acci­den­tal­ly added chili pow­der instead of cin­na­mon). We tast­ed a deli­cious choco­late and chile gela­to which you can cre­ate at home by stir­ring chili pow­der into soft­ened choco­late ice cream and refreez­ing until firm. Check out McCormick­’s web­site for all 10 fla­vor pair­ings, plus recipes.