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Paris chocolate tour with Chloe
The day after our visit to the Salon, Cyrus and I joined Chloe Doutre-Roussel‘s chocolate education/chocolate tour. It was pretty awesome. I’ve been wanting to meet her since I read her book, The Chocolate Connoisseur, several years ago. Her book helped me gain an understanding of fine chocolate and build a vocabulary to better explain…
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Paris Salon du Chocolat (Grand Publique) 2011
The Salon du Chocolat was everything I expected and more. It seemed like every chocolate shop in France represented there and every type of chocolate imaginable was for sale. Next to the showcases popping with colorful bon bons, there were booths with mountains of chocolate barks, dipped marshmallows, and macarons, over which the French are…
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Day One at the Salon Du Chocolat
We went up to Paris to see the opening day of the Salon Du Chocolat at the Porte De Versailles expo center. After a long subway ride, we arrived and excitedly went in! We left the kids back in Fontainebleau with Grandma and Grandpa. Don’t worry! They will come back to the Salon over the…
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World Chocolate Masters 2011 (preview)
We made it to the Salon du Chocolat! The chocolate masters are currently underway. Some of The best pastry chefs in the world are competing for the title of world chocolate master. They are making wild and wonderful chocolate sculptures and there’s a huddle of judges observing and calculating including my favorite Parisian chocolatier, Patrik…
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A tour of the chocolates of Fontainebleau
Fountainebleau is a town on the outskirts of Paris. We are here with Cyrus’ family who is visiting from the Netherlands and New York. The town is famous for its palace and palace gardens which date back about 400 years. To be honest, I don’t know much about the history of the place. I’ve been…
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A Chocolate-y Afternoon Tea Party
UPDATE: Cally herself will be in the shop with us for the afternoon! She is preparing 3 different tea blends, and will be selling some of her wares as well. This is a good chance to stock up and hear a bit about her future plans! Rachel, in particular, has been waiting to host a…
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Meeting Herr Mohr
I had an interesting meeting with a man who used to own a chocolate factory in the town of Maechtersheim where I lived as a child. His name is Mr. Mohr and he and his family once made chocolate in the region including a certain confection called “puffreis schokolade” which simply means chocolate and puffed…
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The Americans – Portland
While Portland may only have one bean-to-bar manufacturer (Woodblock), the flavours going on in Oregon are pretty exciting, with the likes of Cocanú, Shagùn, Alma and Xocolatl de Davíd all in the mix. I couldn’t resist filling my suitcase with “a few” bars for Rachel and I to sample back at the shop. Here’s how…
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Say hello to Vosges (and more Domori, Zotter and Venchi)
We’re starting to run out of shelving space in the shop, but last week we happily made room for items from Vosges, Domori, Zotter and Venchi. From Vosges we received Red Fire, Blood Orange Caramel and Black Salt Caramel bars, in addition to their famous Mo’s Bacon Bars in dark and milk. There’s also some…
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Our October Pick: Michel Cluizel’s Maralumi Lait
We were originally wowed by Michel Cluizel’s handling of the Maralumi Noir, made up of beans from his Papua New Guinea plantation. But then he sent us Maralumi Lait. Cluizel has an excellent record when it comes to dark-milks. Just taste the surprisingly bright and citrusy Mangaro Lait. His Maralumi milk keeps this trend going.…
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One night in Paris…
On route to visit my hometown in Germany, we stayed one night in Paris to catch up on some sleep and to try to overcome our jet lag. Our hotel was situated near the Gar de L’Est where we would catch our train to Mannheim the following day. We decided to do some sight seeing…
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New York: The beginning of the beginning
It’s our last day in New York and this evening we fly to Paris. We’ve spent the last few days here sorting ourselves out and getting mentally prepared for what will probably be the biggest trip of our lives. I’ve discovered that there isn’t much one can do in terms of preparations except to just…
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Gearing up for our first leg, preparing for Paris!
We leave for Europe on October 6th and our preparations for our departure are reaching a fever pitch. We will be visiting some family in Germany for a week, and then we go to Paris and prepare for the Salon du Chocolat. We might even get to go to the famous Chocolate Fashion Show (Click…
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