Wicked and inspiring Cacao Prieto

Everyone’s heard of Mast Brothers. Two charming, twee brothers from the Midwest. One incredible beans-to-bar factory in Williamsburg. Gorgeous packaging. Delicious products. Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. The world is in love with the Mast Brothers’ chocolate bars.

But what of Cacao Prieto?? Strolling through Red Hook, there were signs of sweetness ahead. But still, I wasn’t prepared for this gorgeous distillery-factory in the middle of this barren neighborhood.

Daniel Prieto Preston, formerly an aerospace engineer and inventor (!), opened the gorgeous beans-to-bar factory in 2009. His family owns cacao plantations in the Dominican Republic, which is where his beans come from. While working with them, he noticed the alcoholic wash produced during the fermentation of the cacao seeds. This lead to a line of sweat cacao rums and the first rum distillery license in New York City since prohibition.

 Not only do they produce delicious rums and beautifully packaged 72% dark chocolate bars, with post cards designed by Brooklyn artist SophieBlackall…

… but master chocolatier Damion Badalamenti also makes fresh bonbons—like the sugar-rich, rum-filled Conquistador beauties.

 All in all, an amazing dose of discovery, inspiration and deliciousness.

Milk chocolate + apple crumble = more trouble

Speaking of nostalgia, I found another Dolfin bar that put me over the edge.

It elicited an indulgent mood, recalling nights of Speculoos dinners and afternoons spent lingering over tea and crumbles.

Or maybe it was just the flavor: “Memories of Summer Apple Crumble”.

I’m sorry, how could anyone ever pass up a chocolate bar with a name like that??

Or maybe it was just me, looking for an excuse to buy another chocolate bar…

Milk chocolate + Speculoos = Trouble

I am nothing if not a sucker for Speculoos. And now that I’ve discovered Dolfin makes a milk chocolate bar with Speculoos, I am in big trouble.

The Biarritz chocolate train

How do I explain this one? A sixth sense for cacao? An exquisitely attuned nose that enables me to detect almond paste from over 400 miles away? Faith that any place in France is going to have to-die-for bonbons?

When I booked my trip to Biarritz, I knew rugby, pelote and thalassotherapy spa treatments were big. But I had no idea that the region had a storied chocolate history. I swear.

It was only on the TGV from Paris, furiously cramming to create my two-day itinerary, that my eyes came across this info and my heart skipped a beat: a chocolate museum? Vraiment?? And when I was searching for my hotel and passed three chocolatiers within 100 yards of each another, well, it was only then that I believed my beach weekend was taking a delicious detour (bikini be damned!).

The chocolate museum, Planete Musée du Chocolat, is (no pun intended) a sweet little place. It starts you off with a film about where and how chocolate is produced and then offers a handful of galleries devoted to chocolate molds and sculptures (created by Serge Couzigou), vintage advertising and packaging, and tools and machines from around the world and through the eras. At the end of the visit, you’re rewarded for your attentiveness with a cup of rich hot cocoa. And, of course, you’re spit out into the museum shop, where you can buy the house chocolate bars, bonbons, cocoa and cakes.

I skipped the shop to do my chocolate shopping at the local chocolatiers.

Henriet and Adam are located across the street from each other, reminding me of separated lovers—Henriet, traditional and decorated in pretty blue.




And Maison Adam, dark, sleek and contemporary.




Both have similar selections—chocolate bars, bonbons and bouches; marzipan molds and bricks, and pastries including the regional specialty, Gateau Basque.




The Gateau Basque comes in several variations. One, a drier, circular shortbread cake is filled with cherry preserves. The other is also made with shortbread pastry, but it’s a flatter, denser square slice that sandwiches a lemony custard filling. The former is from Maison Adam, the former from Henriet.

At both chocolatiers, the pates d’amandes—one of my favorite things—came in a spectacular array of flavors and varieties: raspberry, lemon, pistachio, pine nut, vanilla, chocolate…




Sometimes it was sliced and packaged like a chocolate bar, sometimes smaller bite-sized pieces were rolled in sugar and sold like a bag of suckers. It was delicious both ways.




And the chocolate bonbons were equally adventurous and divine: milk chocolate with passionfruit ganache, dark chocolate with African tea, praline with lemon and coriander, salty, floral, spicy… really, had I known I was training straight into chocolate paradise, I would have stayed for more than a weekend.




There was no time for La Maison de Kanouga or Daranatz (with those cheerily wrapped chocolate bars).





But, now that I know Biarritz’s sweet secrets, I’ll make sure the next visit is for an entire week.

Fudgy and free

Baked goods have a way of making people feel better. Especially when they're free. So if you're out indulging in retail therapy (or torturing yourself by "just looking") at Henri Bendel this month, beat it to the third floor. Whisper the words “Brownie Bailout” and the fine folks at Alison Nelson's Chocolate Bar will give you a free brownie. Seriously.

Mondays through Thursdays, 3 -8 p.m.
712 Fifth Avenue, 3rd floor

Peanut butter. And some jelly.

I was pretty sure that Violette & Ruby made a pb & j cookie and that Baked had a pb & j brownie. Either one of those would have kicked Hill Country's pb & j cupcake. (Oh my, remember that??)


But, sadly, I was mistaken. Still, I can't get pb&j off the brain. At least there are other rich, savory snack situations. To wit…

Peanut butter sandwich cookies from the Treats Truck and Bouchon Bakery.

Peanut butter brownies at Baked, and peanut butter hot cocoa at Jacques Torres (um, since apparently it's winter already).

Peanut butter cupcake (with a chocolate ganache center) from Sweet Revenge.

And the best ever: City Bakery's peanut butter cookie.

To tart up the nuttiness, there are even jammie treats. Like Chocolate Bar's raspberry jam Retro Bar. And the raspberry brownie from the Treats Truck.

And for the truly gluttonous: fried pb & j at Mama's Mudsliders.

The mixing bowl: Alison Nelson

I've been a fan of Alison Nelson's chocolates since I tasted her peanut butter caramel Retro Bar. Dee-lish. But now that she's moved the original Chocolate Bar from the West Village to my 'hood, the East Village, there's some fresh sampling to be had.

Growing up, my favorite sweet was:
Charleston Chew

My favorite sweet now is:
PBJ Truffle

My personal favorite from Chocolate Bar:
Spicy brownie with vanilla gelato.

What I love about the East Village is:
It’s still funky and a little bit edgy.

Truffles or pralines:
Pralines, if done well.

White, milk or dark:
Dark

Caramel, ganache or cream:
Ganache

The perfect pairing:
An americano with salted caramel truffles.

I'd love to create a flavor for:
Dolce & Gabbana. I own nothing of theirs and would never qualify to wear anything of theirs. But I love their style, the risks they take and their overall brand.

Kitchen essentials:
Whisk, scale, measuring cup & spoons, and a saucepan.

Style essentials:
Great-fitting jeans, wife beaters and ballet flats.

Chocolatiers I admire:
Gustaf Mabrouk, Ilene Shane, Andrew Shotts.

I'm most inspired when:
I walk my dog in Chelsea early morning or late night. My brain clears out and just goes into dream/creative mode.

How much is too much?
Cheese only belongs with chocolate if it’s chocolate cheesecake.

Favorite movie snack:
Junior Mints

Guilty pleasure:
Guinness with peanut butter and dark chocolate on toast.

Other favorites:
Right now, loving the Flobots and the new Cold Play CD. Elliot Smith and Cake are my all time favorites though. Can’t live without pasta, hot pastrami on rye, or cheese. Favorite books are The Great Gatsby by Fitzgerald and Ham on Rye by Bukowski. Favorite movie is Breakfast at Tiffany’s. And I am totally guilty of watching America’s Next Top Model with my kids (ages 5 and 2).

Obsesssion of the week: Unusual pairings

I haven’t been able to get Batch off my mind and only wish I made a commission for every Sweet Freak I sent to the bakery. Pichet is the master of sweet-savory concoctions. Who else would marry salted caramel frosting with carrot cake?

Then there’s the sweet-salty combo of Mast Brothers’ Fleur de Sel chocolate bar. It’s 81% cacao infused with flecks of salt, awakening taste buds all over the tongue.

And while lavender might make you think of potpourri and chamomile, granny tea, when the two flavors are put together as they are in Amai’s cupcake, it makes for a lovely-weather indulgence.

Salty sweet

How about this sweet-salty thing?

Next to lavender and honey, sea salt seems to be the ingredient of the season (smoked salt truffles at Kee's, salted caramel bonbons at Chocolate Bar, chocolate caramel sea salt tarts at How Sweet It Is — dig in.).

Baked's got the goods, too.

In addition to super flavors like peanut butter, spicy and the good old classic deep dark brownie, there's a sweet & salty brownie that's infused with caramel and fleur de sel.

The fudgey brownie is sprinkled with large flecks of sea salt, creating an irresistible punctuated texture, and putting those taste buds to work. Even though the sweet and salty taste buds are both concentrated at the front of your tongue, the combination creates a sensory experience that plumbs the depths of taste appreciation: rich, bitter, thick, chocolaty, sonorous. Another bite of happiness.

Raising the Bar

After a trip to chocolate bar, you’ll never look at a Snickers again.

Upon entering Alison Nelson’s chocolate bar, it takes the discipline of a monk to pass by the Kahlua-and-cream bonbons or decline a peppermint mocha. But ultimately chocolate bar is the destination for — you guessed it — chocolate bars. Happily, it doesn’t disappoint.

With flavors like milk sesame and white chocolate infused with lime, the big blocks of Brown Label chocolate ($6.25) are for true gourmands. Me, I went straight to the two lines that are more kid-in-a-candy-store-fun.

Retro Bars ($3) boast such nostalgic ingredients as raspberry jam and caramel apple, but are made with today’s high-quality cocoa. Of the six flavors, the Salty Pretzel is the most popular with its nearly perfect sweet-salty balance and delicately crunchy texture. But for my money, the scene-stealer is the Peanut Butter Caramel, which tastes like a Tagalong Girl Scout cookie — very nostalgic, indeed.

To counter the guilt of chomping into a 2.25-ounce chocolate bar, try an Artist Bar ($4). The ten flavors come in wrappers designed by cool pop artists, such as Gary Baseman and David Horvath, with a portion of the proceeds going to the Third Street Music School Settlement in the East Village. The Milk Chocolate with Hazelnuts is enveloped in a portrait of a red Cyclops in mid-bite, and is all the invitation I need to tear in myself.

Chocolate Bar
48 8th Avenue
212.367.7181