Every Fall, the best event of the year takes place: the Chocolate Show. Or, as EIC Jennifer Wright and I like to call it, “CHOCOLATTTTTTTTTTTE SHOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW.” Basically, a bunch of vendors fill up the Metropolitan Pavillion in Manhattan’s Chelsea neighborhood, lay out their chocolate-y wares in festive booths and politely demand you eat them. Without sounding like a chick lit cliche, it is fucking awesome.
Let’s take a look at what they had.
1. ChocMod
The first thing we ate were chocolate-covered marshmallows.
They don’t try to reinvent the wheel at the Chocolate Show.
2. Foodstuffs For Your Person
There’s always some purveyor of food-themed baubles (though non chocolate-specific vendors are few and far between). This year, we spotted these jam jar earrings amidst an array of other edible-looking jewelry, like ice cream cones and toasts. Precious indie fashion bloggers, take note.
3. Francois Payard
An ex got me a cake from Payard for my birthday a few years ago–the relationship didn’t work out, but the cake was righteous. Here are some chocolate bars of his, though they were also selling macarons and phenomenal double chocolate cookies.
4. Buzz Fudge
This is Buzz Fudge. They make alcohol-infused fudge. I can’t imagine you could get wasted off it, but you could definitely give yourself a terrible stomach-ache trying.
5. Chocolate Sculpture
Here’s a chocolate wine bottle. Look, as much as I love the Chocolate Show, they really dropped the ball on the chocolate sculpture front this year. Last year, a dude was carving a chocolate dragon before our eyes. It was tremendous. Maybe it’s just me, but I like dragons more than wine bottles.
[UPDATE: It is just me.]
6. Roni-Sue’s Pig Candy
Roni-Sue’s famous Pig Candy, AKA chocolate-covered bacon.
7. No Chewing Allowed
No Chewing Allowed makes soft, delicious French truffles and perversely sexual advertising materials.
8. Hudson Valley Naturals
We had to stop and look at these chocolates because they were so striking. I asked what was in them and the extremely polite young clerk hesitated, then asked if there was a sign beside them; indeed there was, but the French label said something like “d’Opium” and that didn’t illuminate much. Apparently they’re blood orange-flavored, which is to say, not filled with opium. So you can’t mix them with alcohol-infused fudge and get super fucked up. :(
Still, they sure are pretty.
9. Screme Gelato Creation
These people make crazy gelato flavors. Jennifer always makes a beeline for the caramel sea salt one; as you can see, it is caramel gelato stuffed with pretzel chips.
But it gets considerably more madcap after that:
I just like the idea of using a whole bottle of Patron as an ornament.
