Thanks MissyD - I looked on the website under the dining link on the left side of the page but it didn't come up. I'm thrilled that it's still active. I will be dieting from now until April...

http://chicago.peninsula.com/pch/dining_03.html

i didn't look hard enough... because apparently its available Thursday too.

Chocolate Bar
Thursday - 7:00 pm to 11:00 pm
Friday and Saturday - 7:00 pm to 12:00 am

How about the first ever FT Chocolate DO? I will be in Chicago April 23 - 27! Let's eat!!:p

I fell in love with Leonidas while in Lille about 10 years ago. Now whenever I or any of my friends go to Europe, we're required to bring about 10 boxes of pre-packed pralines back with us!

They have two shops here in the NoVa/DC area that sell the pre-packed chocolates, but none with the "select your own" pralines.

Only if we get to DO Vosges :D

Interesting that CHI should be such the chocolate epicenter in the US, I would have innocently thought of NYC first. But hey, if the theme is chocolate then I'm all over it!

Does that mean I have to fly AA or UA into ORD? :confused:

Hey, I don't have any idea if Chicago really is the chocolate epicenter of the world (CEW), but the combination of "Chocolate at the Pen" and my already scheduled trip to Chicago is reason enough for me. It really would be great to do a chocolate DO though, wherever that might take us. I would think there might be a number of cities in the running for "CEW" and if we get a consensus, I'm IN!!:D

Chocolate DO
 

I am not quite sure about my favorite chocolate. Prefer to keep on testing :D

As a suggestion for a chocolate DO, Cologne even has a chocolate museum!!!

Does anyone have a recommendation for a US city that would be in the running for a chocolate DO? As I said above, I only brought up Chicago because I'm going anyway and staying at the Pen. The more I thought about this over the weekend, the more I thought it might really be fun. So ...

What are the nominees for US chocolate central? Hershey, PA? NYC? SFO - Ghirardelli?

It wouldn't be the first... there have been several Chocolate-centric FT events ... including Chocolate at the Pen.... but there is always room for another. :)

Seattle has some award winning chocolatiers.

Fran's and Theo


Come to think of it, maybe I'll put the Theo Factory tour on the list of SeaDoo events this year.

Excellent and maybe a group dinner at cache?

Oh Chocolate! with Bellevue and Seattle stores is also pretty damn good, but not to the caliber of Fran's.

lala

Forget all that, go to New York during the big chocolate show and Jacques Torres etc.

Link to the salon du chocolat

I saw this at Whole Foods the other day and picked one up out of curiosity. Though I posted in this thread a while ago, I hadn't read the recent comments about the Bacon Bar.

Wow! It's really good!

It's also kind of spendy...their price was $6.99. Ouch :( I'll have to find a cheaper place to get another!

i once had this chocolate in Germany that was so incredibly delicious....it came in a darkish red packaging and for the life of me, i can not remember what it was....does anyone have any clue what it could be?

I don't think it gets any cheaper..but if you find a source let me know!

I bought my boyfriend one at the Vosges shop in Chicago for $7, and then saw them later at Whole Foods. It was pretty tasty. Even his 17 year old daughter who saw it and went into a "eww thats gross" diatribe, tasted a piece by accident, and ended up consuming half the bar.

Name-check for Meiji.

Somehow my pack of 28 Meiji Black has become a pack of 14. :eek:

Those 20g blocks are a fine advertisement for Japanese sweets. ^

I did seriously upset Airport Security several years ago. Had on an over-sized raincoat with lots of pockets all over. In those pockets I'd tucked 14 Cadbury bars (had to get one of each flavor), plus some Easter Eggs. What I didn't think of was they were each wrapped in foil.

Even after I took them all out, explaining I was a grandmother on the way home, they insisted on another very thorough wanding.

Romelle

My choice when main-lining chocolate is those big Ghardelli chunks one can buy very reasonably at Trader Joe's.

Chocolate Fix
 

How do you like your chocolate fix?

Do you go for;
Premium chocolate
Midmarket chocolate
Mass market basic chocolate
Chocolate with flavouring (orange, mint, sea salt etc)
Chocolate covering a biscuit/wafer


Do you have the same kind of chocolate each time or does your chocolate fix vary by time of day or mood?

Is there a chocolate you can't bear? I can't stand very dark or bitter chocolate. I just don't see the point of it.

When is your next fix?

Annoyingly, I love dark chocolate, but it's an incredibly effective migraine trigger (and for particularly nasty migraines, too - last time I had some of this, I managed to get lost a couple hundred yards from home.

Otherwise, I'm flexible. I love:

• G&B Maya Gold or Butterscotch
• Lindt Excellence Chilli
• Hotel Chocolat* Billionaire's Shortbread (and frankly, half the other things they do)
• Proper French profiteroles - filled with ice cream and covered in a thick, hot, dark chocolate sauce (which you save some bread to dip in too)
• The various chocolate spreads at Le Pain Quotidien
• M&S Belgian Chocolate Flapjack
• An obscure cardamom-flavoured chocolate that I've never found again

Next fix? There's some Waitrose Millionaire's Shortbread with my name on it at home...

* dangerous, as I have their outlet shop not too far from me...

I fell in love with very dark chocolate when I spent four months in Roma.

The darker the better.

I don't want chocolate very often, I have a savory, not a sweet, tooth.

But when I do want chocolate, it is generally dark and ideally involves some caramel. I will also indulge in an English chocolate bar once every few months (Lion Bar, Toffee Crisp, Malteasers, Cadbury's caramel or fruit & nut, etc)

I also have a soft spot for dark chocolate covered orange peel or cherries, Charbonnel & Walker Rose & Violet creams, Quality Street (but only at Christmas) and Bendicks Bittermints (the latter are so very delicious and worth trying if you get the chance!)

I HATE chocolate with chilli, chocolate with salt, and caramel with salt - sweet should be sweet, end of!

I really like G&Bs chocolate with sea salt in it. It's the right mix of sweet and salty.

There is a baker on Greys Inn Road, London that does a chocolate salted caramel brownie which is divine.

Otherwise I'm a purist and go for a pure chocolate bar. My favourite being G&Bs milk chocolate with a higher cocoa content than standard.

i was impressed by vahlrona hot chocolate recently

although there is a chocolate shop in venice that makes hot chocolate by melting chocolate, with zero milk

i agree re unadulterated, i actually go as far as not liking a lot of european desserts. while i can have expensive taste for food and beverage, and i appreciate a good pastry chef in terms of preparation, for dessert i am really a plain chocolate, vanilla, lemon person. pretty much only other flavors when gelato/sorbetto.

I don't eat chocolate that often, so I will enjoy whatever I can find or whatever is presented to me.

I love dark chocolate. Love it with caramel, with mint, with sea salt, or plain. Had a delist wasabi chocolate in Belgium. Cinnamon chocolate is great too. Mm chocolate. More please

Same here. I haven't had a chocolate bar in probably 15 years. Does nothing for me.

Savory/salty is the way for me. I like Chex Mix. :D

Duncan Hines Rich & Creamy Milk Chocolate frosting out of the container with a spoon :D :D

I'm not a huge chocolate person, but I do prefer milk chocolate to dark/bitter chocolate. Usually with a glass of red wine.

Cheers.

A good dark chocolate ( > 70% cocoa) and a nice glass of Porto ;)

Learnt to appreciate the % of cocoa when i visited a Salon du Chocolat nearly 20 yrs ago. One lady , owner and artisan of chocolat in Paris , taught me a lot about cocoa and the mfrg of chocolate. Too bad the salon has become too big these days to have that type of one-on-one interaction.

I like dark but not too dark, the 85% stuff is too much, it loses something.

dark premium chocolate.

Or if there is nothing else available ... peanut M&M's.

I'll just say....yes!:p:D

I start each and every day with half of a trader joe dark chocolate bar. It is the first thing I do in the morning. They are made in Belgium and I have heard by a very respected chocolatier who does private label for TJ. They come in a 3 pack and are very good. If having milk chocolate I will go for Lindt. Love Perugina Baci too.
Cooks Illustrated did a chocolate chip blind test and I think Guittard won. Or maybe it was Ghirardelli.

Chocolate and cognac is great as well.

Am not a fan of dark chocolate, love milk chocolate. Even though there is a great chocolatier down the street from me, mind you love his chocolates, I still like a bite of snickers/ flakes/kitkat and cadbury milk chocolate.

Though I tend to side with savory.

I love dark chocolate. I took a chocolate making class once and we tasted chocolate as the Aztecs drank it (it was horrible - no sugar in it at all). In the class I made dark chocolate pyramids with a cardamom cream filling. They were amazing!

I do not like milk chocolate. I am not tempted at all by it. Not fond of white chocolate either, though I do enjoy white chocolate chip and macadamia nut cookies every now and then.

There are a couple of places in Toronto that do that - you know I am having a really bad day when I sneak off there!

Preferably dark and preferably Belgian. I used to say I'd settle for anything chocolate, but then I had some truly awful stuff I bought in Ghana.

I must try with those VSOP bottles we brought home ;)
No milk chocolate for me but some nice dark "truffles au chocolat" will disappear fast in my house

Some of the Lindt truffles are very good...I think Kohl's carries them around Christmas.

While in Mongolia, of all places, I got to try some former east-bloc chocolates imported from Poland and they were good (mostly of the filled type).

Peanut butter flavor M&Ms are a triumph of sorts of American ingenuity, and maybe they'll bring back the peanut butter/strawberry jelly ones of a few years back.

Cadbury seems to have the most straightforward of the milk-chocolate recipes, followed by Nestle and then Hershey (which has staked out a unique Hershey taste).

As with beers, I'm sure there's a small-batch craft maker somewhere that runs circles around the mass-marketeers, but too much research in this area is dangerous for me.

Dark chocolates when there are no lemon/key lime bars, fruit tartes, creme brulees, cheesecakes, macarons (good ones), or various pastry treats at hand.

When you add flavors (like orange, even nuts), it becomes difficult to make valid comparisons. "Pure" dark chocolate IMHO is the best; I've tried several Swiss brands, Belgian etc., but find DOVE the best.