XOXO Chocolates

Is there anything we like more than receiving a box of chocolate products in the mail?



No. There is not.



XOXO Chocolates is a small, independent Las Vegas chocolatier and bakery. They make fudge and various types of bark and biscotti and brownies and just a whole host of delicious things. So we sampled some of them, as we are wont to do.



The white chocolate fudge (upper lefthand corner) was salty and sweet, with an excellent texture, the kind of soft that melts in your mouth.

The espresso fudge (upper righthand corner) was excellent if you're a coffee fan. It had a strong coffee flavor, and bits of coffee bean throughout it, to add texture.

The biscotti (lower righthand corner) was not very chocolatey-tasting. It was plain biscotti with raisins, so really the only chocolate came from the white and dark chocolate drizzled on top.

The bark (lower lefthand corner) was a little milky for my tastes, but the almonds added nice texture, and the white chocolate drizzled on top made it look pretty. I tried only this one kind of bark, but I can see on the website that they have peppermint bark (which is my favorite type) and sugar-free almond bark (which seems useful), so I think you just need to pick your flavor wisely.

The winner from my perspective was definitely the espresso brownie (in the center, with the bow). The brownie was straight-up delightful, and its frosting was what carried the coffee flavor, so you could easily scrape off some or all of it if you don't love coffee.

The prices are also reasonable. I think a package of XOXO Chocolates would make an excellent gift for someone--it certainly made an excellent gift for me!

BOTTOM LINE: An up-and-coming dessert company that clearly loves chocolate as much as we do

Grand Hyatt New York chocolates

Last week Grand Hyatt New York launched their own artisanal chocolate line, and we were lucky enough to get invited to the launch party! Their executive pastry chef Gonzalo Jimenez is the chocolatier, and he's making all the chocolates by hand, in small batches, using his one tempering machine.

Here's the chef himself:

Let's get a close-up on that sculpture next to him. What is that thing?

Oh, of course, it's a sculpture made entirely of chocolate. This is actually Gonzalo Jimenez's thing, and he has even competed in chocolate sculpture competitions. We asked him if it was stressful to carry those things around. He emphatically said yes. We asked if he'd ever dropped one. He even more emphatically said yes. This is one reason why I am not a chocolate sculptor.

This was a lovely event and we got to meet many like-minded chocolate fans. The Hyatt kindly also had a table that served non-chocolate foods, like in case someone somehow got tired of eating the amazing chocolates. Here is what that area of the room looked like:

Please compare that view with this hubbub of action near the chocolate table:

Okay, enough with the people-watching. Let's look at the rest of the collection.

There was delicious bark and bars in dark, milk, and white chocolate, all of which are made out of Valrhona. But the star of the line is clearly the bon bons.

The bon bons come in five flavors: passion fruit, citrus, nutella and truffle, coffee, and dulce de leche. I probably ate two of each one. My favorite to eat was the nutella and truffle; I loved how the filling came oozing out. I don't know which flavor is the most pleasing to the eye, though.

For now the bars and bon bons are sold only at the Grand Hyatt New York's Market, since this is just a one-man operation. Incidentally, in looking up the link for the Market, I learned that it's open 24 hours a day.

BOTTOM LINE: When delicious, handcrafted bon bons are available 24 hours a day, you have no excuse not to eat them.

Peppermint Bark Comparison Shopping

'Tis the season for peppermint bark!

By now, I think everyone on the Internet knows how we feel about chocolate-mint combinations: extremely positively. So obviously peppermint bark is the greatest part of December.

But which peppermint bark?

Well. Here are a few ideas.

These babies are from Cocoanuts, which we were raving about after our trip to Boston. They're like simple dark chocolate nonpareils, except with crushed candy cane instead of little sugar drops. Delightful.

This was a free sample from Ghiradelli. Not so good, my friends. The base is milk chocolate, and then there's a layer of what seems like white chocolate with peppermint flavoring in it. The texture was too creamy for me and just didn't have enough of that candy cane crunch. That said, Ghiradelli has an entire Limited Edition Peppermint Bark collection, so it's possible one of the other products performs better.



This is one of my favorite holiday treats: the Trader Joe's peppermint bark. I have not yet purchased a tin this year, which is why I have nothing to photograph for you. But it is a holiday classic: a layer of dark chocolate, a layer of white chocolate, and a layer of crushed candy canes. Perfection.

Who makes your favorite peppermint bark?

Storm Rations B5: Theo 70% Sea Salt Dark

Remember Sandy?  Wrapping up that situation with three final posts:

So the last bar I purchased for the car ride home was Theo's 70% Sea Salt bar.  I got this mostly for my lovely chauffeur, as sea salt is not my favorite thing in the world, but we did not get to it the whole drive.  I wound up breaking into it at my brother's house the following night.

This bar is very good.  It's simple and exactly what you'd expect.  Sea salt has a tendency to dominate whatever its been added to, but Theo is an excellent chocolate company, and they smartly worked hard to make sure the flavors balanced.

One thing I very much like about Theo is that they don't try do too much.  And this is a great example of it.  They make good quality chocolate, and if you want something added to it, they'll do it in a tasteful way.

All this said, every time I see Theo sold, and I can't find their 90% Venezuela-origin bar, I cry a little on the inside.

(As a side note, Theo is based in Seattle, and their factory building was shared with a band/actual circus I loved very much called Circus Contraption.)

Bottom Line:  If you are looking for a high quality, well balanced sea salt bar, this is a nice starting point.