L'Albero dei Gelati

When I first heard there was going to be a new gelato place in Park Slope, I have to admit I was dubious. I mean, this is Park Slope in the year 2013. It's not a neighborhood lacking for gelato. This new place was opening within a few blocks of two of my most beloved dessert venues, Culture and Caramello, so I just didn't see what new things it could bring to the table. The dessert table, so to speak.

But now that I have been to L'Albero dei Gelati, I will never doubt again. This place is awesome. It's owned and run by a couple from Milan; this is their first outpost in the United States. The gelato here is top-notch. Most of the media surrounding this place has focused on the savory gelato flavors that they offer, but let's get serious: all that matters is the quality of their chocolate gelato, which is superb. The texture is exactly right.



And they don't just sell gelato in this place. They have actual food, like classy, delightful meat and cheese platters. Obviously I didn't get those, because I was focusing my appetite on chocolate. But they also offer delicious pastries, cookies, cakes, and mousse. Here, for example, is a crispy nut cookie sandwich with a thick, nutella-like filling.



This thing is also awesome, and it only cost $2.25! There was a large selection of similarly delicious looking basked goods that I need to go back to try. Oh, and I need to go back soon because there is a beautiful backyard garden that I need to sit in.



BOTTOM LINE: A neighborhood can never have too many good chocolate options.

Barrington Brewery Chocolate Cake

Friend of Chocolate NYC Emily has been talking about Barrington Brewery's chocolate stout layer cake for years. The weekend before last, we finally got to eat it.



This cake has appeared in Bon Appetit magazine, which also provides the recipe, if you are a daring baker and want to try it yourself.

As you can tell, this cake is massive. I mean, I've seen babies smaller than this cake. One slice costs $7 and it's worth every penny. Emily and I split it and we couldn't finish it in one go.



I am usually not a cake person because I tend to find cake too dry, but this was almost brownie-like in its consistency, and that is a high compliment. It's still drier than a brownie, of course, but that just comes with the territory of being cake.

The frosting is the real winner here. Oh my gosh. This chocolate frosting! Perfect.

BOTTOM LINE: If you're going to the Berkshires, you should try a slice of this cake. Just find one or two people to split it with you first.

City Bakery Cookies Redux

Leila does not like City Bakery cookies.  I have gone on record as loving their melted chocolate cookie.  But I finally got around to reviewing their regular chocolate chip cookies:

They are good.  The problem is that they are crispy.  I think gooey is the more preferred option.  Especially because if your cookie is crispy that definitely means there is not enough chocolate in them.  There was not enough chocolate in these.  But there was still more chocolate in them then average, and that chocolate was really great.  So I actually think these are decent chocolate chip cookies for a chocolate lover, though maybe they are not the best cookies for a cookie lover.

I also received some of the vegan chocolate chip cookies:

The real problem here was that there was less chocolate.  I don't know why that happened.  I'd've done the opposite, since probably the cookie part is harder to make.  But maybe they had problems getting it to stick together with lots of chocolate and no egg.  In any case, these were actually not bad, but definitely not as good as the non-vegan version.

Bottom Line: Good cookies for a chocolate lover, but room for improvement in that there should still be more chocolate.

Chocolate at Belmont: featuring Noi Sirius 45%, Wild Ophelia Southern Hibiscus Peach, Patric "Columbia Art Bar" 70%, Jelina Chocolatier "Noir Dark" 72%, and Theo Almond Sea Salt

I went to the Belmont Stakes a while ago, and obviously I brought chocolate.  And obviously my friends did too.

Here is one chocolate:

I've never been much of a fan of nuts in my chocolate.  I honestly did not particularly appreciate the almonds in this bar.  But I must say that I didn't really mind them too much.  The chocolate was really excellent -- Theo always does a great job -- and the nuts were unobtrusive.  The chocolateyness, as always, was key.

The biggest disappointed was the Noi Sirius 45% bar.  Especially because I love Noi Sirius.  Really, it was my fault.  I saw 45% and expected milk chocolate.  I tend to prefer dark to milk, but sometimes I am in the mood for milk chocolate.  But here's the thing: 45% dark chocolate is way too sweet.  As someone used to 90%+, this was difficult for me to eat in the way I imagine my high-percentage bars are difficult for the lay chocolate eater.

I did manage to succeed in getting one bar of milk chocolate: The Wild Ophelia Southern Hibiscus Peach bar.  

It was 41% chocolate -- almost as much cacao as in the Noi Sirius -- but with the milk and peach, it had way less sugar.  The peach was honestly a bit too subtle -- which may have been a blessing as this was a weird experiment -- but the bar was delicious, and we wolfed it down in about 5 seconds.

Next came the Patric Columbia Art Bar, which was just a 70% dark chocolate bar with a fancy name.

This was a solid chocolate bar -- definitely recommended -- but not as good as the Mint OMG.

Last, we went with the Jelina Chocolatier "Noir Dark" 72%.  I am always dubious of companies that use high-percentage sounding names for mid-percentage bars.  But good thing I did not prejudge here.

This was probably the best bar of the bunch, at least in my opinion.  It was not too fancy, but had a nice rich taste.  I look forward to trying more Jelina-brand bars in the future!

Bottom Line: This might not sound like the most successful haul, but if you knew how badly I did at the race track, you'd see how this was sort of the highlight of my afternoon.

La Maison du Chocolat's Chocolate Mousse and Bonbons

La Maison du Chocolat makes chocolate mousse:

Now, as we know, La Maison du Chocolat does everything well.  This is an exception only in that it is good even for La Maison du Chocolat.  Definitely one of the top-5 chocolate mousses in NYC.  Woo.

So, while there, Angel and I got into an argument.  I insisted that the best bon bon there was the Caracas -- Venezuelan origin.  Angel insisted it was Akasambo -- Ghana origin.  We had both tried both, and both liked both -- these are two of the best bon bons in NYC -- but we were both EXTREMELY insistent.  So we did a blind taste test.

I predicted the result perfectly: we each preferred the other's pick.

Importantly, her taste set had Caracas first and mine had Akasambo first.  Now this actually gave me a thought.  I think, in chocolate taste tests, the first items tasted have an unfair advantage.  Because when you first taste a piece of chocolate, you're like, "CHOCOLATE!!!"  But then when you second taste a piece of chocolate and have to compare them, maybe you are like, "How can anything compare to that?"  And then you eat it and you are like, "Oh wait, that is good.  Hmmm...."  But then you remember "CHOCOLATE!!!" and then pick that because your second reaction was not as excited.

Bottom Line: Chocolate NYC: we have some theories.  Usually they are better thought out than this.  But great mousse!

Cinnamon Snail's Death by Chocolate

So this is actually vegan:

Also, maybe more surprisingly: it's extremely chocolatey?  I mean, just look at all that not-chocolate going on in there!  But seriously, it was incredibly chocolatey and delicious!  This ranks among my top donuts of all time, vegan or otherwise.  Though Doughnut Plant might still have it beat.

Bottom Line: Even if you are not vegan, you should consume as many of these delicious greaseballs as you can get your grubby little paws on.

Food Emporiun: featuring Chocolate Santander 70% and Chuao Salted Chocolate Crunch

Food Emporium has an often-underrated chocolate selection.  In fact, they have an entire chocolate shop on the Upper East Side.  But here are a couple bars I got when stopping by in Union Square:

I had never tried Chocolate Santander, but I was more than pleasantly surprised -- it was really great!  Richly chocolatey, but with interesting notes.  I'm bad at distinguishing Colombian chocolate, but now I am convinced that this is what Colombian chocolate is supposed to taste like.

I had tried Chuao once before, and I was disappointed.  But that surprised me, and it had been a while, so I gave them another shot.  This almost never works for me.  I am pretty consistent.  But guys: I totally loved this bar!  One of the few things that goes well with chocolate is bread, because bread is an amazing substance that goes with literally everything.  And the sea salt was very light -- just enough to make it a salty/sweet addictive situation, where you sort of tear through it ravenously as if it were M&Ms or something.  But without the regret!

Bottom Line: Two really great chocolate bars from an underrated chocolate supplier.  If you want to shove an entire dark chocolate bar down your throat and never look back, Chuao Salted Chocolate Crunch has to be among my top recommendations.  Santander is just a really good quality bar that you similarly will not regret.