Russ and Daughters Cafe

Our beloved Russ and Daughters has recently opened a cafe, so naturally I went to check it out and order all the chocolatey things on the menu.

The cafe is really lovely, all clean and white decor, delicious bagels and challah. It feels very soothing. It is also super-crowded, probably because it is still so new. I managed to secure a table by showing up for brunch around 3:45 in the afternoon. Feel free to employ this technique.

Elyse got an egg cream:



Classic U-Bet syrup, milk, soda. I tasted a sip and it was chocolatey. I can't say any more than that because I don't like fizzy beverages. It cost $7.

We also split a chocolate babka french toast:



UM, what can I say about this. It was freaking delicious. I used the word "perfect" while I was eating it. It's the perfect crispy-soft texture. No gross eggy bits. Just warm, moist, somehow slightly crispy on the outside, very chocolatey bread product. Emily theorized that maybe they didn't fully bake the babka, and that's how it stayed so moist when they french toasted it. It's a good theory. All I can say for sure is that I loved it.

Unfortunately, it costs $10. Before tax and tip. And then there's that previously mentioned long wait for a table, most of the time. After brunch someone asked me if it had been "worth it," and I found this a hard question to answer. It was expensive, for a small piece of chocolate french toast. But can you really put a price on perfection?

BOTTOM LINE: Definitely go to Russ & Daughters Cafe. Ideally, go on someone else's dime.

Where is your favorite place of worship?

Mine is in Heathrow:

(photo courtesy of my brother)

Bottom Line: I'm pretty ready to support dark chocolate in a holy war against the imposter chocolate faiths.

Raw Hemp Brownie from Organic Grill

That's no brownie.  It's a Larabar.

Bottom Line:  Though I guess we do like Larabars...

Mast Brothers dark chocolate with sea salt bar

You may be looking at this chocolate bar and thinking, "Well, that doesn't look all that attractive to me. That wrapper does't look like a jaunty shirt worn by Ralph Lauren on his sailboat." And to you I say, "That's because I tore through three-quarters of the bar before I stopped to take a photo. Of course it looks bedraggled now."



There is a LOT of sea salt in here, and it works great. It reminds me of what I like about dark chocolate pretzels. A great salty-sweet combo.

BOTTOM LINE: Mast Brothers does it again!

Chocolate Bar iced hot chocolate

Earlier this week, the temperature rose to 70 degrees for a brief but glorious afternoon (before it started raining). That meant it was at last time for my go-to summertime beverage: the Chocolate Bar's iced hot chocolate.



BOTTOM LINE: I have missed you, warm weather. And I have missed your beverages.

Shake Shack concrete

I go to Shake Shack a fair amount, but I've never actually gotten a milkshake there, despite its name. Instead I go for the concretes. A concrete is custard (so frozen, but soft) with different toppings spun into it.

There are a lot of toppings to choose from, but I generally go with a Shack Attack, because it is chocolatiest: chocolate custard with fudge sauce, chocolate truffle cookie dough and Mast Brothers dark chocolate chunks, topped with chocolate sprinkles.



BOTTOM LINE: How can you possibly go wrong with this?

Happy 30th birthday, David!

On Sunday we had a surprise 30th birthday celebration for my co-blogger David. Obviously that meant we had 30 cakes. Here is what they all looked like:







We'd had a lot of leftover chocolate chips from our chocolate party. Our friend Danielle took them all--I mean like hundreds or possibly thousands of chocolate chips--and baked them into vegan cakes.

Here is the birthday boy himself cutting into a cake:



Here is what a plate with samples from the various options looked like. There was also milk, as you can see, but I didn't touch it. Milk is just a thing that takes up room in your stomach when that room could be better used for more chocolate.



We'd asked every party guest to bring with them two bars of chocolate. So at the end of the party we sent David home with all the bars pictured here, on the bottom shelf. Stay tuned as we review them over the weeks/months to come. You know, just in case you were worried we were running out of material.



Happy birthday, David, and many happy returns of the day! Thanks for giving us an excuse to eat 30 chocolate cakes.