Chocolate Show

The Chocolate Show

With Contributions from Karen Fawcett of Bonjour Paris and Kathryn Nilsson Reichert.

The Chocolate Show was conceived of by chocoholics Sylvie Douce and François Jeantet about 16 years ago. Today you can find the Salon du Chocolat in Paris (of course) and then it moves to New York, Marseille and then Cairo. I decided that the Chocolate Show was the perfect excuse to have a virtual tasting of sorts to compare French and American chocolate. Could American chocolate possibly hold up to the spectacular French chocolate I was partial to? I felt as if I would be biased, so I brought in two consorts, Karen and Kathryn, to help me out. Needless to say, chocolates make the perfect hostess gift during the holidays so let's have at it.

We tested 6 chocolates on a scale of 1-10 for taste (most important of course), packaging, inventiveness and artistry.

Michel Cluizel from Paris is a name you see a lot in the City of Light. They have been making chocolate since 1948 and they clearly know what they are doing. I gave them a 7. Great flavor, an ample line of product but I’ve never been crazy about their packaging. That’s probably the least important area, but let's face it: when you are buying a gift of chocolate it has to be beautiful. They have recently opened in NY.

Boissier has been making chocolate in Paris since 1827 and their packaging was the most spectacular of all those we tasted. Very girly and very classic. I bought a box of chocolate petals in a variety of colors: pink, white, green and chocolate. It was gorgeous – but since the colored petals are made of white chocolate I wasn’t a huge fan; however, if you are into the white, this one is for you. I’m anxious to try some of their other products because the packaging is so charming—I just have to find a product that suits me. I give Boissier petals a 6.

No Chewing Allowed French truffles from 1934. These were absolutely divine in a melt-in-your-mouth kind of way. A tad too large, but other than that these were my hands-down winner at 9. The packaging is cute and practical—a silver tin that makes the perfect holiday gift.

Maha Chocolates from San Francisco. I sampled the dark chocolate-covered roasted almonds with ginger. I ranked these an 8 although I think I would have preferred them without the ginger. They come in a cute package with a purple label and would make a lovely little hostess gift, and at $10.95 it’s a great deal.

Two Chicks with Chocolate from New York is a mother/daughter team. They were named one of the ten best chocolatiers in the USA in 2009. I tasted wine-flavored chocolates, a cinnamon chocolate and peanut butter bon bon and cranberry one too. They also had pumpkin for fall. These I ranked these lowest at 5. Points for creativity, marketing and a great name but the taste was too simple for my palate. I think my daughter may like them, but for a chocolate connoisseur, I’d have to pass.

Sweet Riot was the last American maker that I tasted. I must admit bias here because I had heard the founder Sarah speak at a recent women’s conference I was at and she is absolutely adorable. It was hard not to like her chocolate. It’s intense and very dark. She’s got bars choc full of nuts and fruit and everything is quite tasty and the company supports fair trade, so their cocoa farmers make a living wage. Conscious chocolate. There is a whole foods kind of sensibility to the product and their marketing. No fancy-looking artistry here—just serious chocolate bars or chocolate bits that they call chocolate peaces. I wasn’t a fan of the packaging as I prefer a more luxurious look, but for an everyday chocolate treat that you can carry in your purse this fits the bill. Sweet Riot ranked a 6.

But…we had others also taste, and this report will show you that everyone’s tongue has its own ideas!

The Bonjour Paris Team headed up by the veteran Francophile Karen Fawcett tested the chocolates and drank a lot of water to compensate, and this was their report:

It was a bittersweet test to the end. The chocolates from the 2 Chicks were the clear taste winners at 9. They were decadent. But this tougher-than-tough team didn’t think the box was up to snuff. The brown color was boring and why did the company opt for the sticker? It looked amateurish.

The judges had nothing nice to report when it came to the chocolates from Sweet Riot, rating only 2. They hated the packaging and thought the chocolates tasted as if there were too many additives and were overprocessed for unsophisticated palettes.

Michel Cluizel’s chocolates at 8 were judged to be “really good” and unpretentious. They were among the winners. Nothing was wrong with the packaging and they were deemed “pure melt-in-your-mouth” (calories).

Maha Chocolate with roasted almonds had too many almonds and not enough good chocolate. Thumbs down, scoring 3.

The truffles (no, we did not chew) had a strange texture plus a bitter after-taste. Everyone wanted to be wowed by them but weren’t. Sigh. Perhaps they were lost in transportation, scoring only 6.

Ah—the Boissier Chocolate petals were seductive. The judges deemed them unusual and intriguing; they received a thumbs up and a score of 8!

The Bonjour Paris team told us they are always happy to take on these challenges. No surprise!

Then we asked the independent micro-blogger/foodie and Francophile extraordinaire Karen Reichert @knreichert. Here is her report:

No Chewing Allowed: Wow! These truffles were so rich; I ate one and almost swooned. This is chocolate overload in one bite and great, strong flavor, but it may be too much for palates used to milder American chocolate.

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