I can’t say that I was looking forward to going to San Francisco, however I was looking forward to leaving the record low temperatures in the northeast (it was nine degrees Fahrenheit when I left). I’ve been traveling to SF for business for close to 20 years now, and at one time making four to six trips a year. What I’ve noticed is that as New York has got cleaner and nicer (in part to ex-Mayor Giuliani’s focus on so-called quality-of-life crimes), San Francisco has become dirtier and less pleasant. That impression was reinforced within a block of leaving my ####: I was approached by several panhandlers and saw many homeless people asleep in doorways.

Originally posted January 2003.

Saturday was also the day of the huge anti-war rallies in SF and Washington, DC. In SF, the path was, of course, between my #### and the Moscone Convention Center where the Fancy Food Show was being held. After safely crossing the rally route, I was able to register for the show, pick up materials, visit the press office, and generally start my planning. A colleague lent me an exhibitor pass, so I also had the opportunity to visit the show floor during the last hours of setup and get myself oriented so I could get a head start on the show the next morning.

Going to a major trade show requires discipline and flexibility at the same time. After many years I’ve developed a specific method of walking the show floor to ensure that I don’t miss anything important. That requires discipline. It’s also important to put yourself in a position to make casual acquaintances to turn you on to the things that you inevitably miss, no matter how hard you try not to. So, an hour or so before the show began I was in the press room looking at press releases and chatting up the various PR folk and journalists I was going to be seeing over the next couple of days, trading impressions, ideas, and generally setting the stage to share information gathered during the show.

At 10:00 I was as ready as I was going to be to spend nineteen hours over the next three day talking about (and eating) chocolate with dozens of vendors. Tough, I know, but if not me, then who?

News

The biggest news at the show (at least as far as chocolate is concerned) is the effect that the unrest in Venezuela may have on the chocolate industry worldwide. At the moment, I was told, the port of Caracas is closed, which means that no cocoa beans are leaving the country. Unless the port reopens within the next 45 days or so, we are likely to see large increases in the price of all chocolate, not just chocolate that uses Venezuelan beans, as cocoa is traded on the commodity market and changes in supply affect prices worldwide. A side note is that El Rey chocolate is likely to get very scarce, so if you love El Rey chocolate you might want to stock up now (their Icoa (ivory) is on sale in the co-op).

El Rey announced a new line of chocolates at the show called “Criollo Natural.” There are two different flavors, a 61% semi-sweet and a 39% milk. Unlike other El Rey chocolates, these are made from a blend of Trinitario beans (not pure criollos) from several growing regions in Venezuela (the other El Rey chocolates are from specific regions and varietals, Rio Caribe or Carenero Superior).

Trends

The hot new flavor this year is ... (imagine snare drum roll here) Ginger. It showed up everywhere in all sorts of products. It has been a flavoring ingredient in high-end chocolate for many years, but given its very high profile at the show, you can expect it to start showing up in chocolate in very unusual ways and from many more companies than you might expect.

The newest trend in chocolate is the replacement of the “diatetic” and “sugar-free” labels with the phrase “low net carbs.” In sugar-free chocolate, the sugar (cane sugar in high quality brands, less expensive beet sugar in lower-quality brands) is replaced with maltitol, a no-carb sweetener. The taste difference is immediately obvious, as members of the Usenet newsgroup rec.food.chocolate have pointed out to me. It’s immediately obvious on the tongue because the sweet taste buds are excited in a different way. That’s why many people are disappointed by the taste of sugar-free chocolate; that part of the mouth feel they enjoy from eating regular chocolate is totally missing. There were many companies touting sugar-free/low-net carb chocolate, and one surprisingly good one which we’ll talk about later.

Finally, while there have been a number of tea-flavored chocolates from many vendors (mostly Earl Grey, for some reason), we’re starting to see a wider variety of tea flavors worked into chocolate and new techniques to get the tea leaves themselves to a point where they don’t affect the texture of the chocolate.

Highlights

In all fairness I must post an update on a chocolate that I called the weirdest chocolate I ever ate in a previous review. That chocolate was from the German company Hachez, their Strawberry/Pepper bar. When I tried it at the Fancy Food Show in NYC this past summer, the bar I had started out with an initially okay taste that went curiously flat in the mouth in about fifteen seconds. I stopped by the importer’s stand and told them my impressions. We immediately opened a new bar and this one was a totally different experience, which leads me to believe I got a bad bar or one that was not stored properly at some point.

One of the best sugar-free, sorry, low net carb, chocolate I have eaten was one of the new product introductions at the show. It’s from a new company called Yamate. Another very good sugar-free chocolate comes from Cuba Venchi, and their sugar-free gianduja is exceptionally good.

Although not exactly a new trend, we are beginning to see more organic chocolate. Dagoba is a favorite of mine, and is run by one of the nicest guys in the chocolate business, Frederick Schilling. Frederick bills himself as the chief alchemist and is in large part responsible for the wonderful flavors that the chocolate comes in. He’s also very concerned about fair trade and related issues, so not only is his chocolate great tasting but a good buy in many other ways. Normally, Dagoba bars are available in cases of twelve of a single flavor, but I negotiated a deal for The Chocolate Co-Op of mixed cases of one of each the twelve different flavors. These will be offered soon.

One new organic chocolate is Biocioc made by Aiello of Italy. There are three choices, white, milk (32%), and 72% dark. Overall the bars are not as good as the Dagoba offerings but they are better than most of the other organic chocolates on the market. The only thing I really don’t like about the bars is that the wrappers are not sealed tight which means that extra care must be taken in storage.

Another Italian newcomer is Cioccolato di BruCo. This is an artisanal chocolatier that won, I was told, best new Italian artisanal chocolatier at the recent EuroChoc exposition. These chocolates are quite refined, with a wonderful texture and finish and very subtle flavorings. These are brand new and aren’t in wide distribution yet. The importer, Ritrovo is in Seattle, so you’ll probably find them there first. I will be getting samples for review and offering them in The Chocolate Co-Op soon.

Seattle seems to be, for some reason, a hotbed of high quality chocolate activity. Maybe the same impulse that lead to it sophisticated attitude toward coffee? Whatever the reason, another Seattle-based importer, Powers-Seles, represents two wonderful Spanish chocolatiers, Enric Rovira and Blanxart. What makes the Spanish wonderful is their experimentation with flavors. I tried a Cava-vinegar (Cava, Spanish for cave, is the Spanish version of champagne) ganache truffle. I know it sounds weird, a vinegar-flavored ganache, but it was actually wonderful. Rovira apparently makes a Cabernet-vinegar ganache. The importers are very nice people and we’ll be offering some Spanish delicacies in the Co-Op pretty soon.

One established Seattle chocolatier is Fran’s. Founded about 30 years ago by Fran Bigelow, the company offers a very high quality product for a very fair price. They are constantly experimenting with various couvertures, and use a comparatively wide range of products from many different suppliers. One of their newest offerings is spicy chocolate-covered macadamia nuts. One of the main ingredients is smoked paprika, which they get from Powers-Seles, the importers of Rovira and Blanxart. These are addictive little devils that sneak up on you. The heat is not immediately apparent, but creates a nice tingle in the mouth aftertaste. Fran’s chocolates are available from their website as well as through specialty foods stores.

One of the more intriguing new introductions was a line of nutraceutical chocolates from New Tree. These aren’t the first “enhanced” chocolates—I believe that distinction belongs to Smart Chocolate from Functional Foods. What is most interesting is that these chocolates are being marketed for their health benefits and are enhanced with vitamins, minerals, herbs, and flavorings to promote peace, well-being, relaxation, mental alertness, and weight control, among other things. I haven’t tasted the Smart Chocolate, but the New Tree offerings, which were “designed” with help from the respected Belgian chocolatier, Pierre Marcolini, were better than I expected them to be. Again, they were just being introduced at the show and are not in wide distribution yet. I am getting samples for review and will let everyone know where they can be purchased.

Given the prestige of European chocolatiers, it is easy to forget that cocoa and chocolate are New World foods. So, it was nice to see a new company Chocolate de Oaxaca that is focused on importing Mexican chocolate products. They have four different flavored bars for making hot chocolate and both molÉ negro and mole rojo.

The newest offering from Cluizel is a new single estate from Santo Domingo called Los Ancones. A 67% dark it is more robust than many 70%+ chocolates. The flavor is very complex and includes very interesting green olive notes that, while it may sound awful, are very, very good. This is definitely going to be a Co-Op offering soon, probably in conjunction with the 65% single estate Hacienda Concepcion from Venzuela. The importer of Cluizel, Vintage Chocolates, has also started importing a number of Chocovic (a Spanish chocolate manufacturer) couvertures. These are a mid-priced line; less expensive than Cluizel or Valrhona, and priced about the same as Cocoa Barry, but more than most Callebaut offerings.

Guittard had its usual strong presence at the show, and it appears that their long-awaited E. Guittard line is finally in production. However, it is still not generally available. There are three varietal couvertures available in 1 kg bars, and through special arrangement, these will be a Co-Op offering soon—1 each of the three different bars. Overall, I prefer these varietal offerings to the conventional blends Guittard offers—they are much more interesting. I don’t think they are as interesting as the Domori varietals (or the Cluizel single-estates), but they are less challenging and less expensive, which may interest a broader audience.

At the Vintage Chocolates stand on Monday I happened to meet Maribel Lieberman, the founder of MarieBelle chocolates. This gave me the chance to find out first-hand if it was true that Jacques Torres made her chocolates for her. Turns out it is true, Jacques Torres makes MarieBelle’s chocolates. The difference is that Torres makes the chocolates to MarieBelle’s specifications. I happen to think that they are much tastier (and prettier), but they are also more expensive. What it does say is the Torres is talented enough to make great chocolate, I just wonder why he doesn’t do it for his own line.

And finally, a couple of non-chocolate entries. If you’re interested in some great ice cream, try Dr. Bob’s handcrafted ice cream. The line was created by Dr. Robert Small, a professor in the Hospitality Management School at Cal Poly Pomona. He makes a mean vanilla with cocoa nibs and a scrumptious blackberry with chocolate chunks. Definitely worth a try.

I happen to like fennel, and one of my favorite chocolate pieces is the fennel ganache truffle from La Maison du Chocolat. So, I was intrigued to discover Sugar Ranch, a company that makes spice mixes that include fennel pollen. The fennel pollen, which has a very subtle fennel flavor, is wildcrafted, which means that it is harvested from fellen that grows wild in various locations along the California coast and in the Central Valley. The spice mixes were developed by Chef Bernard Guillas, who works at the La Jolla Beach and Tennis Club. They are very good. I was talking with Chef about how fennel pollen might work with chocolate and I suggested a traditional bittersweet ganache truffle that was rolled in a mixture of cocoa powder, fleur de sel, and fennel pollen. I can hardly wait to get my hands on some so I can try this one out.

Apres Show

Wednesday following the Fancy Food Show was a very busy day. I started the morning in Berkeley with a breakfast meeting with restaurateur Andrea Froncillo (The Stinking Rose and The Crab House on Pier 39 are two of his restaurants) and his partner Jennifer Jeffrey to discuss their new on-line venture, Sex And The Kitchen. The site is devoted to cooking as an activity that two people can enjoy together, with an emphasis on the romantic (not just the erotic). If all goes as planned, I will soon be collaborating with them, providing editorial, recipes, and, unh, ways to use chocolate romantically.

After breakfast, Jennifer, Andrea, and I headed over to the Scharffen Berger factory to take the free tour. It starts with a short lecture on the history of chocolate, followed by the opportunity to taste some of the chocolate the company produces, and finishes with a tour of the factory. The tour takes you through the bean room where beans are stored and cleaned and continues on to the roasting room where you can see the roaster in action and try to be heard over the din of the winnowing machine that cracks the beans into nibs and removes the shells. From there you can see the melangeur in action, the stage where the cocoa nibs are ground into cocoa liquor, a process that take several hours. The cocoa liquor gets piped into the conche where the sugar, vanilla, cocoa butter, and lecithin are added and the mix gets conched for between 24 and 30 hours. From the conche, the finished chocolate is transported to the tempering machine before being piped over to the depositor to make the bars. The larger bars are wrapped on site—by hand—while the small tasting squares are shipped offsite for mechanical wrapping.

One of the great things about the tour is the fact that Scharffen Berger is very open about what they do and the tour provides a lot of useful information. Beans from each country (each percentage uses a different blend of beans from different, and a different number of, countries) are individually roasted to bring out the individual characteristics of the bean. They are blended in the melangeur in the process of creating the cocoa liquor. Scharffen Berger’s demonstration process is unusual in that there is no refining stage between the melangeur and the conche. They also say that they don’t make their own cocoa powder. It’s made in France according to their specifications using their own blend of beans.

There are three tours each day. The best one to take is the 10:30 tour, the first of the day, because production starts early, about 6:00 am and ends about 2:00 most days. If you take the 10:30, you’ll probably get to see all the machinery in action, which may not be the case if you take either of the later tours. Reservations are suggested, and can be made on their web site. The tour takes about an hour and begins and ends in the gift store, so although the tour is free, it’s tempting to drop a serious chunk of change on chocolate, books, and paraphernalia.

After the factory tour it was off to Santa Cruz for me to visit with Richard Donnelly, whom many consider to be among the best, if not the best, chocolatiers in the US. At Richard’s suggestion I stopped in Los Gatos to sample the wares at Fleur de Cocoa, a patisserie founded by Pascal Janvier, a renowned pastry chef. I had a wonderful pan bagnat for lunch, the French version of a tuna sandwich. It may have been the best I’ve had since I was last in France, the only thing that detracted from its authenticity was California olives rather than nicoise olives. I’d also purchased a hot chocolate which turned out to be dark, rich, and quite thick, and a small chocolate tart. Janvier, who used to be the corporate pastry chef for Cocoa Barry and has been on both silver and bronze medal winning teams at the National Pastry Competition, uses Cocoa Barry products extensively. The tart was rich, and very good but not great. The chocolates use prepared flavorings and are also good but not great. During my visit, Richard told me that they may make the best croissants outside of Paris, so I have a mission the next time I am in San Francisco to return to Los Gatos to visit Fleur de Cocoa to sample the croissants. I’ll let you know.

The final stop of the day was Richard Donnelly’s shop in Santa Cruz.

I had planned to stop and pick up some Ghirardelli and See’s to bring back to New York for tasting, but I was so loaded down with samples from the show and the box I picked up at Donnelly’s for my wife to thank her for doing yeoman’s duty watching the kids during the arctic freeze back home that I had no room.

Darn! I guess I’ll just have to return.

UPDATE(S):

Update: June 2004: Yamate sugar-free chocolates are now available through eChocolates.com.