This year (2003), Presidents’ Day weekend will be known—in the Northeast at any rate—as the weekend it snowed. A lot. I was on my way from southern Westchester county where I live to Colonial Williamsburg for a visit to the 18th century with my family when we got stuck in it. But, as luck would have it, there was almost an entire week of chocolate adventure which made the heaps of snow less ... snowy somehow.

Originally posted February, 2003

The first stop was The Swann House in Washington, D.C. Located near DuPont Circle The Swann House is a small bed and breakfast in a historic house. We arrived in the early evening just as flakes were beginning to fall, registered, and got ready to go to dinner. While The Swann House does not offer chocolate turndown amenities, they do offer Lindt Lindor Truffles as well as Ferrero Rocher and Hershey’s Kisses for guests to munch on. Well, I’d have a talk with the proprietors about their choice in chocolate later, but first, dinner at al Tiramisu, reportedly one of DC’s best Italian restaurants.

A short walk down New Hampshire Ave and around DuPont Circle led us to the restaurant (on P near 20th), where we were seated immediately (not bad for 7:00pm on a Saturday even with reservations). Like many Italian restaurants, even upscale ones, families are welcome and they accommodated the off-menu requests for my very tired five-year old.

Dinner, which included a lovely Chateauneuf du Pape was not inexpensive, but the venison chops I had were worth the price. A word to the wise ... the daily specials average twice the cost of the menu items. The dessert selections include tiramisu (surprise), and an excellent chocolate “salami”. This consisted of several slices of a mousse-like chocolate studded with nuts and cake which gave it the look of salami. Definitely a restaurant to return to the next time I am in DC.

The next morning we woke up to several inches of snow on the ground with snow falling and as much as two feet expected before it let up on Monday. I had a morning meeting with the pastry chef at a local #### and when I got back to the B&B it was to discover that the city had quite literally shut down. The Metro was running on two-hour schedules and all the Smithsonian museums were closed. We’d planned to sightsee, but instead spent the day in the B&B playing games and sitting in front of the fire—relaxing.

That did give me the opportunity to talk chocolate with the proprietors, and it looks like we will be planning a Chocolate Indulgence Weekend early next year. If you’re interested in a weekend in a fabulous B&B with the opportunity to partake in fabulous meals laced with chocolate and sumptuous chocolates and chocolate desserts, let me know. (And, of course, we’ll let you know right here when plans firm up.)

Monday was not much better than Sunday in the city, thank goodness it was a holiday anyway. I spent several hours shoveling out my car and saw the movie Rabbit Proof Fence, which I can recommend.

Tuesday dawned to the realization that many major streets still had not been plowed. Undaunted, I headed out to retrieve the car so we could get to Williamsburg at some point that day. With a lot of finessing, I got the car out of the parking lot and into the ruts on “S” street, and made my way to the B&B where I picked up my family and headed out to Colonial Williamsburg.

Colonial Williamsburg

I am ashamed to admit that even though I’ve been on the east coast for more than twenty years, this was the first time I’d made the trek to Colonial Williamsburg. I am not a big fan of theme parks, and this had always struck me as something like that. However, we were coming in the off-season and the weather was chancy, so there were actually very few people on the property. Nonetheless, it is obvious from the visitor center that the crowds can be mammoth, so if you do ever plan a trip, plan it for the off season.

Trellis

Dinner at Tuesday night was at Trellis, the restaurant co-owned by Marcel Desaulniers, author of Death By Chocolate and other chocolate-themed cookbooks. The location is amazing, located in the Merchant Square immediately between Colonial Williamsburg and the College of William and Mary.

The fare, which was moderately priced, did not sparkle. Entrees were okay but not great; the risotto of my wild mushroom risotto with lamb medallions was quite good but the lamb portion was very small and two were verging on well-done though I had asked for rare. Caesar sald made with whole romaine hearts was challenging. Still in all, the main attraction was the dessert (right?) and that was coming up.

Maybe it was just me, but given the reputation of the cookbooks I was expecting to be blown away by dessert, but I wasn’t—even by the signature Death By Chocolate Cake. The cake was served very cold which made the ganache frosting very chewy and the mousse on the top of the cake had a grainy consistency. A daily chef’s selection was also uninspired. In a follow-up conversation with Kelly Bailey, the pastry chef, even though the cookbooks use easy to find ingredients like Hershey’s cocoa and Baker’s chocolate, the restaurant uses Cocao Barry products. Maybe that was it ... the chocolate itself is not too inspiring.

Overall I was disappointed that the dinner was not better, even though I thought the price was moderate. Trellis may have location, location, location, but it’s part of the Colonial Williamsburg experience that is not an absolute must-see.

Impressions of Colonial Williamsburg

We did manage to score one of the colonial-era residences to stay in, which was very cool, and very convenient. A friend’s father is a tour guide, so we had a very special introduction to the town with insider information.

But, let’s cut to the chase: chocolate.

Surprisingly, to many people, chocolate was available in Colonial Williamsburg. Many of the stores sell bar chocolate (made by Hebert in Massachusetts it is very pedestrian), even though solid eating chocolate wasn’t invented until more than 100 years later.

However, chocolate was consumed by the upper classes, and there are records of the Governor of the Virginia colony having as much as 50 pounds of chocolate in his private stores.

Chocolate may have been manufactured in Colonial Williamsburg, and there are records of both chocolate stones (metates) and cocoa beans (from the Caribbean and Venezuela) in the colony. Strangely, though, the people who owned the chocolate stones did not own the beans, and vice versa.

I did meet Jim Gray, who is in the Foodways areas of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, and we had a fascinating discussion about the history of chocolate in colonial times.

The first thing I had to unlearn was that chocolate was being made in the colonies at least 35 years before what is generally considered to be the founding of the first chocolate factory—Baker’s (still in business today and owned by Kraft)—in Dorchester, MA in 1765. Gazettes (newspapers) in towns like Philadelphia as early as the 1730s have advertisements from chocolate makers announcing the arrival of the latest water-powered chocolate manufacturing equipment from England. I suppose it depends on what is meant by factory.

Another thing that had to be considered was that the chocolate made back then did not have a long shelf life, perhaps 30 to 90 days. So, chocolate, when it was made, would have been made very near to where it was sold.

Jim Gray makes chocolate at Colonial Williamsburg on Tuesdays at least once each month during the year. He purchased a chocolate stone (a metate) from Mexico, complete with a stone roller. The roller broke quite easily, and he had the blacksmith shop in town make a replacement using 1750s manufacturing techniques.

Using beans sourced from El Rey in Venezuela, Jim roasts, hulls, and winnows by hand. Placing the metate over a fire, Jim grinds the roasted beans in small batches, placing each batch of cocoa liquor to the side to “rest.” When a sufficient amount has been ground, he places it all back on the stone with sugar, vanilla bean, and other spices including chile pepper. He then grinds the whole mass together until it is done.

Done is a very subjective point. I can tell you, because Jim sent me a sample, that the chocolate, while tasty, is very gritty. That might be okay, because the primary use for the chocolate was not eating, but for making hot chocolate. But, contrary to most of what has been read, this chocolate was made into desserts. Jim graciously sent me some copies of those, some dated as early as the early 1700s!