Thoughts on the Austin Chocolate Festival
Sep. 19th, 2009 11:47 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
livingdebI ended up going to the Austin Chocolate Festival after all. It's all because Indigo Rose decided to go at the time I thought would be the least crowded and thus the most pleasant.
This is just the sort of thing that could easily sound better in fantasy than it turns out to be in real life. How it works is they give you a card of sixteen pull-off tickets plus a contest ticket. There are a bunch of tables set up (more than 16, maybe 40 or so). Virtually all of the tables have something you can get with these tickets [the exceptions being a breast cancer organization that's getting the proceeds for this event, the Oil is Dumb organization that's giving out $5's (for taking a bike or bus) and $1's (for promising to turn off all the lights you're not using for one full day), and some people who made a movie about chocolate or something].
Most tables also had things for sale. And things weren't always clearly labeled. It was easier to tell what your options were once more people arrived (and started demonstrating the possibilities) than just by walking by the table. Sometimes I just gave up and started asking them questions (as if I were a regular person with social skills and stuff).
Different organizations had very different ideas about what should be available for the price of a single ticket. I basically refused to buy anything that cost two (or three!) tickets but was small. Most of the things that were clearly worth more than one ticket, such as the La Madeleine chocolate sandwich and the four-piece sample of toffee, cost only one ticket.
My favorite thing was the brownie contest. You go to a separate contest area and they give you four samples (labeled A - D) and then you put your contest ticket into the jar for your favorite brownie. After my first bite, I knew I would have no problem tasting something good enough to win. The second brownie was just as good, but a little sweeter (and it was Indigo Rose's favorite). The third brownie was more like devil's food cake with vanilla icing, also delicious, but not a brownie. The fourth seemed like it might be more boring but have darker chocolate. I spent a lot of time deciding between A and D and finally chose A. I told Robin to try at least A and D and he said A had something interesting added to it that was not sweet, so he chose A also.
As I learned at my Willy Wonka party and again at an all-chocolate birthday party, there is such a thing as too much chocolate in one sitting.
Fortunately, I really did learn that. I restrained myself very well at the festival and although I did cash in all my tickets, I also brought much of it home to have later.
As result, I feel only the tiniest bit ill. I have no urge to go to sleep for the rest of the day or anything like that.
Pictured above, clockwise from the upper left, are:
* toffee - yummy
* Pure Bliss - a chocolate that tastes like an extremely dark fudge, but is not full of butter or anything like real fudge. Blissed Out Chocolates specializes in "gourmet, organic, gluten-free, dairy-free, raw chocolate chocolates," partly because raw cocoa is so rich in nutrients. I've always heard that roasting the cocoa brings out the flavors--this chocolate proves that I don't care about that. Robin's favorite flavor (and favorite thing at the festival) was the cashew goji berry, indigo rose's was the mint. Of those, I prefer the former. Pictured above is the plain ("pure") one, which I haven't yet tasted.
* two cookies, from two different places. Both were surprisingly not awesome and awfully crunchy and hard. I'm thinking a little reheating and a lot of milk will help.
* chocolate cherry melt - as described in my last entry about La Madeleine. It was pretty good (I tasted Robin's) but maybe not awesome, but maybe it wasn't fair to try this right after judging the brownie contest. I think that this plus a big glass of milk will make a fine breakfast someday soon. Note: they said that this would not be around long and was made specifically for this festival. I fear this also means it is not available outside of Austin.
* milk and dark chocolate pools sprinkled with caramelized cocoa nibs - this treat from Fat Turkey Chocolate was one of my favorite things (obviously, since I got four of them). I'd never heard of this sort of "pool" before, but it's like a giant splatted chocolate chip.
Another of my favorite things (not pictured) was the "sipping chocolate" from Wiseman House. This tastes like super rich hot chocolate. They seem to have made the mistake of explaining how the magic worked (I won't know for sure until I try doing the magic myself). They told us it is made from nothing but chocolate and boiling water. They showed us a bowl of the sipping chocolate mix, and it looked like finely grated chocolate. They told us you use half mix and half boiling water, and just pour the boiling water over the mix and stir. They said that one cup is four servings (as if you don't want to drink a whole cup of this stuff because it's so rich). Robin read the ingredients and saw that they included milk, which supports his theory that it was made from both dark and milk chocolate.
I also had another fabulous brownie from Taste and See. Although brownies are not on their website, they were entered in the contest. They definitely may have been the brownie I voted for.
This event is one of several things reminding me this week how delicious real brownies are (as opposed to the monstrosities that come out of my oven when I try to make them healthier). I will have to keep trying. So far the only healthification method I have tried that works for me is substituting peanut butter for half the butter in a good brownie recipe.
In sum, it was a good experience but nothing I need to do every year. Maybe once every five or ten years. I certainly didn't know there were so many local chocolate companies (though none of the cards I took have street addresses). And I didn't know so many used organic chocolate, and I didn't know that raw chocolate is something I would want to eat.
This is just the sort of thing that could easily sound better in fantasy than it turns out to be in real life. How it works is they give you a card of sixteen pull-off tickets plus a contest ticket. There are a bunch of tables set up (more than 16, maybe 40 or so). Virtually all of the tables have something you can get with these tickets [the exceptions being a breast cancer organization that's getting the proceeds for this event, the Oil is Dumb organization that's giving out $5's (for taking a bike or bus) and $1's (for promising to turn off all the lights you're not using for one full day), and some people who made a movie about chocolate or something].
Most tables also had things for sale. And things weren't always clearly labeled. It was easier to tell what your options were once more people arrived (and started demonstrating the possibilities) than just by walking by the table. Sometimes I just gave up and started asking them questions (as if I were a regular person with social skills and stuff).
Different organizations had very different ideas about what should be available for the price of a single ticket. I basically refused to buy anything that cost two (or three!) tickets but was small. Most of the things that were clearly worth more than one ticket, such as the La Madeleine chocolate sandwich and the four-piece sample of toffee, cost only one ticket.
My favorite thing was the brownie contest. You go to a separate contest area and they give you four samples (labeled A - D) and then you put your contest ticket into the jar for your favorite brownie. After my first bite, I knew I would have no problem tasting something good enough to win. The second brownie was just as good, but a little sweeter (and it was Indigo Rose's favorite). The third brownie was more like devil's food cake with vanilla icing, also delicious, but not a brownie. The fourth seemed like it might be more boring but have darker chocolate. I spent a lot of time deciding between A and D and finally chose A. I told Robin to try at least A and D and he said A had something interesting added to it that was not sweet, so he chose A also.
As I learned at my Willy Wonka party and again at an all-chocolate birthday party, there is such a thing as too much chocolate in one sitting.
Fortunately, I really did learn that. I restrained myself very well at the festival and although I did cash in all my tickets, I also brought much of it home to have later.
As result, I feel only the tiniest bit ill. I have no urge to go to sleep for the rest of the day or anything like that.
Pictured above, clockwise from the upper left, are:
* toffee - yummy
* Pure Bliss - a chocolate that tastes like an extremely dark fudge, but is not full of butter or anything like real fudge. Blissed Out Chocolates specializes in "gourmet, organic, gluten-free, dairy-free, raw chocolate chocolates," partly because raw cocoa is so rich in nutrients. I've always heard that roasting the cocoa brings out the flavors--this chocolate proves that I don't care about that. Robin's favorite flavor (and favorite thing at the festival) was the cashew goji berry, indigo rose's was the mint. Of those, I prefer the former. Pictured above is the plain ("pure") one, which I haven't yet tasted.
* two cookies, from two different places. Both were surprisingly not awesome and awfully crunchy and hard. I'm thinking a little reheating and a lot of milk will help.
* chocolate cherry melt - as described in my last entry about La Madeleine. It was pretty good (I tasted Robin's) but maybe not awesome, but maybe it wasn't fair to try this right after judging the brownie contest. I think that this plus a big glass of milk will make a fine breakfast someday soon. Note: they said that this would not be around long and was made specifically for this festival. I fear this also means it is not available outside of Austin.
* milk and dark chocolate pools sprinkled with caramelized cocoa nibs - this treat from Fat Turkey Chocolate was one of my favorite things (obviously, since I got four of them). I'd never heard of this sort of "pool" before, but it's like a giant splatted chocolate chip.
Another of my favorite things (not pictured) was the "sipping chocolate" from Wiseman House. This tastes like super rich hot chocolate. They seem to have made the mistake of explaining how the magic worked (I won't know for sure until I try doing the magic myself). They told us it is made from nothing but chocolate and boiling water. They showed us a bowl of the sipping chocolate mix, and it looked like finely grated chocolate. They told us you use half mix and half boiling water, and just pour the boiling water over the mix and stir. They said that one cup is four servings (as if you don't want to drink a whole cup of this stuff because it's so rich). Robin read the ingredients and saw that they included milk, which supports his theory that it was made from both dark and milk chocolate.
I also had another fabulous brownie from Taste and See. Although brownies are not on their website, they were entered in the contest. They definitely may have been the brownie I voted for.
This event is one of several things reminding me this week how delicious real brownies are (as opposed to the monstrosities that come out of my oven when I try to make them healthier). I will have to keep trying. So far the only healthification method I have tried that works for me is substituting peanut butter for half the butter in a good brownie recipe.
In sum, it was a good experience but nothing I need to do every year. Maybe once every five or ten years. I certainly didn't know there were so many local chocolate companies (though none of the cards I took have street addresses). And I didn't know so many used organic chocolate, and I didn't know that raw chocolate is something I would want to eat.