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Honestly I don’t know what’s really happened with the New York Green Cart plan and the idea to get produce carts into under-served neighborhoods. But it certainly was refreshing to see this up in Carnegie Hill anyway.
Mmmm, not quite. Also turns out that chocolatier styles are not interchangeable. In fact there are so many completely different ways of making those really high-end chocolates that – in my opinion anyway – you can’t even really compare them. So check out my story in The New York Times if you want to really understand 1. What these different types of chocolates are and the varying degrees care and expertise they require, and 2. Just how pervasive small, artisinal chocolatiers have become in recent years. (And don’t call the chocolate makers – those are the guys who make the chocolate from the cacao beans.) This list will help you a little more than the one with the story. I’ve included each chocolatier’s specialty. Remember, these guys don’t all make the same things. BROOKFIELD Bridgewater Chocolate, 559 Federal Road, (203) 775-2286. Enrobed chocolates featuring their own toffees and caramels plus roasted nuts. These are big, multi-bite pieces. They also have their $20 version of a Snickers. GREENWICH The Little Chocolate Company, 99 Mill Street, (203) 531-6190. Been around for awhile online and catering only, but just opened a store. Bark with homemade add-ins such as peppermint – the real stuff, not the commercial junk; Chocolate dipped mini-biscotti – which they also bake. KENT Belgique Patisserie & Chocolatier, 1 Bridge Street, (860) 927-3681. Classic Belgian pralines. They are really the only guys who do this level of work. LITCHFIELD The Dutch Epicure Shop, 491 Bantam Road, (860) 567-5586. This is a totally by-hand operation. Easter is the big holiday for them. They make hollowed chocolate Easter eggs filled with their handmade truffles. Three Oaks Chocolatier, 583 Bantam Road, (860) 567-0392. Small selection topped by handmade truffles plus more basic bark, coconut stacks, turtles. MADISON Madison Chocolates, 908 Boston Post Road, (203) 245-4335. Handmade truffles. MIDDLETOWN Tschudin Chocolates & Confection, 100 Riverview Center Main Street, (860) 759-2222. The newest chocolatier in the state specializing in truffles and filled chocolates with unusual herb and spice mixtures. MILFORD H. Mangels Confectioner, 107 River Street, (203) 783-9770. Truffles plus seasonal specials. NORWALK Knipschildt Chocolatier and Café Chocopologie, 12 South Main Street, (203) 838-3131. Pralines, truffles and enrobed chocolates featuring herbs and spices. Most of it is wholesaled, however, at places like Dean &DeLuca, Balducci’s and Whole Foods. RIDGEFIELD Deborah Ann’s Homemade Chocolates, 381 Main Street, (203) 438-0065. Enrobed chocolate, fudge, butter crunch, solid molded chocolate. WATERBURY Fascias Chocolates, 2066 Thomaston Avenue, (203) 753-0515. The oldest of the small guys – started in 1964. Enrobed chocolates, “meltaways,” peanut butter cups with pure peanut butter, lollipops, truffles, and lots of stuff dunked in chocolate. WESTPORT Cocoa Michelle, 190 Main Street, (203) 221-0002. Herb and spice truffles and filled chocolates with cocoa butter jewel-colored coatings, which is a recent trend.
But that little food shop deal, after you check out. Now that caught my attention. Mostly because you need to do some serious language intensive just to figure out what the heck you might be about to ingest. Knackebrod flerkorn? Saft flader? Inlagdsill? Skorpor kardemumma? You know, I’m kind of wondering how big a call there is for all this stuff. I mean, I was the only one even in there. Is there a run I’m not aware of here on cloudberry jam, lingonberry concentrate, To be fair, there were some interesting cheeses and mueseli and those classic Swedish crackers. So I tried some sas pepparrot — horseradish sauce and sylt flader & apelsin — orange and elderflower marmalade (no corn syrup!) and chocolate (that turned out to have a big Kraft on it), and jelly rats (gummy bears in another life). As for that list of stuff: multigrain crispbread, elderberry concentrate, pickled herring and cardamom crisp rolls. Actually sounds like dinner?
For those of us in the New Haven area who have been waiting for a Whole Foods to at least get close to us and end those interminable drives to Glastonbury or West Hartford or Greenwich or Westport – November 11 is the day. Whole Foods in Milford opens at 8 a.m. It’s located at 1686 Boston Post Road. It’s not that Whole Foods is necessarily the be-all, end-all of food and natural stuff in Connecticut. And heaven knows, it ain’t cheap. But it is the only place for certain things. And I, for one, am willing to pay a little more for some of that product. Cheese is the main one – at least for me. For reasons I have yet to figure out, Connecticut just can’t seem to rustle up a real cheese shop with a full international blend of good stuff – kind of a la Murray’s in New York. Liuzzi’s in North Haven has its homemade mozzarella and ricotta, an improving selection of Italian cheeses and a few others thrown in for good measure. Caseus in New Haven tends to tilt French, but with a tiny selection. The local cheese makers are hit-and-miss around the state at farmers’ market and specialty stores. But if you want a great big fat selection of all kinds of cheese – imported, local, organic, you name it – Whole Foods seems to be the only one-stop-shopping in the state. For meat eaters it generally is the only place to get fresh bison meat (other than the meat produced at Creamery Brook Bison in Brooklyn, Conn. – but it’s always frozen). It’s about the only place to reliably find lamb. It’s about the only place to get jars (NOT cans) of Hatch chilies, which of course you will never get fresh in this part of the world. You can count on quality produce, even if it’s not local, which makes a difference in the off-season. And it tends to carry large sizes of good natural brands of cleaning and laundry products, so you’re not having to buy a gazillion bottles. And they have extremely high quality bulk products – flours, nuts, grains, etc. Granted the chicken and fish – you can usually do better locally. The breads have just never been all that good. And the prepared foods – yes they’re good. But in this economy – who’s really gonna spend the money? On the whole (OK, pun intended) – I am happy they’ve arrived, and once I check ‘em out, I’ll fill in a little more. |
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Turns out Valentine’s Day isn’t the biggest chocolate holiday of the year – that honor belongs to Christmas followed by Easter. But really – who cares? Chocolate is, well, chocolate.
No one really knows why Italian cookies are so popular this time of year. We say, who cares … dig in. Find out where in 