This year, my good friend Edna suggested that we visit the Salon du Chocolat, right outside my window at the nearby Porte de Versailles Salon des Expositions. We decided to force the boys to come along as well, and while they proved to be quite stressed by the sheer number of people in the Disney-for-Chocaholics, they were also quite helpful in pushing through large packs of people and stealing little cups of Baileys from the free samples table.
Dressing as a life-sized Mikado is probably in my top 10 jobs I never want to have, but these girls were fairly smiley about it.
We tried the 72% chocolate here, which was unreal. Then The Country Boy requested a taste of the 100%, which was actually unreal. Bitter but not unpleasantly so, rather like coffee. The woman selling it let us know that the chocolate was made by a team of only 20 people in her native Madagascar.
The Country Boy and my jam collection made it to 9, with three from this stand: pineapple-rum, pineapple-vanilla-rosemary and guava. Look at the cute little lid covers!
We now have a lot more jam than any person needs. I love jam.
This chocolate sculpture was pretty cool.
Don’t know what was in these, but it looked tasty.
The nougat stand looked like a little workshop. The man running it offered us free tastes of the salted caramel one, which was delicious. Those things were huge and heavy! He carried them around propped up on his shoulder.
These were like gourmet M&Ms. I tried ricotta and pear, and Edna went for cappuccino.
The woman running the stand asked me if I wanted a “mix.” I didn’t know what that meant, and stood there, gape-mouthed, trying to figure it out, until Edna dropped in and saved the day by asking for a free sample. Apparently, I don’t do well under pressure.
Green-tea waffle-batter-covered chocolate macarons from Aoki.
This guy was super pro.
You could watch the people from Pralus making praluline. I’ve had the praline-stuffed brioche before. It’s out of this world.
An appropriately chocolate-stuffed one.
These people looked like they were having fun.
Chocolate Arc de Triomphe.
Macaron-covered car.
All in all, it was a success. Though by the end of it, TCB was ready to sit in a quiet room and not talk to people for awhile. Crowds are hard for a country boy. Next year, we’ll be going mid-week.