Chocolate Travels

From salsa-tinged Humboldt Park, to jollof rice-scented Uptown, Chicago offers some great cultural experiences. You don't have to hop a plane to absorb some of the sensations of India, Mexico, Puerto Rico or Nigeria. Although I love the neighborhoods that supply these escapades, I have to admit that one of my favorite Chicago cultural experiences doesn't involve an actual area or just one culture. Katrina, the genius/diva behind Chicago-based Vosges Haut Chocolat, combines her love of world travel and sustainable chocolate so seemlessly that I swear I didn't notice that I was munching on candy that represented my favorite places until last week. I stop into the purple swathed (always a good sign) Vosges boutiques about once every 6 weeks to stock up on my fave $7-$8 chocolate bars. They happen to be deep milk chocolate and smoked almonds sprinkled with fleur de sel grey sea salt, for the Barcelona bar. Then there's the dark chocolate spiked with Mexican ancho and chipotle chillis, topped with Ceylon cinnamon for the Red Fire bar. Last week, I discovered the addictive crunch of Ecuadorian plantain chips in deep milk chocolate of the Habana bar. Each bar conjures up a heady, sensual explosion of flavor. Each bar also represents places that I either already travel to frequently (Mexico) or have longed to visit (Barcelona, Havana). A coincidence? I don't think so. Traveling through chocolate is one sweet escape that I can't stand to miss.

Comments

Anonymous said…
I love chocolate, Im going to paris and london in 3 weeks so i'll be grabbing some chocolate when i get there.
February 14, 2009 at 7:53 AM
Anonymous said…
Yum. I'd love to try the chocolate-dipped plantain chips.
February 15, 2009 at 9:32 AM
Anonymous said…
Ebony, chocolate should always be on travel souvenir lists!
Lola, the bar is filled with the plantain chips and it is totally yummy!
February 15, 2009 at 3:13 PM
Anonymous said…
I'm seeing more and more chocolate places advertising and offering their chocolate based on location. I like the pattern. Jacque Torres makes great chocolate in NYC
February 17, 2009 at 1:24 AM
Anonymous said…
Thanks for visiting Gennaro, I think this trend makes for better and more exotic chocolate!
February 17, 2009 at 6:55 AM
Anonymous said…
mmmmmmmmmm. i like the chocolate with chili trend. Delicious.
February 17, 2009 at 8:01 AM
Fly Girl said…
Kristine, there's nothing better than chocolate with a hint of spice!
December 29, 2009 at 10:10 AM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Puerto Rico's Taino Culture

Image
The original inhabitants of the Caribbean region of North America were the Arawak, Taino and Carib  native peoples.  The Tainos are a subgroup of the Arawaks and are recognized as the founders of the island of Boriken or Puerto Rico.  These were the people who offered a peaceful welcome to Columbus in 1493.  They didn't know the cruelty and violence that would follow his so-called "discovery" of the land that they had cultivated for centuries. Despite official government pronouncements that the Taino have been killed off by the massacres and slavery that followed in Columbus' wake, they live on.  As demonstrated in the photo above by  members of  the Puerto Rico Folklorico Dance & Culture Cultural Cente r, Taino traditions, food and names remain strong. Throughout Puerto Rico, town names like Mayaquez, Utuado and Caquas echo the Taino language as do the musical instrument maracas and hamaca or hammock. Legends of Taino warriors, like Hatuey, who organized the ba
Read more

Traveling Through A Liberian Childhood

Image
I like to explore the world with books as much as I like to actually travel. A well-written narrative can transport you to places that you'd never experience with just superficial details like photos and descriptions. I've been interviewing writers about the criteria they use to select books for Summer reading and it made me think about my own general reading criteria. As a journalist, I'm really drawn to biographies, autobiographies and memoirs more than fiction. There's something about using the facts to entice readers into your world that gets me. It's no coincidence that some of my favorite writers--Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Zora Neale Hurston, Hemingway, started out as journalists. So when I glimpsed The House at Sugar Beach , at my local bookstore and saw it was a memoir written by a journalist, it was pretty much a done deal that I would buy it. Now it wasn't only that the author Helene Cooper was a journalist, it was that she was a Liberian journalist chro
Read more

Switzerland's Fete Des Vignerons

Image
                                               Once every generation, the centuries-old viticultural festival, Fete des Vignerons, unfolds in Vevey, Switzerland. Watching this spectacle of music, dancing, wine and fanciful costumes, felt like I had been transported to something out of a Dr. Seuss story. With a law that prohibits the fest from taking place more than five times in a century, I felt incredibly lucky to witness this celebration of Swiss wine traditions dating back to the 17th century.  Some of the fetes 5,500 performers in costumes strolled the narrow streets of Vevey after a show that featured fairies, bees, royal courts, playing cards and 17th-century wine growers. The performance was in French but the drama transcended language barriers. It's a difficult experience to describe but if I had to sum it up, I would explain it as the magic of Cirque Du Soleil combined with the pageantry of the Olympics, topped with the history of folk celebrations.  Take a peek at my v
Read more