I have found that New Yorkers are particular about their hot chocolate.  Usually, they fall in one of two camps:

1) The hot-chocolate-as-dessert camp.  These people believe that no hot chocolate is too thick or too sludge-like.  They’re happy if a plastic spoon can be stood on end, supported only by the pudding-like contents.  They view hot chooclate as a meal.

2) The hot-chocolate-is-a-drink-like-coffee camp.  These people are no less fussy about quality, percent cacao, etc. but they believe that you should be able to drink hot chocolate easily in any situation where you would drink coffee or tea.  If they get a cup of hot chocolate and notice that it spills easily they are happy. 

To make things easy, Dessert Buzz is rolling out a 10-point scale to rate the density or thickness of the different hot chocolates.  A ranking of “one” means the hot chocolate is drinkable and fluid.  A rating of “ten” means it’s basically melted chocolate or melted chocolate with some heavy cream or half-and-half–you get the idea.

Don't miss the hot chocolate festival at City Bakery in February

City Bakery Notes: Very, very thick.  A solid 9 on the MCD scale.  Interesting and innovative flavors.  Annual hosts of the Hot Chocolate Festival.  Every day in February 2012 they will feature a different hot chocolate flavor such as fresh ginger, banana peel and “What would Faulkner drink”.

City Bakery’s website is here.  Main location is 3 West 18th Street.

Dessert Truck Works Notes: Valrhona chocolate.  Very thick, not quite as thick as City Bakery but at least an 7-8 on the MCD scale.  A long-time DessertBuzz favorite.

Dessert Truck Works is located at 6 Clinton Street.  Their website is here.

Donatella Valrhona hot chocolate with Nutella

Donatella Notes: Really more of a restaurant but I’m including them because they have such a great pastry chef in Andrea Jarosh and also superb pizza.  Not a thick hot chocolate–easy to drink (a 5 on the scale).  Also made with Valrhona chocolate.  Because they are a restaurant they can add a shot of alcohol.

Donatella is located at 184 8th Aveneue.  Donatella’s website is here.

Francois Chocolate Bar Notes:  Old school thick!  Made with milk and heavy cream or half and half in an Ugolini machine.  An 8 on the MOD scale.  Grab a famous Payard almond chocolate

Francois Chocolate Bar is located in the Plaza hotel food hall at 1 West 59th Street (Francois Payard Bakery at 116 West Houston St. also has this hot chocolate).

The Francois Payard website is here.

Jacques Torres hot chocolate

Jacques Torres Notes: Plenty of locations around the city, a number of different size and flavor options and a great value at $3.59 for the small or $4.36  for the large.  An 8-9 on the MCD scale.  Available in classic, wicked w/chilies, peanut butter and mocha.  Jacques Torres has five locations in the city.

The Jacques Torres website is here.

L.A. Burdick Notes: Our favorite easy-to-drink dark hot chocolate, a very pleasant shop in Flatiron where you can sit down and enjoy your drink.  A 3 on the MCD scale.

L.A. Burdick is located on 5 East 20th Street.  L.A. Burdick’s website is here.

Hot chocolate from Peels: Photo courtesy of Chef Shuna Lydon

Peels Notes: very thick, comes with a delicious honey-vanilla marshmallow.  They are in the 9 range on the MCD scale.  Try a slice of their “monkey bread” too.

Peels is located on 325 Bowery.  Their website is here and their bakery “special order” form is here.

La Maison du Chocolat Notes: Available in two grades–milk and dark chocolate (we agree with Kathy YL Chan of Serious Eats NY –go with the dark), nice shop to drink in (Rock Center).  A 6-7 on the MCD scale.

La Maison du Chocolat is located at 30 Rockefeller Center (49th Street).  Their website is here.

Wafels and Dinges "Choclotron"

Wafels and Dinges Notes: (See their website and Twitter feed for locations) Very thick Belgian chocolate, half-and-half base, uses similar machine to the Ugolini at Francois Chocolate Bar.  An 8-9 on the MCD scale.   Add a Liege waffle while you are at it. Tip: Check the Wafels and Dinges Twitter feed daily to learn the question for a free topping.

Wafels and Dinges’ website and schedule is here.

Other recommended NYC hot chocolate: Grom, Via Quadronno and Tarallucci E Vino.  Follow DessertBuzz on Twitter.

Junior's will offer free cheesecake or layer cake when you order a lunch

In celebration of National Dessert Day on Friday, October 14th, and the publication of Junior’s Dessert Cookbook, Junior’s is offering a free slice of its famous cheesecake or slice of its skyscraper layer cakes with the purchase of any dine-in lunch or dinner entrée on that day at its four locations: Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn, Grand Central Terminal and Times Square in Manhattan, and MGM Grand at Foxwoods in Connecticut. Junior’s website has more info.  Related: SeriousEats NY rates NYC’s cheesecakes.

The gold Buddha is a specialty of Bond Street Chocolates

Bond Street chocolates is just one of the many DessertBuzz favorites to be participating in NYC Chocolate Weekend from Oct 14-16.  Other participants include Jacques Torres (all locations), L.A. Burdick, Chocolat Michel Cluizel, Ronni Sues and NuNu chocolates in Brooklyn.

New York City Chocolate Weekend

There will be discounts and free samples. If you visit the website you can print out a map and plot out your own personal chocolate walking and tasting tour.

The beautiful Michel Cluizel Chocolate

Chocolate Weekend NYC is all about celebrating New Yorkers love for chocolate–and showing off the most gourmet and best chocolate we have to offer.  One of the main goals is to connect people to the small businesses who shape and create our favorite food!

Chocolate penguins from L.A. Burdick

The best chocolatiers all on one map for one weekend.  Go here for more details.

Jacques Torres: Dark chocolate meet pumpkin seeds - perfect for October

L.A. Burdick frozen Hot chocolate - expensive but good.

L.A Burdick on 20th between 5th and Broadway doesn’t actually list a blended frozen hot chocolate on their menu.  I’m not sure why.  Maybe it’s a pain in the arse for their staff to trek into the kitchen for every order?  I understand that customers would make this request since their standard hot chocolate is so highly regarded.  My guess is, some regulars nagged them (that’s what I would do if I lived nearby) until they conceded.  In any event, despite it not being on the menu, you can and should try a frozen hot chocolate from Burdick this summer.

Burdick’s frozen hot chocolate is made from their blend of 68-70% dark chocolate bits and is one of the “darker” frozen hot chocolates available especially when compared to the others favorites like Torres (see below).  It’s certainly very good–but it will cost you.  They charged me $6.50 when I visited last week.

Go here fore a Google map of their location and here for L.A. Burdick’s website.

Jacques Torres Frozen Hot Chocolate

Jacques Torres is really the “go to” frozen hot chocolate in New York City.  With multiple flavors like peanut butter, expresso, wicked and regular and  5 locations (one in Brooklyn) you  don’t have to go out of your way to get ahold of one.  All their frozen hot chocolates are made from melted chocolate vs. cocoa powder.  If you are a peanut butter lover stop reading right here–run out and try this asap.  The Jacques Torres frozen peanut butter is one of the tastiest things you can get in NYC for $5.00.

Jacques Torres locations are here.  Their website is here.

Nunu frozen hot chocolate - one of the City's best.

If you find yourself in Brooklyn near Atlantic Ave – do yourself a favor and stop by Nunu chocolates to try their take on frozen hot chocolate.  It’s much lighter than Burdick or Torres but it’s also a bit sweeter.  YIn addition to their main locations you can also find Nuna at various pop-ups and street fairs, in summer they often have their frozen hot chocolate on offer.  $5.00.  Nunu’s flagship store is located on 529 Atlantic Ave. bet. 3rd & 4th Ave.  Their website is here.

I highly recommend the Ginger with mint

Finally, if chocolate isn’t your thing head to the Kelvin Natural Slush truck, the 2010 Vendy award winner for best dessert truck.  They have a great selection of all natural flavors like ginger with mint (my favorite).  These slushies are nothing like their 7-11 counterparts.  They’re not tooth-achingly-syrupy or made with fluorescent colored food dyes–the flavors simply taste as expected.  The ginger for example, is very strong, like biting into a slice of ginger, in a good way.  Other flavors I have tried and liked include tangy citrus with acai or strawberry, and ginger with blood orange.  Prices range from  $3.50-5.00 (small, Med, Large).  Go here for their schedule of planned locations.

A Dark chocolate Valrhona Mendiant

Valrhona chocolate mendiants:

This gift is twenty dollars worth of class.  It comes inside a particularly nice looking box and you get a few layers of milk and dark chocolate disks embedded with apricot bits, hazelnuts and pistachios.  These aren’t just any chocolate disks, these are made by Valrhona. What does that mean?  It means they’re damn good.

Milk Chocolate mendiant

$19.99 at the Valrhona store.

Special protection for special chocolate

L.A. Burdick chocolate penguins and snowmen:

Snowmen in a box

Despite appearances these snowmen are not made of white chocolate.  Each snowman is actually “hand-piped with clementine and dark chocolate ganache, topped with a roasted hazelnut, dipped in white chocolate, then finished with a dark chocolate top hat”.  They come in their own wooden container and make a great one-of-a-kind gift at $33.00 for a box of nine.  Penguins are also available.   Click here for descriptions of the penguins. In stock at the NYC store as of  12:30 Sunday.

The penguins

L.A. Burdick is located at 5 East 2oth Street.  Their website is here.  If you go to their store to buy this gift make sure to treat yourself to a cup of their hot chocolate which is rated as one of the best in the city.

For the rest of this year’s DessertBuzz holiday guide go here.

Melt Bakery Fried Apple Pie from the Hester Street Fair

It looks like the last Hester Street Fair is this weekend and there are some great sweets on offer at reasonable prices.   What’s available if you head down there you ask?  Well, according to Blondie and Brownie Melt Bakery has some delicious fried apple pies!  If it’s still mad warm you might also want to try their cookie-heavy ice cream sandwiches too.

On the other had, if the temperatures do drop this weekend it would be a great excuse to start trying some of the great hot chocolates New York City has to offer.  Serious Eats NY recommends Caracas at La Maison du Chocolat.  Served with a square of chocolate and whipped cream $8.00 (!)  I like L.A. Burdick in Flat Iron.

For those looking for vegan Halloween treats or just some sweets that are a bit healthier this weekend I recommend checking out Vegan Divas.  They have some special Halloween-themed cupcakes and other goodies.  Available at Butterfield market.

Vegan Divas dark chocolate brownie - try it you'll be surprised!

]]> http://dessertbuzz.com/halloween-weekend-dessert-ideas-fried-apple-pies-hot-chocolate-and-vegan-treats/feed/ 3 http://dessertbuzz.com/macaron-day-nyc/ http://dessertbuzz.com/macaron-day-nyc/#comments Sat, 20 Mar 2010 16:48:13 +0000 JK http://dessertbuzz.com/?p=835

Dessert Truck Works Pomegranate macarons from Nov 2008

Updated: Georgia’s on the Upper West Side and Cannelle Patisserie in Queens have been added.

François Payard is organizing the first annual Macaron Day in NYC on Saturday, March 20.   Discover just how good these gourmet little pastries can be at one of the bakeries below.  These retailers will be offering a free macaron if you tell them you are there because of Macaron Day (of course you should tell them you are there because of  DessertBuzz too, but you won’t get anything extra).  As you would expect in a city of 8 million, supplies are limited so go early.

Macaron Day NYC is inspired by and will coincide with the 5th annual Jour du Macaron in Paris, organized by Pierre Hermé.

Bouchon Bakery macaron from the Time Warner Center location

Chocolate macarons from L.A. Burdick

Macarons from Kee Chocolatier (as of yet not participating in Macaron Day)

Francois Payard's macarons from Francois Chocolate Bar

	Almondine Bakery 85 Water Street, DUMBO(718) 797-5026 442 9th Street, Park Slope (718) 832-4607www.almondinebakery.com
	Bouchon Bakery 10 Columbus Circle, 3rd Floor (212) 823-9364 www.bouchonbakery.com
	Burdick Chocolate 5 East 20th Street (212) 796-0143 www.burdickchocolate.com
	Butterfield Market 1114 Lexington Avenue (212) 288-7800www.butterfieldmarket.com
	DessertTruck Works 6 Clinton Street www.dt-works.net
	FC Chocolate Bar714 Madison Avenue, 4th floor(212) 759-1600www.fcchocolatebar.com
GEORGIA’S CAFÉ & BAKERY 2418 Broadway at West 89th Street (212) 362-2000 Cannelle Patisserie 75-59 31st Avenue, East Elmhurst (718) 565-6200
	La Maison du Chocolat 1018 Madison Avenue at 78 Street 63 Wall Street 30 Rockefeller Center Empire State Center Lobby (212) 744-7117www.lamaisonduchocolat.com
	Macaron Café 161 West 36th Street (212) 564-3525www.macaroncafe.com
	Madeleine Patisserie 132 West 23rd Street 212-243-2757www.madeleinepatisserie.com
	Mad-Mac “The Authentic French Macarons” At Bernardaud 499 Park Avenue at 59th Street (973) 225-0930 www.madmacnyc.com
	Silver Moon Bakery 2740 Broadway at 105th Street (212) 866-4717 www.silvermoonbakery.com

A friend of mine who I believe holds a black belt in New York City food knowledge recently introduced me to L.A. Burdick in Flatiron.  This small, chocolate-centric pastry café is a great alternative to Manhattan’s axis of popular hot chocolate evil of City Bakery, Jacques Torres and Grom.

What I really like about L.A. Burdick’s dark hot chocolate, and what sets it apart from it’s peers is the quality of the chocolate and the level of sweetness. It’s got just the right amount of sweet, which to me, means very little. The house blend is about 68-70% cacao and is very flavorful.  It felt like drinking my favorite 72% Dagoba chocolate bar.  They also make their hot chocolate standard with 1% milk (you can ask for whole) which means the hot chocolate itself is very “drinkable” rather than sludge-like, as it is at City Bakery or Jacques Torres.  People who really like their hot chocolate super thick and heavy, essentially, a cup melted dark chocolate with sugar, might like this hot chocolate less.

Another difference with their standard hot chocolate is that they don’t cut it with anything, such as peanut butter or hot peppers, to alter the flavor, it’s just straight up high-end dark chocolate.

For people who like their hot chocolate a little more sweet and a little less bitter they offer hot milk chocolate (which I didn’t try) but my host, who is a regular, says is quite popular.  I didn’t get to try any of their pastries or individual chocolates but I did get to try a fresh-out-of-the-oven chocolate Madeline which was excellent.  All of their pastries are made in-house.  Look for more coverage of L.A Burdick soon.

Recommended: The daily special dark hot chocolate, special, one-of-a-kind chocolate gifts

Go here fore a Google map of their location and here for their website.