by Julie Burba

Ten days into the new year, my favorite gourmet food store began stocking shelves with ribboned boxes of candy intended for Valentine’s Day sales. I wasn’t so surprised that the season had moved on to the next big sales opportunity, since retail stocks for Christmas the day after Labor Day, I was more surprised at the “sameness” of the candy. Beautifully handmade, papered, ribboned, and decorated boxes contained what seemed to be exact replicas of molded and filled confections from chocolatier to chocolatier. Each little bon bon was indistinguishable from Swiss maker to Belgian maker to Vermont maker. My self-imposed mission became finding new and tongue-temptingly delicious chocolates.

After a visit to four other gourmet locations, a drugstore, a coffee shop, and a grocery store, I found two products worth noting. Mind you this is not an exhaustive search into the best chocolate shops in the area, but a commentary on the confections made to sell in retail outlets.

The “pretty darned good chocolate bar” goes to the milk and dark chocolate bars manufactured by Bloomsberry & Co., a designer chocolate business out of New Zealand. I first “discovered” these bars at Pemberton’’s Market in Cambridge a week before Halloween.

Bloomsberry’s Valentine’s packaging doesn’t disappoint in the entertainment or taste factors. I busted out loud laughing when I saw the packaging, possibly the cleverest chocolate bar wrapper designs in the history of copywriters worldwide. Packaged in a box and wrapped in coated paper, the chocolate is better than your average candy bar.

Who can resist a chocolate bar that declares itself the “World’s Greatest Pick Up Bar,” with the subtext “3.5 oz. of milk chocolate that promises never to lie to you, to be there in the morning, to never ask your age, or to really truly listen to everything you have to say,” or “Instant Gratification,” stating “of course there is more than instant gratification, just not right now.”

Considering that 90 percent of women crave chocolate, and 40 percent of those women crave chocolate over sex, why not give a chocolate bar that makes her laugh and fulfills her, um, cravings? Gives a whole new meaning to the term “oral pleasure.” Kudos to Bloomsberry for making a dark chocolate bar that is rich, melts in your mouth, has a delicious bitter punch without being chalky, and makes a girl laugh.

The ‚Äúbest chocolate I‚Äôve tasted in years‚Äù goes to a confection by the name of La T√©ne, a one-man, handmade operation out of the kitchens of a business in Somerville and sold at Formaggio Kitchen in Cambridge. Can I just say, ‚Äú  Oh my God!‚Äù?

Brendan, the chocolatier, sizes the confections to pop in your mouth whole. Let these little beauties sit on your tongue and melt. I swear the champagne truffle exploded in my mouth with the bubbly effervescence of Dom Pérignon, finished with lush, silky, rich chocolate with the melting quality that other chocolates aspire to.

The stout truffle was like taking a frothy swallow of the libation with the heady creamy finish of a perfect pint. Made with uncultured butter, local organic cream, single origin chocolate, and other secret ingredients, these confections are what every girl dreams about.

If Nirvana, Godiva, Lake Champlain, and Lindt are to your liking, I say buy up and leave the good stuff for me!

Julie Burba, CCP
Director of Communications
Cambridge School of
Culinary Arts
2020 Massachusetts Ave.
617-354-2020, ext. 121