Paris Chocolate Show??? I'm there!

Last Friday, le 2 novembre, was a very rainy and yucky day. What better day than to go to Paris for the annual Salon du Chocolat (Chocolate Show) at the Porte de Versailles?! Mr. K had the day off (actually, he had time off the 1st and the 2nd due to a bridge holiday of Toussaint- All Saints Day- in a very Catholic country). So we went.
The metro and RER were a bit messed up to say the least and we had to get off mid trip and take a tram to the place, but we made it nonetheless mostly dry.

Evidence we were outside at one point in the day.

 So you go inside and it is jam-packed full of treats and stands selling everything from chocolate, macaroons, and cookies to foie gras with chocolate fig chutney and chocolate lemonade.  Oh yeah, they even had a poetry reading by who else? Dame Chocolat. And the end of the day was topped off with a chocolate fashion show where the clothing was made out of chocolate.

These are the pictures from that day.

Treats, treats, and mountains of treats...

 This was the big display in the center of the show.  COMPLETELY made of chocolate and was about 6 feet tall. So cool!

This is a man that was making baby cookies by Krambly.  If you've never had one, oh man are you missing out!  They are like caramelized crepes meeting a sugar cookie. Delish! And he was so cute in showing us how he made them.  He just eyeballs how much to put in the machine and uses his nose to decide when it's time to take them out. I bet the factory is filled with many guys like this one making the cookies.

Mountains of chocolate slabs

 Of course a chocolate show is not complete without a fondue stand.  And why have one fondue fountain when you can have four. Plus, it really isn't fondue unless you have three things to put chocolate on: strawberries, waffles (odd but so good), and marshmallows (only in France do they serve marshmallows as a side dish).
The waffle was the best option for us so we just had to try it.

Milk chocolate fountain?
Yes, please!

Here's the loot! So yummy!

This stand was all about what you could do with marzipan and a flexible mold. Look at those little geese and turtles! Don't know what the dentures are about...but then again, we have wax lips in the US.

It's not a chocolate show in Paris without a chocolate monument: Arc de Triomphe!

Okay, all you Disney-philes, this one's for you!

These next ones are for the accessory girl in all of us.

Chocolate Crocodile? This one I can do!

A Cinderella slipper just for me...you shouldn't have

For those of us that just love to wear our chocolate out of doors, this is the new fashion.

The Mikado girls look so happy, don't they? It was hard to get a picture of them, they moved so fast in those things.

 So you can get around in your chocolate outfit and accessories, they made you a Voiture de Macarons!

Looks so yummy...I would never drive this thing.

Mr. K and I continued our walk. Bought lots of chocolate. Tasted tons of chocolate too.

I tried a Quinoa Dark Chocolate which was very good.  They also had Lavander, Superfruit, and Thyme Bars all in dark chocolate. They were out of the Speculus milk chocolate bar. Bummer. Those cinnamon cookies they serve with coffee are very yummy.

We tried Pop-Rock chocolate spread. Very interesting, though I wouldn't buy it. Too weird.

As I said before, I tried a foie gras with chocolate-fig chutney on French bread. The bread and foie-gras were yummy, but paired with the chutney, it just didn't go. It took the rest of the time there tasting chocolate to get the weird taste out of my mouth.

We saw a chocolate lemonade and neither one of us was willing to buy a bottle just to try it, so we passed on that one.

This is a booth that looked like a florist from afar and as you got closer, the flowers were made from cookies tightly wrapped in cellophane.

On display in the glass booth.

We then passed a stand of the company Chapon, one of the oldest chocolatiers in France. They had a thing for painted chocolate "boules" and were very art deco like.

Lovely packaging. I loved the colors they got on the chocolate. So chic, non?

This is just so pretty.

 
 We continued on our way, pushing elbow to elbow with the crowd now.  They were trying to get to the shows in the center of the expo.  Apparently, when you think chocolate, Peruvian musicians come to mind. They were fun though and it gave an exotic flair to the atmosphere.

We happened along a stand selling chocolate covered nuts. And, we were just happening to look at some tins, when the lady behind the booth came up and proceeded to have us taste every single flavor of chocolate nut she had behind the booth. Awesome! Score! I swear they must have covered those nuts not only with chocolate but also with a mildly addictive drug. It's a good thing we bought a tin for family for Christmas, otherwise we would have felt bad for consuming so many.

Honestly it was her fault though.

Anyway, as we were leaving, they did a demonstration of how they made their nuts. The secret is out. They do cover them in a white powder...sugar!

  There were also other demonstrations. Couldn't miss the Ferrero Rocher demonstration. They triple coat their chocolates, twice before the nut covering, then once more after the nuts. They were just handing them out like...well, I guess that's what they're supposed to do. Hehe.

It was the 50th anniversary of Le Petit Ourson Guimauve (or Marshmallow Bearcub) at Cemoi. So, we went there as we were heading out and found they had something even cooler! Hedgehogs! Chocolate and crisp rice outside, marshmallow and caramel inside. So yummy and just plain adorable!

We did go and peruse the chocolate high fashion models, before the catwalk, but that's for another posting. This couple is very tired and I don't want to over do it.

Chocolate out!