Wednesday, March 24, 2010

coco-luxe

Coco-Luxe TrufflesAll photographsRon Dunlap/Doglight Studios
My journey with Coco-Luxe began with a small tragedy that reminds me of a Bill Murray skit on Saturday Night Live. In the skit, Bill Murray plays an recently fired and disgruntled grocery bagger who thinks that bags should be packed "hard things on top, soft things on bottom." Sadly, my postman has similar logic. For example, if a package is marked This Side Up, it appears on our porch upside down. If it is marked Fragile, it is crushed, perhaps with a tire tread on it. He also likes to give me the mail of another household with the same number but a different street and them mine. When questioned about any of this, he becomes very defensive. While I do hold on to my belief that there is a large purple ape in the Monrovia post office that helps crush packages, in general I think this postman's decisions just feel right to him. So when he delivered my precious box of Coco-Luxe, despite my having asked him in Coco-Luxe Trufflesadvance to leave packages in the shad, he left it in the full sun. Thus some of the Coco-Luxe chocolates were a little melted--not that it affected the taste!

Whereas I am not so sure about my postman's concepts, I am a big supporter of Coco-Luxe's concept that if you put two great things together -- chocolate and classic sweets--the winning combination becomes even greater than the sum of its parts.

Because we're the kind of people who like to bite the head off the bunny first, we decided to start with the truffle with the Gingerbread Man on it. I happen to be a sucker for anything gingerbread, so this truffle had my name all over it. Rich and creamy with a nice gingerbready (this new adjective is my contribution to the American vernacular) taste.

Coco-Luxe TrufflesAfter some debate, we decided to try the Devil's Food next. We were curious. Would it taste just like a chocolate? Or would it really taste like a chocolate cake? Well, we were delighted to find it was definitely cake-like in taste and texture.

The next set of chocolates were devoured in quick succession and with less philosophical discussion: the Double Cherry was surprisingly piquant, sweet and a little tart just like a cherry should be, only better because it had chocolate and the German Chocolate truffle was a perfect blend of chocolate and coconut, with just the right amount of toasted pecans thrown in for a little texture. If you've ever dreamed of a Malted Shake that is in the form of a truffle, you must have a Malted Milk. And, if you are an Angel Food cake fan, Coco-luxe offers a chocolate ganache Coco-Luxe Caramelsinfused with a heavenly amount of vanilla bean. We also loved the After Dinner Mint too. We felt that if the After Dinner Mint truffle were a person, he/she would be serious (after all it's dark chocolate) but when you got to know them better you'd would find them to have a light, minty and refreshing personality.

Our favorites were the Banana Split and Dreamy Orange. The Banana split had a banana ganache with tiny bits of dried cherries, which for some reason, made it really taste like a Banana Split. After you taste the truffle you think, why isn't Banana Split a more popular flavor? It almost feels un-American not to like it if you ask me. When I bit into the Dreamy Orange, I felt it was aptly named. It flooded me with memories of those hot summer days when by some miracle you found yourself with a Creamsicle in your hand, that you didn't have to share, and it didn't matter that it would drip all over you. Imagine the feeling, make it taste better, add chocolate and you have the Dreamy Orange.

Coco-Luxe also has sensational chocolate covered caramels, chocolate bars, chocolate covered nuts, hot cocoa and seasonal confections.

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