Food

10 MOST BEAUTIFUL CHOCOLATES

Patrick Roger is a talented fine arts sculptor with a passion for metal and sweets. His metal sculptures can be found in galleries and home collections around the world. Taste how he “sculpts flavors” in his eponymous chocolate and confection creations. With sweet names such as Opium, Instinct, and Allegory, which are combinations of flavors like yuzu, plum, caramelized orange, and sichuan berries, you know you are in for some heady stuff. We think his St. Germain boutique is the prettiest.

2. Sweertvaegher, Antwerp

This tiny shop in Antwerp sells the chocolate we crave the most and will request it as part of our last meal on earth, if given the chance. Family run for generations, it is simple, it is pure, it is chocolate that loves your whole mouth completely. Their signature Galets, billed as chocolate and butter sandwiched between two chocolate wafers, sound and look “meh,” but ohhhh... These classically styled morsels, the Grenoble and the Snobinet Praline, get a beauty prize all around.

3. Bond Street Chocolate, New York City

Bond Street makes a gorgeous 24kt gold-dusted 72% cacao Buddha that comes in three sizes, for your spiritual and culinary delight. They also spike truffles with Elijah Craig Bourbon, St. Germain Elderflower Cordial, and Herradura Blanco Tequila.

4. Madecasse, Madgascar

This bean-to-bar artisanal chocolate producer is unique because it does the whole production process in Madagascar, which is a beautiful thing for the native people and for us. Fruity cacao nibs and sea salt make this particular bar particularly addictive.

5. Stein Eriksen Truffles, Park City, Utah

We first tasted these truffles during the Sundance Film Festival in 2013 and have been dreaming about them ever since. These gorgeous delicacies were created and lovingly handmade by the Stein’s assistant pastry chef, Curtis Cameron, as a passion project. He uses rare single origin blends of cacao beans to achieve desired flavor profiles, ranging from dark Venezuelan 72% , a lighter Mexican 66%, a rare Ghana 40% for milk chocolate. The fillings are made in house from proprietary nut compounds, balsamic reductions, fruit purées, Portuguese Fleur de Sel from Portugal and liqueurs. All natural, fresh small batches maximize the taste and texture of each individual flavor.

6. Hedonist Artisan Chocolates, Rochester, New York

Hedonist pushes flavor edges with its Spice Collection Truffles, including Lemon Pepper, Coconut Curry, and Orange Chipotle. Their Lavender Collection Truffles are deep and sultry.

7. Krause’ Homemade Chocolates, Saugerties, New York

These silky and velvety, traditional styled chocolates have been keeping us happy for decades. They’re not fancy or complicated. They’re simply and intensely delicious. They are made by the Krauses, a genius multi-generational family chocolatier in the antique-laden Upstate New York town of Saugerties.

8. Chocolaterie Arn, Geneva

Arn Chocolatier is a stop we make whenever we’re in Geneva. It sits on a little hill in the Old City, as it has for a long, long time. Charming, beautiful attention to detail, and, at more than a century old, it keeps its graceful character in form and flavor.

9. Knipschildt, South Norwalk, Connecticut

A chocolate truffle is a beautiful thing. These chocolates are not much to look at. Their beauty is on the inside. Are you ready for a chocolate-covered, Perigord truffle-stuffed chocolate truffle? Yes, the deepest and darkest you can imagine. With each layer crushing, thin bittersweet coat to buttercream, towards its black gold center. They’re $250 a piece.

10. Rococo, London

Handpainted doves on a chocolate heart case look old fashioned, innocent, and sweet, until you open the lid and find a wicked ménage à trois of deep dark ganache (all ethically sourced cocoa, of course).