We Survived a Sugar Coma from the Chocolate Salon

In a rare escape from the insular, hater- and stan-filled world of local hiphop, Seattlest visited the realm of food lovers at TasteTV's Chocolate Salon on Sunday morning; the foodie realm is also insular, but significantly more sugary, and involves oddities such as chocolate virgins de Guadeloupe (from Alma). Twenty-some chocolatiers arrived with wares to share and sell, and as a judge and panelist for the event, we had more than our fill of traditional and startlingly creative chocolate concoctions while we attempted to rank our favorites.

Thanks to broken air conditioning and an enthusiastic turn-out of euphoric (and then crashing) chocolate lovers, the conference room for the event at Bell Harbor Conference Center was a muggy swamp. This wasn't pleasant for the humans in the room, so we can only imagine how the truffles, poor melting things, were suffering. Fortunately, we were still able to focus our energies on the crazy flavor combinations presented to us. Soy sauce truffles from Petit Noir? Scrumptiously salty, and not in the usual fleur de sel kind of way. Kalamata olive truffles from Fiori? Briny, smooth, and unforgettable. We even tasted Grendelsweet's crunchy white chocolate oatmeal stout/potato chip truffle--and liked it!

Another photo and more about chocolate we loved most, after the jump!