Chocolates

Can we talk about novelty chocolate items for a moment?

I will admit I'm not a chocolatechocolatechocolatechomp kind of girl, but I do go out of my way to find certain goodies. I've been at home and in that mood where I want to eat so much dessert. Maybe this will make it better.

Here are my favorites, in no specific order:

Kinder surprise

I've only ever seen these in Western Europe. I think you can order them online and find them in Canada, though. For those unfamiliar, this is a hollow egg-shaped chocolate shell (milk on the outside, white on the inside) that comes with a little "easter egg" inside with a toy.

They're apparently banned in the States because the toys are so damned small. While this makes sense, I love them, and the toys are brilliant considering how tiny the packaging is. I make sure to buy extra boxes to bring home in my suitcase whenever I'm abroad.

The last time I was able to get my hands on a couple of these, they had a magic set you could collect. Magic! With real magic tricks, like disappearing dominoes and floating genies.

Kinder hippo

These are another quirky part of the Kinder chocolate family. I guess this isn't chocolate-chocolate per se, but they're delicious. These are little bite-sized hollow hippo shaped wafers filled with a hazelnutty creme. Their bottoms are covered in little white styrofoamy wafers and all of them are fully of delicious.

I don't know if it's just me, but I've found these IMPOSSIBLE to find when I want them. When I was abroad in 2007, I went to several countries before finding any. I then proceeded to buy and eat the whole box.

Best part? Hazelnut filling? No. It's shaped like a hippo.

Cadbury egg

I don't know why I like things shaped like eggs. To be honest, I hate eating real eggs. But a chocolate egg always seems to hold something more special than unmade baby chickens, right?

I am disgusting and HOARD these babies each year at Easter time. Hoard them. They are sooo delicious and sugary and magical all at the same time. I mean, how do they keep the yellow sugar yolk from oozing into the white sugar white? It is mindblowing.

I was told once that there is a Cadbury cafe (!!!) somewhere in London that has these year round. Could you imagine? A Cadbury egg instead of one of those little chocolate tabs at a cafe? Delish.

I was also told that these are released as "ornament" eggs at Christmas time. Look, I don't remember who told me this, but I have scoured the candy aisles for the past two holiday seasons and found nothing. Lies. Good thing they'll be pushing the Easter candy as soon as Valentine's Day passes by.

Serendipity frozen hot chocolate

First off, this is not the same thing as a frappe blended beverage. Neither is it the same as a milkshake. It is just as the name suggests, a frozen hot chocolate. And it is full of delicious.

This concoction is served at the fabulous Serendipity 3 on the Upper East Side (NYC, duh). But you can occasionally find recipes and gift sets with the drink mixes on the web. I believe gift sets come accompanied with the spoons and goblets as well as drink mix!

The cute little coffee shop Urban Grind here in Atlanta served it for a bit, I don't know if they still do. They're still worth a visit for their sweetheart owner, Cassandra, and their constantly stocked case of Jake's ice cream. Yummm.

Godiva Chocolixir

This is my mother-of-all-chocolate-cravings, had-a-really-bad-day-at-work, feeling-really-cranky-and-bloated cure all fix all weapon of choice. This too is different from the above mentioned beverages. This is just pure chocolate goodness.

When blending the drink, the chocolate ladies even throw in a few chunks of actual Godiva chocolate, which gets blended with the ice in the drink. It is so decadent and so satisfying. Sometimes I skip meals so I can have one of these instead. My favorite is milk chocolate with caramel.


And note: I had to stop during the preparation of this post three times to hunt down chocolate in my room because the pictures were too much.