If you visit Paris in October and have a sweet tooth don’t miss the Salon du Chocolat (www.salon-du-chocolat.com)– a must for all gourmands and chocolate lovers. The Salon du Chocolat takes place in Paris every year. It is the world’s largest event dedicated to chocolate and cocoa. This year Delicious Paris was enticed by packets of raw cacao nibs as an individual product and by velvety textured chocolates by Japanese manufacturers with fruity notes that melt in the mouth leaving a beautifully flavourful aftertaste.
Specialist chocolatiers, pastry makers and confectioners, as well as cocoa bean producers from around the world, descend upon Paris for five days to surprise you with new trends in chocolate manufacturing.
This is an opportunity to meet the best chocolatiers in Paris, along with various regional French chocolate and sweet manufacturers inviting you to taste local specialities: gingerbread, honey sweets, nougat, fruit jellies, calissons, spreads, caramels, marrons glacés, marshmallows, macaroons, chocolate syrup, ice-cream, etc.
You will love the work of chocolatiers from the five continents encompassing Belgium, Japan, Vietnam, Brazil, Switzerland, Spain, America, etc. Smooth textures, fruity or spicy aromas and amazingly exotic flavours, such as wild forest tea, yuzu, tofu and sake ganache, will take your senses on a journey. This year we adored the chocolates by Dari K (http://www.dari-k.com/en/), a Japanese brand that makes chocolate from Indonesian cacao beans. They don’t use couverture chocolates and have their own original recipe to make flavourful chocolates from cacao beans. Their chocolates are pure poetry both visually and in terms of taste: citrus, yukou, matcha, etc.
A big hit was the Strasbourg brand, Erithaj (http://www.erithaj.com) : fresh chocolate cream, fresh, fermented or roasted cacao beans, bars with cashew praline, cinnamon, milk chocolate ganache, etc. This brand works with beans grown in South Vietnam, but the chocolate production takes place in Strasbourg.
You can visit the Salon du Chocolat alone or with the whole family, children revel in plenty of tastings at the stands, taking part in workshops or dancing with entertainers. You need to register on the website if you want to take part in the workshops hosted by master chocolatiers during which they share their favourite recipes. For tourists this is a perfect opportunity to purchase gifts to take home.
Some stands provide information about the chocolate production process beginning with the harvesting of beans. You can speak with producers to understand significant concepts in the chocolate production process: praline, cacao, couverture chocolate, etc.
