Too Bad This Isn't The Ice Cream Sandwich On My Android

North Brooklyn is expanding at a rapid pace, and the places seem to be getting cooler and cooler.  Just a few blocks from where I used to live on 5th and 5th, you can find Bierkraft - a self-described 'dine-in or take-out beer and food emporium'.  I must have passed this place a million times, but since I'm not a beer drinker never thought to go inside...

...until I learned that Bierkraft doesn't just have beer, they also have an ice cream cookie sandwich that makes the 'Best Of' lists.  After dinner last weekend, we decided to take a walk over to this place to check out this gelato sandwich, since ice cream seems like an appropriate dessert in the middle of winter.  When we walked in, I was a little bit confused - it appeared to be a convenience store of sorts with a long aisle filled with beer upon beer upon beer.  It turns out Bierkraft sells beers from around the world both by the bottle and on draft, where you can enjoy it with a sandwich, cheese and meat platters or specialty chocolates.  

In the freezer section, there I found the reason I came - the gelato sandwiches!  I picked the brownie cookie sandwich with chocolate chunk gelato, which comes from Il Laboratorio.  Honestly, what could be better than this!?  I was a huge fan.  It was crazy expensive - $6 for the sandwich - but two of us were barely able to split it, it was so rich and filling.  Of course I managed to finish it, because it was incredible.  I let it sit out for a little while once I got home so that it had melted just a little bit, and the gelato melted into the brownie to make it a little less thicker and easier to eat.  There are other varieties - cherry blondie with dark chocolate gelato and brownie with peanut butter gelato.  

Bierfkraft is open 7 days a week, from 12-11 Monday-Saturday, and 12-8 on Sunday.

191 Fifth Avenue (between Union and Berkeley Streets) in Brooklyn

R train to Union Street is the closest stop

www.bierkraft.com

Good thing it's a leap year when February is hot chocolate month!

The month of February holds a lot of things for a lot of people.  For kids & teachers, it means a week off of school for President's week. For Hallmark & select females, it means cards & roses on Valentine's Day.  For snowboard enthusiasts, it means weekend trips out to Vermont or the Poconos.  For me - it means hot chocolate month at City Bakery!

Every February, City Bakery has their hot chocolate month 28 (this year 29 thanks to the Leap Year!)  This year, we planned to go one day over President's Day Weekend and decided to go on February 19th, which was Sunken Treasure day.  The lines were longer than usual, which I attribute to a combination of it being hot chocolate month and also President's Day, when most people were on holiday.

We decided to go all out today and get TWO cookies - one of the traditional chocolate chip cookies that makes everyone's top 10 list, and the double chocolate one.  Between those two cookies and the hot chocolate, we were definitely in chocolate overload.  But it's just SO GOOD here!  I am fairly certain the sunken treasures in the hot chocolate were caramels, but all I could taste and smell and see was chocolate everywhere so I really can't be sure.

City Bakery has a great chocolate selection (obviously the cookies and hot chocolate are the most common) but they also have a cafe in back where you can get soup, salad, and sandwiches.  All of the food looks amazing, and every table of both floors of this two-story cafe were filled.  I would definitely recommend coming here for lunch, or to bring food back to your office (they have a salad bar where you can get things to go).


City Bakery is located at 3 West 18th street, right off of 5th Avenue.  They have a sister location called Birdbath, that I actually stumbled into one time and recognized the cookies and knew they were related!
www.thecitybakery.com

Le Chocolate on Le Strip

While ChocolatesWhyImFat originated as a New York-centric blog, we have decided that while traveling, why not find the best desserts around the world?  We've covered Philly a few times, and now we're heading out west to the city of sin.  Viva Las Vegas.

Some come to Vegas to gamble.  Some come to replicate the Hangover and experience a little of that 'what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas' philosophy.  Some want to eat all they can eat and frequent strip clubs they discovered by having fliers shoved into their hands at every corner.  And some want to see minor glimpses of cities around the world all along one strip of land in the middle of the dessert.  

I don't exactly fit into any of these categories.  This was my first time in Vegas above the legal gambling age, however my time there was short, as it was merely a starting point for a ski trip to the mountains in Utah.  Now with limited time, the most important thing to do was to figure out the best places to eat, since Vegas is known for having the best of everything all in one place.

What our photographer Justin discovered upon researching desserts on the strip, was a chocolate shop located in the Bellagio, Jean-Philippe Patisserie.  Chef Jean-Philippe Maury comes from Paris, and serves as the Executive Pastry Chef for all of the Bellagio's 17 gourmet restaurants.  

At the front of JP you'll find a giant chocolate fountain with streams of dark, milk and white chocolate dripping down from the ceiling, amassing at the bottom to create a giant pool of mocha-colored chocolatey wonderfulness.  Blocks of the chocolate fountain are available to purchase as souvenirs.  The fountain is certified by the Guiness Book of World Records as the largest in the world.

While the fountain was impressive, the rest of the shop was filled with beautiful cakes, ranging from birthday to wedding cakes, each more glamorous than the next.  

There was a wide selection of gelatos, but we had come to try some of the pastries and chocolates.  Justin, being obsessed with both Nutella and brioche (and really anything Parisian), bought the last Nutella brioche available.  While I'm not overly excited by Nutella, this pastry truly was a not-so-little piece of heaven.  The pastry was large, fresh, and dense, able to hold what seemed like an entire jar of Nutella.  With a layer of powdered sugar across the top, this was certainly messy to eat (we both were covered in hazelnut spread and sugar after the first bite), but delicious and highly recommended.  Guest blogger of the day Justin described it in just one word - "epic".

The selection of confections to purchase was quite large, including chocolate rocks (which I accidentally spilled all over the floor - the package was much heavier than it looked!), hot chocolate pellets, chocolate covered caramel sticks, and much more.  The dessert I opted for was a package of four chocolate macaroons, half covered with a layer of white chocolate.  The macaroons were extremely thick and moist, and retained their flavor and moistness for days.  (Who am I kidding - I don't know how long they really lasted because I finished them off on my plane ride back to NY!) Each one was large enough for two to share, and the inside tasted like a flavorful cake, rather than the typical drier taste of a traditional macaroon.  The white chocolate layer provided an extra kick of chocolate that added a nice balance to the chocolate cake.  Since this was a one-time trip to Vegas where I probably won't be returning any time soon, I was okay with buying a package of 4, however at $3 apiece, if I was in Vegas and wanted one I would have preferred for them to be sold individually.

Lastly, we got a tin of assorted chocolates.  The bars came in dark, milk and white, a little bit of everything from the fountain.  I usually like my chocolate less on the plainer side, but these bars were delicious, and I felt the taste of Paris in every bite.

I would certainly return to Jean-Philippe if I ever made it in Vegas again, next time to try the gelato.  I definitely would recommend checking out the one in the Aria, which is even bigger and better than the one in Bellagio, as I just found out from investigating on Google.  Even if you don't have a sweet tooth, this place is worth checking out if you're on the strip, even if you're just window shopping and want to see the world's largest chocolate fountain.

A taste of the Catskills, down in Tribeca

Growing up, I used to go with my family to the resorts up in the Catskillls.  Primarily, it was the Pines & Kutshers.  I remember a lot of things about those vacations - I remember my grandfather playing shuffleboard out back while my grandma played bingo by the pool.  I remember going to kids camp where we would have scavenger hunts around the hotel.  What I don't remember, is anything about the food having any redeeming qualities.  That's why when Kutsher's Tribeca, a 'modern Jewish American bistro' opened up a few weeks ago, I was skeptical.  Did I really want to go somewhere to pay $10 for a bowl of matzoh ball soup? The words gefilte fish manke me queasy.  But my friends from Birthright wanted to go for Restaurant Week, so since I wanted to see them I went and prepared to eat challah bread all night.

Since this is a chocolate blog, I'm not going to go into detail about the meal.  Proving to be the stubborn one I am, I was the only one at the table of 5 who opted out of the restaurant week menu and went with a salad and brussel sprouts.  Now when the time came for dessert, I spotted two things on the menu which made me realize the reason to come here hadn't been about the rugelach at all.  There was a black and white ice cream cookie sandwich, and a rainbow cookie ice cream fudge sundae.  Four of the girls ordered the B/W cookie sandwich, and I ordered the rainbow cookie sundae.

The sandwich was such a fun concept.  Two black and white cookies surrounded a heap of ice cream, forming a sandwich that was too big to eat in sandwich form.  Luckily, the dessert came with a bowl of chocolate to dip it in, so we dissected the cookie, scooped up the ice cream and dunked it int he chocolate.  Taste wise, it wasn't anything spectacular, but I definitely give it points for concept.  I think it was the vanilla ice cream that killed it for me, because  since I'm a chocolate freak, vanilla is too bland for me.  The girls all loved it though, although were so full from their steak and potato dinners that they gave me all of their leftover cookies :)

Now for the rainbow cookie ice cream sundae.  I am very particular about my rainbow cookies.  There are certain bakeries I get them from, my favorite being the bakery in Astoria, Queens that I reviewed last summer.  They were my fathers' favorite before he found out he was diabetic, so by the way if anyone knows of a really good sugar-free rainbow cookie, please let me know!
There were pieces of rainbow cookie spread throughout the sundae, which were fun surprises as I picked through the cup to throw away the vanilla ice cream and get down to the fudge at the bottom.  I didn't realize it at first, that there were two different types of consistencies to the white part of the sundae.  I thought it was whipped cream, which is also a skippable ingredient for me, but Alana and I figured out it was marshmallow fluff!  This was such a fun dessert, and made my experience at Kutsher's a happy one.  I have to say, I wouldn't eat here specifically for the desserts, but if you are going here for dinner, it definitely is a fun after-dinner treat.

Kutscher's Tribeca
186 Franklin Street
(212) 431-0606
www.kutsherstribeca.com

Best of Philly 2012

We have been to Reading Terminal Market before, specifically to check out Flying Monkey Patisserie to see their 15 layer Pumpple cake.  Once we got there, we saw that every single stand in the market had been featured at some point in the 'Best of Philly'.  Which meant, of course, that a more in-depth review of the whole market was very necessary.

This past weekend, I made a trip back to Philly with Chocolate's Why I'm Fat's new official photographer to try a little of everything the market had to offer.  

We started back at Flying Monkey, since that was the place we loved so much the first time.  This time, we tried the cheesecake brownie, the smoreo, a whoopie pie, an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie sandwich, a red velvet cake ball, and a chocolate chip cookie.  All of the desserts looked amazing, and they have interesting spins on traditional treats.  Since we bought so much, and expressed our love for Flying Monkey, the lady even gave us the cake balls for free!

Market bakery, which carries a full line of LeBus breads (a famous Philly bakery featuring artisan breads since 1978), also had fantastic chocolate chip cookies.  They were fresh and warm and had giant chocolate chunks.  We brought half home and warmed it up in the toaster oven, and it proved to be just as good the next day (or at 5 in the morning when we tried this experiment).  The focaccia breads looked amazing, but we made the mistake of saving them for the next morning when they were slightly stale after sitting in the ice cold car all day.  Putting them in the toaster didn't help in this case, so we'll have to try them again next time.  LeBus also has a separate store where you can purchase their breads near Rittenhouse Square.

One of our favorites in the market was The Famous 4th Street Cookies.  They have a lot of different flavors, and initially we just bought a white chocolate chip and a chocolate chip walnut.  But then we saw there were traditional chocolate chip cookies with a fresh coat of chocolate fudge on top.  So back out came the wallets, and another cookie was purchased.  This was my favorite, although very sweet and I was only able to handle a couple of bites at a time.  The Famous 4th Street Cookies is located at the very front of the market, but you can also have them shipped off of their website.  Although to be honest, I would rather hold out until a return trip to Philly because spending the day at Reading Terminal Market is such an enjoyable experience.  There are other things besides food stalls here, such as beautiful flowers from Lancaster county, candles made naturally with bee pollen, and so many Amish people.  Especially for someone who's never been to Amish country, coming here will be a very unique experience.

At the back of the market we found an Amish bakery called Beiler's Bakery.  They are apparently known for their pies and sticky buns, but since neither of those have chocolate we were ready to keep walking.  They we saw a sign that said, 'try our chocolate covered whoopie pies'.  I've never had a chocolate covered whoopie pie before, so we asked if we could try them.  They were sold out of the packages, but they had one package left that they were willing to give us as samples.  I don't usually care for whoopie pies all that much, but these were smaller than a normal pie - probably 3-4 bites in total - and the chocolate covering did the trick.  It was delicious, and I was disappointed they didn't have more for us to bring home!

Reading Terminal Market is located at 51 N. 12th Street.  It's walking distance to the historic district, Rittenhouse Square, and the shopping along Walnut and Chestnut streets.  We parked the car next to the terminal for the day and were able to cover all of the major sites, so I would strongly recommend doing this.  Aside from the bakeries, there are a lot of places for real food too - from Cajun to seafood to Turkish to Italian.  Anything you want, you can find here.  Just make sure to come on an empty stomach!

Bee's Doesn't Have Much to Buzz About

In my attempt to cross a few more places off of my chocolate and burger list before the end of the year, we tag teamed Bee's Desserts en route to Bill's Burger last week.  The burger was amazing, but of course I was most looking forward to dessert at the end.

Bee's had been written up for having an amazing honey cake.  I don't know what a honey cake is, but it was covered in chocolate, and I saw the place in the Serious Eats blog (http://newyork.seriouseats.com/2010/03/lunch-for-one-bee-desserts-west-village-opening.html).  So we figured it must be good.

When we passed by, there was a sign on the door that they were closed for the day because they were filming something inside.  There's a garden in back, so I think it was being used for some movie, most likely with Sarah Jessica Parker because she seems to be in every movie filmed in the West Village.  We politely asked if we could still buy the honey cakes.  I could go back any time, but we had visitors from California that wouldn't have a chance to come back another day.  The people at Bee's were very nice about it, and they did let us buy two honey cakes to go.  We picked the original and marshmallow varieties (there are 4 altogether to choose from, the other two are almond and liqeur).

The honey cakes are made with honey instead of refined sugar, which is supposed to make them more moist. They were moist, but I wouldn't exactly say they were good.  They're covered in a layer of dark chocolate, but it's not very thick.  For $5, I would have much rather had 2 cookies from Paradis, a make your own froyo from 16 Handles, or a brownie from Vegan Divas.  They are supposed to be eaten cold, but we tried to thaw them out a little because they were given to us frozen!  I think they'd been in the refrigerator back at Bee's.  We tried a little of each one, and the communal decision was that it was just okay.  I liked the marshmallow one a little bit more than the original, but overall it reminded me of a mallomar.  Which I actually enjoy more than these.  And I can get an entire box for less than $5 (maybe not in Manhattan, but definitely in Brooklyn.  But not in the summer because apparently they aren't sold in hot months).

Bee's has a cafe too, and the menu looks pretty decent - I would potentially go back there for brunch, but I won't be getting another honey cake anytime soon.  We didn't even finish these - I think I was disappointed

Bee Desserts and Cafe
www.beedesserts.com
94 Greenwich Ave, near 7th Ave S and between W12th and W13th streets

212-366-6110

Paradis Lost

My company's office moved down to the Union Square area back in October. While Union Square is great for commuting purposes, in terms of snacks, there's really not much in the immediate area.  There's things way in the west village, and way in the east village, and in Chelsea, but really not much aside from Max Brenner (not a favorite of mine).

When the office was in the process of getting set up, Justin came all the way from California to both get the place up and running, as well as cross some cookie spots off his must-try list.  Justin stumbled upon Paradis, 2 blocks from the office, which had a sign on the door that said NYC's best cookie.  He picked it up and said it was pretty good, and worth checking out.  So of course, a good 6 weeks later, I finally made it down there!

I tried the brownie the first time. At first bite, it tasted a little bit like Jell-O pudding.  I didn't think I was going to like it, and was kind of disappointed.  But then I tried it again a few hours later, and it tasted much better.  It was light and chewy, and had a layer of powdered sugar on top.  I don't think I would get it again, but it was okay for the moment.  The food there was actually REALLY good.  I had a quinoa salad with kale, fennel and butternut squash. Every time I've gone there I've had great lunches, so I'm definitely a fan of the food.
The story of Paradis is super cute too.  This American girl named Kim was studying French cooking in Paris, and met this French butcher, Mickael Paradis.  They fell in love, got married and opened up Paradis-To-Go.  Now they operate the cafe, serving French/American food with a rotating daily menu and delicious baked goods.

I had to go back to try the cookie, and luckily the next time I went they were giving out samples!  The cookie was amazing - super doughy and chocolatey, and crumbled in my hands.  I went back with Danielle a few days later to split one, and we absolutely loved it.  Luckily, since Paradis is right near the office and within eyesight of our gym, we can pop in there every day to be healthy and get a salad, or be unhealthy and split one of their amazing cookies.  Definitely add this place to your must try cookie list!


Paradis (http://paradistogo.com/about.html)
114 Fourth Avenue (off E 12th Street, diagonal from Crunch gym)
Open Monday-Friday, 7-7; Saturday 9-6