Review: Chocolate Walk 2011

What I brought home to share.
This past Saturday was our 3rd time at the Chocolate Walk in Nashville, Indiana.  While we know that others bought tickets based on the information we promoted here several times this fall, apparently your Chocolate Priestess and your Chocolate Coconut Acolyte went "too fast" last year and wore out some folks.  So even though I tried to arrange carpools those fell through.


We arrived around 9:45am, 15 minutes before the walk was to officially begin.  My arm is in a brace so no photos this year from the walk, sorry.  We went to the starting point, Brown County Art Gallery, where we got our tickets, booklet that had a map of the shops participating, and a button to identify us.  At this first stop there were two chocolate sample offered right away though only one was listed in the book.  The surprise chocolate happened one more time on our walk.

Now the past two years we've done this the wait in lines is horrible at some spots.  This year we decided to tackle the Main Street stops since those seem to be the biggest logjams.  With this adjustment, we were able to make all 31 listed stops over the 9 X7 block area in 2.5 hours.  Each of us packed away more of the samples than we ate or drank on the walk.

Many of the stops and the treats were the same as previous years.  There were some exceptions.  The Candy Emporium and Harvest Moon Pizzeria had different samples as did Holy Cow! though to be blunt, their chipotle hot chocolate was over done in terms of the spice, an opinion many shared if I can judge by the number of tossed out mostly full cups in the nearest trashcan.  Many places had 2-3 different samples you could chose from but all but one requested  you take only one sample.  The lady at Ice Cream Cottage had a good selection but then was also giving out cinnamon popcorn which isn't chocolate but was a nice bonus.

There was less information this year in the booklet. Only five shops listed their "guest chocolatiers" though I'm completely certain many more stops didn't make their own treats.  The listings for each stop last year has information about the sample they were handing out but this was not the case at all this time around.  That's sad because my memory fades over time and given my arm being in a brace, the information was useful since I simply could not take notes the entire time any more than I could take photos.

It was great fun again to walk this all with our Chocolate Coconut Acolyte.  We ran into another Chocolate Cult group while there as well.  The weather was great, the cause is good, and it was fun.  A wonderful pilgrimage all around.

Next year why not plan to join us; November 17, 2012, is the next date.  Before then we may attend their "Chocolate! Chocolate!" fundraiser in February as we did last year.  All indoors that time and more homemade than professionally made chocolates.

For those who attended, please leave a comment below.

Comments

mavido79 said…
I was a bit disappointed that many of the offerings were the same as in past years. So with that in mind, my vote for the best was the Candy Emporium. Every year they offer something different and this year's Dark Chocolate Black Forest Truffle was excellent. Honorable mention goes to the White Chocolate Raspberry "bonus" offering at the first stop. The chipotle cinnamon hot cocoa ranks at the bottom.

It was great fun, also, for me to do the walk with our Chocolate Priestess. I really appreciated the strategic planning of our route to hit the busiest spots first. And it didn't feel like we walked very fast this year. Or maybe that was just my bad ankle talking.
Next year will be the event's 5th anniversary so they are looking to do something extra. They asked me for some suggestions but anyone who attend, drop them an email if you have ideas.
I didn't go, but I would have loved to! How on earth did you not get sick from eating that much chocolate?!
The quantities are small, Jen. Maybe a bite or two of each thing. I ate/drank only 11 samples while we walked -- one I only had a sip of, you can guess which one from the post.

The others samples I brought home and shared with my family.
Caroline Taylor said…
Sounds like a great thing to do. Good job there is walking as well as chocolate!
It was a great cause, All That I'm Eating, because that particular humane society has a very hit success rate that events like this support. Plus a good amount of walking and just looking at the trees and the little artist colony.
mavido79 said…
Even with the small amount I ate during the walk, I was feeling it that night. I'm glad I brought most of it home and gave it to the Mate.
Ah, see I could have eaten it all by myself and had no problems.

Maybe that's why I'm The Chocolate Priestess? Chocolate loves me but I have to exercise Moderation for other reasons, not tummy aches.