This is chocolate week ending with a grand chocolate show at Olympia. Several films have featured chocolates and even chocolate and meat combinations. Whether or not you have tried one of these before, chocolate combined with meat is an interesting experience.
If you are looking for fun evenings out three shops near Baker Street and Madame Tussauds offer a huge choice of events. Cross the road opposite Madame Tussauds next to Baker Street station, walk left along the road to Marylebone High street. Beyond the mini park is a side street, Moxon Street, continuing The Ginger Pig where you can buy meat, next door is La Fromagerie where you can buy fruit and cheese and have coffee and cake or a meal, and opposite is the Rococo Chocolate shop. All three have leaflets about forthcoming events. You can also check out their websites.
I went to an event at which the Ginger Pig and the Rococo chocolate shop had combined to provide an evening of chocolate and meat pairing. The evening cost £25 and we tasted beef and chocolate, parma ham and chocolate, and truffle chocolate with duck confit.
We received a very informative talk from the PR lady from the Ginger Pig and a man from the Rococo chocolate shop.
I learned the history of the Ginger Pig farms in England and how customers ask if they make Parma ham, which is something they have to import because Parma ham means it comes from Parma in Italy and is a protected name. We started with delicious thinly sliced beef, combined with chocolate, a surprisingly good combination. Next was peppery chocolate with child, which some loved but I found the child overpowering.
For me the most visually appealing and unusual meat was the salami with slices of hazelnut. I'm not a fan of salami, which I usually find fatty and as I'm on a beat cancer diet I generally avoid processed foods. But if you do like salami, it's great. If you want to serve it to others, it would be a novelty starter or main course or buffet selection for a dinner party or special occasion.
The other good thing about the evening was we were able to linger in the downstairs room as a group, chatting to the organisers and each other, so it was a convivial social occasion. (Not like some wine tasting where you feel you are lectured at, ignored by other guests who are in twosomes ignoring you, and made to feel that you are expected to leave unless you are buying, or end so late you need to leave the party and rush for your train.)
At the end of the evening we were offered a chance to finish off the leftover meat. I have to say that combining met with chocolate enables you to eat half a dozen chocolates without feeling overwhelmed by the sugar. However, you have piled on the calories and feel fully the end, without any bread or vegetables.
If I were serving at home, I would include fruit and vegetables. Meat and chocolate is a pretty unbalanced combination if you are not eating anything else. We had bought ourselves coffee and cheese and grape platter in advance over the road in La Fromagerie. The man from Rococo chocolates, in whose basement we met for the evening event, said that when he served a chocolate 'kebab' or canapé at the chocolate show at the end of the week he will add dried fig to the chocolates. I feel that the addition of fruit is a good idea.
Full marks to the organisers. The only thing missing was a card and free gift party bag to take home. They also missed out on a chance to give us a discount, a two for one offer, or a free or cheap or expensive pack continuing a free apron or tea towel.
We did manage to put a business card in the card collecting container on the shop counter for a prize drawer.
Another guest was smart enough to think of having a selfie taken with one of the organisers, which I had forgotten, so before I left I did that. (Reminder to self, always have lipstick on and hair combed ready for a selfie with the organisers.)
All in all, educational, entertaining, social, great networking and good company.
For details of the chocolate show, tickets and pictures, see:
http://www.salonduchocolat.co.uk/visit.aspx
For the Rococo Chocolates shop:
http://www.rococochocolates.com
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author, speaker.
