Oh Chocolate, My Chocolate

My hubby and daughters have gone to a daddy daughter dinner and dance tonight. It's quiet around here. I just had a bowl of Raisin Nut Bran for dinner and I'm in heaven. I love not making dinner and not feeling guilty about not making dinner.

So, last week my husband took my to the Chocolate Festival for an early Valentines date. I know, I know, right now everyone is saying- "What? There was a chocolate festival and no one told me?"

Yeah, there was and you missed it.

But you could not possibly love chocolate more than I do, and my hubby knows that too, so he sprayed on his Axe Dark Chocolate body spray, and off we went!

I completely expected it to be something a bit more like a cross between heaven and a romance novel, with flying cupids and maybe a gospel choir singing odes to chocolate, but modified my expectations to include the idea that it was just the indoor exposition hall at the fairgrounds, with booths and vendors and the usual thing, plus a few twinkle lights.

But there was chocolate. Samples of Chocolate truffles from Oh! Chocolate, where my discriminating husband gets my chocolate gifts from, plus there were chocolate fountains, chocolate toffee bits, spicy habenero chocolate (yes!).

Part of the festival was devoted to wine, and not being a wine drinker, I felt completely justified in going through all the chocolate sample lines repeatedly.

We did stop consuming chocolate for a moment in order to share a bag of hot mini donuts drenched in cinnamon and sugar. For those of you who know I do Weight Watchers, I will say that taking a hint from top polititians and their taxes, this day was strictly "off the books".

We wrapped up the evening with a little seminar from "Oh Chocolate". A member of the owner's family demonstrated chocolate dipping techniques, and talked to us about using chocolate in our daily lives (I'm way ahead of you!). After dipping and serving us a lovely tray of strawberries, he talked about the experimental side of his job in the chocolate industry. Then he proceeded to dip little balls of goat cheese in dark chocolate. Now, my hubby and I like goat cheese, and just seeing this gave me the chills. After the samples hubby said "We are going home and making this tonight."

So, needless to say, we spent the evening rolling goat cheese truffles, peanut butter truffles, and anything else we thought would work well. I can't wait to do more.

Long ago as a child my Grandma told us the bedtime story of flying to chocolate town where everything was made of chocolate, even the people.....

Is it any wonder that in the middle of a boring drive I'll fantasize that just around the corner a hot fudge truck has overturned, and it's rich cargo is pouring out over the road..... I slam on the hazard lights as I stop the van, kick off my shoes, and wade in.....

The chocolate festival was KIND OF like that.