Day 189

Apricot Lavender Truffle: Today's new food post is unfortunately coming in right under the wire. I've had an extremely busy day, starting with brunch at the West Egg Cafe, followed by a private gig with my band. I attempted to do a post this morning with something I thought was new, but after doing some research, I realized it was just another version of a plain old orange - nothing really new at all. I didn't have time to go shopping after that, and I thought I'd be frantically searching tonight after my gig, looking for anything new. Luckily that didn't happen, since the GF managed to pick up some sweets this afternoon that surprisingly counted as a new food for me.

I know that chocolate truffles hardly sound like the breaking of new culinary ground, but these aren't any ordinary truffles. If you've never heard of Cacao in Inman Park (www.cacaoatlanta.com), you should. I've read about their artisanal chocolates several times now, and I've been wanting to sample them after hearing much praise from several food writers I respect. These apparently weren't anything like normal chocolate, and the GF picked up 3 flavors: apricot lavender, peanut butter & jelly, and cinnamon pear. If you're looking for run of the mill truffle flavors like strawberry, mint or coconut, you won't find them there. The apricot lavender used real pieces of lavender to provide the flavor - I could actually see it on top of the truffle itself. This was gonna be fun.

I took a small bite of the truffle, and was immediately blown away by how strong the real lavender taste was. It wasn't overpowering, but added a really interesting flavor to the chocolate. Speaking of the chocolate, it didn't taste like any other I've had. It had a definite semi-bittersweet taste, and not at all sugary sweet like what I'm used to. It also had small slivers of real apricot mixed in with the ganache-like filling, which was also dark and not too sweet. Overall, the flavors were great but intense, and I couldn't imagine gorging on these like I do with Lindor truffles and the like. And at this price ($2.50/piece), I couldn't afford to.

If you're curious at all about what real, unadulterated chocolate tastes like, Cacao is a great place to start. I'm glad I tried these, and I hope to try more in the near future.