Douce and Jeantet love chocolate and they’re convinced a lot of other people do too. “Two people out of three eat chocolate every day,” says Douce (which, appropriately enough, means sweet in French). “Francois was an architect, and I was in communications and advertising. We met and we talked about chocolate and we worked together–and we fell in love.” Six years ago, the two launched the Salon du Chocolat in Paris. Last month, it drew 150 exhibitors and 90,000 attendees–some of whom waited more than two hours on line to get into the hall.
In 1998, Douce and Jeante took their show on road. “We wanted to bring a richer appreciation and understanding for this wonderful and magical substance” to New York, Douce says. (While chocolate is America’s favorite flavor for desserts and snacks, according to a poll sponsored by the Chocolate Manufacturers Association, the United States ranked only ninth in chocolate consumption in 1998, with the average person consuming 12.2 pounds annually–or precisely half as much as people in Switzerland, the world’s top chocolate consumer).
For this year’s three-day New York festival, Douce and Jeantet have lined up 40 chocolate makers, big and small, from France, Italy, Belgium, Switzerland and the United States, including Lindt & Sprungli, Neuchatel and Payard. While the free samples of chocolate are sure to be a major draw, the show features all sorts of chocolate-based attractions. More than 50 top-name pastry chefs, among them Rose Levy Beranbaum, author of “The Cake Bible,” and the Gramercy Tavern’s Claudia Fleming, will share chocolate dessert recipes in the two demonstration kitchens. A Barnes & Noble counter will offer an extensive selection of chocolate cookbooks. Chococentric activities will be provided for children.
There will also be various New York landmarks rendered in chocolate on view, an exhibit on how chocolate is made and a display of couture dresses by Nicole Miller and other designers–fashioned out of chocolate. A Japanese confectioner has loaned his chocolate version of a Japanese stone garden. Need a holiday gift? Chocolate makers will offer a tempting array of treats for sale in their booths, often at a deep discount. (Gift possibilities in the past included a beautiful Payard chocolate log filled with an assortment of chocolates and chocolate champagne bottles from Paris-wrapped in colorful foil to suggest the real thing and filled with praline chocolate nuggets instead of bubbly).
Chocolate, say Douce and Jeantet, is good for health, good for love-“Dr. Ruth said so”-and good for the brain. It also, they are convinced, makes people happy. “We have five days in Paris, three days in New York,” notes Jeantet, “and everybody at the shows is happy, friendly. This is the magic of chocolate.”
Now les Croises du chocolat (the Crusaders of Chocolate) as Douce and Jeantet call themselves, are spreading the word in Japan. The Japanese, they say, only started developing a taste for chocolate during the past four or five years. The Second Annual Chocolate Show in Tokyo is scheduled for early February-just in time for Valentine’s Day, “the day of chocolates in Japan,” says Jeantet. Even Switzerland has asked the “Crusaders” to organize a chocolate show, which will take place next spring in Lausanne.
“We do shows about food because we love food,” says Douce. “We’ve done wine shows, a coffee show. Like chocolate, these are products with a culture. We love the know-how, the cultural story. We want to dream-coffee, wine, chocolate, they’re OK. We’re not going to create a show about meat.”
