Midtown Chocolate Tour [NYC]

Abbreviated Entry!

Just a note: that heart shaped one is supposed to be one of Oprah's favorite things. I think.

Doesn't really belong in the category "dessert," but I'd rather not have a whole category for chocolates...

Rice Ball Covered in Peanut Powder [Taiwan]

Doesn't get much more straightforward than this. Congealed rice covered in ground peanuts.

Taste:

Imagine it and you've pretty much got it. Chewy, tasteless rice and yummy, sweet peanut powder.

Reflections:

Great dessert. Nice chew.

Mango Ice [Taiwan]

Perfection on a platter. Three beautiful ingredients: mango, sweet condensed milk, and shaved ice. Pure genius.

Taste:

Good.

Reflections:

MORE.

And for your viewing pleasure, here it is in two more vantage points:

Mochi Cream [Japan]

I've never seen a more beautiful green ball. Mochi Cream is a Japanese chain that sells mochi balls of all sorts of flavors. The stores sell them direct from a freezer hidden someplace below the counter, and tell you pretty specifically not to eat them immediately, allowing 10 minutes for the mochi to defrost. It's quite a waiting period, staring at that delicious little ball, holding yourself back from oral satisfaction...

Taste:

I guess I forgot to explain what exactly mochi is. Traditionally, it's really anything wrapped in a congealed rice wrapper, usually formed into a ball, and almost always served as some sort of dessert. Traditional mochi has a red bean, green bean, or mashed lotus seed center. Now Mochi Cream takes the idea and puts its own spin on things, injecting a cream just inside of the rice wrapper in an attempt to pair whatever inner flavor might be hidden within. Here's the dissected version of the Green Tea flavor at Mochi Cream:

The rice wrapper is pretty much tasteless in all mochi--the taste comes from what lies within. The cream at Mochi Cream is nothing spectacular--simple cream, with slightly more substance than your Cool Whip. The green on the inside is (I think) a green tea cream of some sort. As with most things Japanese, the best part of this dessert comes in the itty bitty details: in this case, the green powder you see covering the congealed rice skin. It wasn't anything complicated either, just a simple green tea flavoring agent that spread that taste throughout the mochi ball. Yet, the slight graininess of that agent paired perfectly with the chewy, goopy texture of the mochi skin. An excellent partnership.

Reflections:

As an aside, I'll also mention that I tried two other flavors: their milk tea and cafe au lait. Both of which were quite good, but both weren't quite as good as the green tea. They were and tasted of pretty much what one would expect out of a coffee and milk tea flavored anything. That powder on the green tea ball was what made it for me.

Of course, that's not to say that the others weren't good. Au contraire, Mochi Cream was a delicious experience, one that I'd hope to chance upon again in the future.

Apple+Tomato / Spinach+Grapefruit / Orange+Carrot Italian Ice [Japan]

So here's an interesting treat from the Hilton Narita in Tokyo. From left to right: Apple+Tomato Ice, Spinach+Grapefruit Ice, and Orange+Carrot Ice.

This was an option in a rather eclectic breakfast buffet that tried quite hard to cater to both Japanese and Western tastes. I'm still not quite too sure who "Spinach+Grapefruit Ice" caters to, but I'm guessing it was a Japanese take on Western sorbets. Nice try guys, but please keep your vegetables out of my desserts.

Taste:

Not nearly as bad as it sounds. I tried a scoop of each flavor and was surprised at how tame the flavors were. In the Spinach+Grapefruit and Orange+Carrot, the fruit dominated the palate, leaving only a hint of vegetable as an after-aroma. The Apple-Tomato tasted primarily of apple, but with a slight citrus-y twang. Texture-wise, the dessert was identical to the melted-and-refrozen italian ice you'd find in the supermarket.

Reflections:

I was a bit disappointed by this. I wanted to be grossed out--to be bowled over by spinach-y flavor in a deceptively familiar icey medium. I got nothing. Just grapefruit ice with a weird aftertaste.