Jacques Torres Valentine's Chocolates

Happy (early) Valentine's Day!

In honor of V-day, here's a post on every woman's favorite dessert--chocolate! And this is no ordinary chocolate... It's made by the self proclaimed "Mr. Chocolate" himself, Jacques Torres.

Ah, I'm a lucky girl. One of the families I work for gave me this Jacques Torres heart shaped box of 34 assorted chocolates. If you don't know who Jacques Torres is (that's ok, I didn't until a week ago), his list of awards and accomplishments are overwhelming. He was the former pastry chef at Le Cirque and is considered one of the country's finest chocolatiers. He has stores in Brooklyn and Manhattan, but thankfully you don't have to go to the big apple to get his chocolates--he sells them online here.

So what's a girl to do with 34... err, 28... um, 20 chocolates? Pace herself, I suppose. Hehe. And share them so she doesn't go into a chocolate coma! My favorite flavors so far have been the white chocolate key lime (it's the one with the cute love bug on top), dark chocolate coconut, pineapple pastis, European peanut butter and dark chocolate spiced with ancho and chipotle chilies.

Jacques' chocolate chip cookies have gotten considerable media attention. Martha Stewart, the NY Times and others have proclaimed this the best cookie ever. I got to try one and it definitely lived up to its reputation. The dark chocolate inside is swirled throughout the cookie instead of kept as "chips". The recipe for his cookie can be found here.