OK, we’re not about to win an Oscar or an Emmy (although our good friend Grace Potter’s duet with Kenny Chesney was up for a Grammy) but I digress.  

We did, however, win the Bride’s Choice Award.  For the third year in a row!  We’re usually pretty modest, but since this award is based on customer reviews, we’re happy to gloat a bit. 

What exactly is a Bride’s Choice Award?  Well, our good friends at WeddingWire present awards each year to recognize the top 5% of wedding professionals across 20 different service categories.  We are thrilled to have won the Wedding Favor & Gifts Category, for three years running! 
Thank you to all of those newlyweds who choose LCC for their wedding favors!  It’s great to read all those wonderful reviews and to see that our attention to detail does not go unnoticed.   In fact, why don’t we let our customers do the talking?

“Timely, considerate, and delicious.”

“Ordering the wedding favors was probably the easiest part of planning my wedding.”

“LCC is fabulous. Highly Recommend.”

“Delicious chocolate and gorgeous presentation!”

“We chose the Vermont sampler for our wedding favors and they were a huge hit! It was the first wedding I've been to where the favors were fought over and none were left behind on the tables. Ordering was a snap over the phone and everything arrived perfectly.”

Recently engaged?  We’d love to help you pick out just the right chocolate favor for your wedding or event.  You can email us at weddings@LakeChamplainChocolates.com or give us a call at 1-800-5909 to talk with one of our wedding consultants. 

Valentine’s Day – a day of love, romance, roses, and (most importantly) chocolate. For the retail staff at Lake Champlain Chocolates, it’s also one of the busiest days of the year! Unlike many of the other “Chocolate Holidays” that have a long busy season (Halloween, Hanukkah, Christmas), most of our customers do their Valentine’s Day shopping on February 14. We’re happy to help you pretend it’s because you want your chocolate-dipped strawberries to be as fresh as possible, but don’t feel bad if Cupid forgot to remind you to get your gift-buying done early. For many of us, it’s our favorite holiday to work.

Here are five reasons why:

1.    We get to find out what everyone likes best.  It is a common sight on Valentine’s Day to have a customer order a pound of Almond Butter Crunch or 25 Raspberry Truffles. When you know what your Valentine loves, why take a risk?

2.    We get to make lots of recommendations. One of our favorite customers is the confused, overwhelmed, last-minute customer. You know, the one who says, “I need a gift that will make me look awesome.” Hand-packing a box of our favorites or helping you decide what kind of truffle your Valentine might like is a blast!

3.    We get to tie hundreds of bows. And we love to tie perfect, pretty bows. We always say, “Once you’ve worked a Valentine’s Day here, you can tie a bow on anything!”

4.    We get wonderful compliments from happy customers – because who isn’t happy when they have found a perfect gift for their Valentine? Thank you for making our day, and for telling us that we’re “not a Factory Second.”

5.    We get to go home at the end of the night and relax. After a long day of helping customers prepare for the perfect Valentine’s Day, we are thrilled to skip the busy restaurants and just take it easy. Besides, it’s easier to get a reservation on the 15th!

Are you dreading pouring through Valentine’s Day cards filled with cliché sayings?   Dread no more.

Our personalized heart throbs have come to the rescue!  Emily Jones, recently featured in a cover story about her talents, has been decorating chocolate hearts for the past few days with corny, sweet and classic Valentine’s Day messages.  Let’s see if any of these catch your eye: Hot Mama, Hot Lips, Cutie Pie, Wild Thing and of course Be Mine.  Beautifully written in white chocolate on a dark chocolate raspberry filled heart is pretty special, not to mention delicious.  The hearts are available at all three of our stores.

Interested in having your own saying?  Give Emily a call at our Pine Street Store and she’ll create one just for you!   The number is 802-864-1807.  One catch, you must be able to come to the Pine Street store to pick it up when it’s ready. Sorry, we can’t ship (at least not this year!).

The Super Bowl is over and it’s time to focus.  Valentine’s Day is a little over a week away.  Next Tuesday is February 14th, which means you still have time!  Valentine’s Day is made for love, and chocolate. And we have chocolate gifts to charm all of your Valentines.

Perhaps your Valentine just loves our mouth-watering gourmet truffles, or maybe they are a sucker for a heart-shaped box.  Are there some salty-sweet lovers in your life?  Look no further than our Sea Salt Caramels.  Do you REALLY want to impress?  The Grand Heart, Be Mine Basket or our new Love is Sweet Basket are all truly gorgeous and delicious gifts of love.  And the Kiss Me Frog is the perfect chocolate gift for the playful romantic in all of us.

Let our chocolate do the talking for you this Valentine’s Day.  And we’ll give you one more hint—order today for $5 shipping!  It’s the last day, so no more procrastinating!  Still wondering what gift is best?  Give us a call, we would love to help!

Are you ready for some football?
Super Bowl Sunday is right around the corner. Whether you watch it because you’re a true hardcore fan, enjoy the laughs from the commercials, or love grazing on the nachos and salsa, there seems to be some part of it that we all can appreciate. For the Super Bowl snackers out there, we’ve got a recipe for chocolate covered caramelized peanuts that could throw your Super Bowl party over the top.

Think salty, sweet, crunchy little snacks you can pop all afternoon if you want. The best part is they’re so simple, and you don’t even have to coat them in chocolate if you want, although trust me, you’ll want to.

Peanuts & chocolate, it doesn't get much better.

Chocolate Covered Caramelized Peanuts
¾ Cup Sugar
3 tbsp Water
3 ¼ Cup Peanuts – Raw (they’ll roast as you cook them)
½ tbsp Butter
½ tsp. Kosher Salt
11.5 oz. wt. Lake Champlain Chocolates 54% Dark chocolate (optional)
¼ Cup Lake Champlain Chocolates Organic Unsweetened Cocoa (optional)

1.    Combine the water and sugar in a wide saucepan. Cook without stirring to 230F.
2.    Remove from the heat and add the peanuts. Stir the mixture off the heat until the sugar fully crystallizes and the peanuts separate from themselves.
3.    Turn the heat to moderate and return pan to it. Continue cooking the peanut/sugar mixture until the sugar caramelizes (you’ll see it turns a lighter brown color).
4.    Once you’ve reached a caramel state, add the butter and salt. Stir to incorporate.
5.    Immediately pour out the peanuts onto the back of a sheet pan coated with oil. Let cool slightly. Then, separate the peanuts piece by piece. (Don’t wait too long. They might set up in clumps on you.) Then, allow the nuts to fully cool.

(Optional Addition of Chocolate)
6.    Melt the chocolate over a double boiler until all solid chunks are melted.
7.    When the nuts are fully cooled, put in the refrigerator for 5 minutes.
8.    Pull nuts out of the refrigerator and pour a third of the chocolate over them. Stir until coated. Pour out and separate into individual pieces when chocolate sets.
9.    Repeat the process two more times to fully coat the nuts.
10.  After the last addition of chocolate, sift cocoa powder over the nuts. Stir to evenly coat each nut. Dust off any excess.

Or, if you're feeling lazy, you can pick up some of these.

Pre-order sweet, delicious, hand-dipped chocolate strawberries today! 
Nothing says romance better than this Valentine’s Day classic.

All you have to do is call one of our three retail stores to place your order:
Pine Street Factory Store– 864-1807
Church Street Store – 862-5185
Waterbury Store – 241-4150

Dipped strawberries are $32.00 per pound (plus tax),  with 12-15 strawberries per pound. Just let us know how many you would like—we would love to pack them into a beautiful box and tie it with a bold red bow.  All you have to do is pick them up!

Pick up is available from Friday Feb 10-Tuesday Feb 14.

Strawberries are only available through our three retail stores. Unfortunately, due to their short shelf life and delicate beauty, they are not available online and cannot be shipped.

PS- They will sell out, so don’t miss your chance to give your Valentine a sweet, luxurious treat!

Last Saturday, the LCC Pine Street Factory Store partnered with the Vermont Beekeepers’ Association and Slow Food Vermont to celebrate and educate – all about honey!

While most of us eat honey regularly (in our breakfast, tea, and even chocolate), very few people really know what it takes to bring it from the bees to the bear-shaped containers we buy it in. On Saturday, we set out to change that.

The store was buzzing from noon until 4 pm with people eager to learn – and taste – the whole process. The event was set up as a series of tasting tables, starting with the always-popular “Learn to Taste” table, run by Pam Chomsky-Higgings from Slow Food Vermont. A mysterious series of clear liquid solutions let everyone taste the differences in the five main tastes, and helped “train the palate” before moving on to the many forms and varieties of honey.

Next, attendees had the opportunity to pick the brains of two very experienced local beekeepers – Bill Mares and Scott Wilson. They answered a wide variety of questions about their work in honey making, and also provided equipment to look at and different forms of honey for tasting. Unfamiliar forms like honey straight from the comb, creamed honey, and even whipped honey were the most popular!

Mara Welton from Slow Food Vermont led the third station – a flight of honeys. Groups started by tasting bee pollen, which is the starting point for any honey production. Mara encouraged eating just one pellet at a time, because each piece of pollen originated on a different flower and would have a unique flavor and sweetness. After tasting the pollen, the tasting groups sampled four different honeys. Each was unidentified, and Mara asked participants to describe the flavors and sensations they noticed from each honey. Responses varied from “floral” and “delicate” to “dark and complex, like molasses.” Three of the honeys were local varieties and one was a commercial blend. Part of the tasting was trying to guess which was the commercial honey, and it wasn’t as easy as it seemed!

As with any event hosted at LCC, we didn’t want anyone leaving without trying lots of chocolate. Tying together the celebration of honey and the taste education, we provided a station for attendees to taste the gourmet chocolates we make every day that feature the unique sweetness of honey, and we encouraged everyone to slow down and really taste what a wonderful combination chocolate and honey can be. Honey Caramel Chocolates of Vermont, Organic Honey Fig truffles, and our best-selling Caramel Five Star Bar were all on offer, and all very much enjoyed.

To top off the event, we were featuring a brand-new drink in our café – a honey latte made with local wildflower honey from Waterbury. It received a warm, sweet welcome, and will be sticking around for a while!

Let’s be honest, Valentine’s Day is not exactly a plan-ahead type of holiday

It’s not like it sneaks up on you, unlike Easter or Thanksgiving, where the date changes from year to year, Valentine’s Day is always on February 14th.  So why all the last minute fuss? 

I have my own theories, but I won’t go into them here.

I will say though that this year it pays to plan ahead because we’re offing $5 shipping!  Pay just $5 per address for standard shipping —no matter how large your order.

This means you can spring for one of our heart-shaped boxes or maybe our new Love is Sweet Basket (filled with such lusciousness as our Sea Salt Caramels and gourmet truffles) and only pay $5 to ship.  Order now, select your arrival date and you will be a hero!

In this case (as in almost all cases) it won’t pay to wait.  This offer is only available for a limited time!

(You can’t say we didn’t try to help.)

It’s time for another taste education workshop with our good friends at Slow Food Vermont.  This Saturday from 12pm-4pm at our Factory Store on Pine St, honey is the star.  We will have Bill Mares, beekeeper extraordinaire, in attendance to talk about how honey is collected, the variety and sources of honey including the special characteristics of Vermont honey and the Vermont Beekeepers Association’s work with over 1,200 local beekeepers to sustain Vermont’s honey industry.

Slow Food Vermont will offer a honey tasting that focuses on the “taste of place.” The tasting will inform participants how to taste and evaluate different varieties of honey and include a discussion about how the local landscape gives Vermont’s honey a complex and unique flavor.  Attendees will sample honey in its many forms including liquid, comb, creamed, and whipped, and a chance to sample pollen, another product of the hive.

You might wonder:  where is the chocolate?  Not to worry, we’ll be sampling chocolates and caramels made with Vermont honey, featuring a Dark Chocolate Honey Caramel, an Organic Honey Fig Truffle and the Five Star Caramel Bar. 

Stop by, we’d love to see you and share our passion for local ingredients, taste of place and amazing chocolate!  Saturday January 28th from 12-4pm at the LCC Factory Store, 750 Pine Street in Burlington.

Oh, we should also mention, all three LCC retail stores—750  Pine Street and 64 Church Street in Burlington and on Route 100 in Waterbury— will be offering sweet deals on chocolate until January 29th!

Hot chocolate seems like a pretty simple thing.  Add some milk, cocoa, maybe a marshmallow or two and you’re done, right?  Well, maybe not.
In fact, there are quite a few different ways people like their hot cocoa.

Snapshot of our cafe menu

Coffee and hot chocolate is a no-brainer.  We even have a Mocha Hot Chocolate in our line.  But some (like our wonderful retail staff) like to take it a step further.  Here are some of our most popular café concoctions made with our famous gourmet hot chocolate—

Mocha Old World:  Old World Drinking Chocolate with espresso.  This will rock your world.  Literally.

Angry Aztec: Like some spice with your drink?  Try our Aztec Hot Chocolate with espresso. 

DIY Aztec:  Old World Drinking Chocolate, adding your own cinnamon and cayenne.  Make it as spicy (or not) as you like!

Peppermint Mocha:  Mountain Mint with espresso.  A cool, caffeine-rich experience!

What about marshmallows?  Or whipped cream?

There are plenty of customers when asked which one they would like with their hot chocolate, they simply say “yes.”   And if you ask me, those are the smart ones.  Homemade whipped cream or homemade marshmallows?  How can people be expected to choose?!

Oh, and while we’re talking about cool and crazy hot chocolate drinks, we don’t want to forget to mention our new Chai & Mighty Hot Chocolate.  Trust us when we say that cocoa & spice means everything nice.

Of course there are those who love the traditional cup of hot chocolate.  And I must admit, most of the time I’m in that camp.  Maybe with a marshmallow if I’m feeling kind of crazy.  :)

And did I mention we’re having a hot chocolate sale?  (just a friendly reminder.)

(This could be yours!)