Kosher chocolates in NYC?

[cutelittlebirdie]

Hi, I am going to spend Rosh Hashanah with some relatives who keep kosher, and I would like to bring them a little treat. Are there any places in Manhattan with good-quality kosher chocolates, or some other nice treat?

Thanks!

[ahuva]

Prime Butcher Baker on the upper east side has a great selection of chocolates.

[mrotmd]

And one more time, the south florida kosher community comes to the mid Atlantic rescue... http://www.schakolad.com/store41. The Miami beach store of schakolad makes excellent chocolate, both parve and dairy (cholov Yisroel), and delivers nationwide. They have some other locations throughout the country, but the kashrut is based on each individual store. By the way, they have a store in Kfar Saba. That one is kosher too, but delivery might be a tad more expensive. Their chocolate is absolutely excellent.

[LittleWave]

Max Brenner and Godiva are just average.
Try www.dearcoco.com from Maryland. Amazing!
Also, someone mentioned refrigeration- I was always under the impression that the better chocolate does not melt the same way that cheap chocolate does. Was I wrong?

[LittleWave]

And how could I forget Mansoura pasteries on King Highway? Homemade chocolate, excellent quality.

[PotatoPuff]

Chocolate World on the Upper West Side (maybe 91st and Amsterdam?) has everything from lowbrow to very elegant candies.

[cutelittlebirdie]

Hi everyone! Thanks so much for all the recommendations. I will check out the Scharffenberger selection and I'll take a look at Godiva and my neighbourhood Fairway too. I'm not really looking to order chocolates, I was just hoping to find something nice in Manhattan. Anyway thank you!

[koshergourmetmart]

check out koshermarketplace. they have chocoalte items made by Tumbador that are not really available anywhere else. It is packaged under kosher marketplace's name. They have s'mores and other goodies

[vallevin]

If the schlep isn't too difficult, I'd recommend Le Chocolat in Teaneck, NJ

[LI Guy]

Almost all Godiva chocolates are kosher, and are available in many places in addition to stand-alone Godiva stores. There's a Godiva store on Broadway between 40th and 41st.

[goodhealthgourmet]

personally i think there are so many chocolates out there that are better than Godiva.

i'm a big fan of Scharffen Berger, and Ghirardelli & Guittard also produce kosher chocolates.

if you're willing to order from somewhere & have them shipped, Jer's Handmade in Solana Beach, CA always got raves when i lived in San Diego. they're kosher, and it's more of a unique specialty/boutique product that you won't find on some random NYC corner - nice for a gift.

you can also try Max Brenner's in NYC - he's Israeli, so they may very well have a good selection of kosher items.

hope you find something great...L'Shana Tova!

[queenscook]

To my knowledge, the Max Brenner store in NY does not have a hecksher, so the "loose" chocolates would not be kosher, though some of the packaged chocolates do have supervision. I think it's the same story with the Godiva stores; much of the packaged stuff has the OU, but I don't think those who keep strictly kosher would buy the loose chocolates from the glass cases in the stores. And to the original poster, if your relatives are serving a meat-based Rosh Hashanah dinner, which I would imagine would be likely, remember that the chocolates of many of these brands are classified as dairy, so while they might make a nice gift, they might not be able to be served for dessert after eating the meat.

[goodhealthgourmet]

good call on the dairy...although dark chocolate would be OK as long as there aren't any filled chocolates with milk inside.

[hanistor]

Dark chocolate would DEFINITELY NOT be OK, unless it specifically states parve (or at the very least does not have a dairy designation next to the hechsher). MOST dark chocolates (except the ones made specifically for the kosher consumer) contain dairy ingredients.

[koshergourmetmart]

also many dark chocolates are made on dairy equipment

[goodhealthgourmet]

i'm gonna have to disagree with hanistor. since when do "MOST dark chocolates" contain dairy???

yes, as koshergourmetmart stated, they may be made on equipment that contains traces of dairy, so you'd have to purchase Kosher certified dark chocolate. but once you get beyond that hurdle, as a rule, dark chocolate does NOT contain milk. so as long as it's kosher dark chocolate, serving it after a fleishig meal is not a problem.

[queenscook]

Except for chocolates made by the companies that cater specifically to the kosher crowd, most chocolate, dark or not, is classified as "dairy," even though it may not have milk in it. For those who only eat foods under hashgacha, that will mean that even dark chocolate will have to be treated as dairy or at least, dairy equipment. As goodhealthgourmet said, if it's "dairy equipment," then there's no problem serving it after a fleishig meal, but some hashgachas don't use the dairy equipment designation. If a box of dark chocolate has an OU-D on it, it might or might not actually have dairy, and I don't think they generally make it public which things are just an equipment issue and which actually have dairy in them. I don't know about the other hashgachas, or even which brands have which hasgachas. What is the hechsher on Scharffen Berger? Ghirardelli? Guittard? (all mentioned earlier).

[GilaB]

Scharffen Berger is under the OU, as is Godiva (all labeled dairy); Ghirardelli was under the Kof-K last I checked, which was a while ago. I think all Ghirardelli products are labeled as Dairy, even the dark chocolate.

[koshergourmetmart]

guittard is under the OU(D)

[ganeden]

BS"D

I don't know about Manhattan, but there was a place in Monsey which was importing some really wonderful gourmet chocolates from Belgium- gourmet, meaning the need to refrigerate, as opposed to standard room-temperature-stable chocolates. I can't remember the name of the product, but it was good enough that it should still exist. And maybe they're available in Manhattan as well.

[koshergourmetmart]

you can order scharffen berger online as well as joseph schmidt at their company websites. There are other smaller kosher vendors like V Chocolates and Heidi and Arthur that can ship to your relatives addresses that make nice gifts and are not available locally.

[craigcep]

Scharffenberger chocolates are kosher. They have a shop on Amsterdam and 83rd (?). Also, Fairway and the like sell gourmet chocolates, many of which are kosher.