Chocolatier Aditi Malhotra of Christian Vautier Le Concept, the newly opened chocolate boutique and café, has been busy in her underground chocolate factory crafting scrumptious Easter packages. Featured within are the shop’s sublime and artistic house-made sweets, like white chocolate truffles hiding bursts of tart and fruity raspberry, lime and passion fruit fillings, as well as other exclusive-for-Easter treats, including dark chocolate eggs filled with surprising treasures and dark chocolate rabbits.
Three different package options have been crafted for your holiday celebration and are available at Christian Vautier Le Concept, beginning Friday March 30. They are as follows:
Petit Package
$53
Dark chocolate egg filled with surprising treasures, atop a bed of dark chocolate hazelnuts
Dark chocolate rabbit atop a bed of dark chocolate hazelnuts
Passion fruit & mango jam
Moyen Package
$97
Dark chocolate egg filled with surprising treasures, atop a bed of dark chocolate hazelnuts
Dark chocolate rabbit atop a bed of dark chocolate hazelnuts
Passion fruit & mango jam
6-pack of white chocolate truffles in raspberry, lime and passion fruit, all coated in coconut
Mendiants – milk and white chocolate discs topped with nuts and dried cranberries
Grand Package
$152
Dark chocolate egg filled with almonds, atop a bed of dark chocolate hazelnuts
Dark chocolate rabbit atop a bed of dark chocolate hazelnuts
Passion fruit & mango jam
6-pack of white chocolate truffles in raspberry, lime and passion fruit, all coated in coconut
Mendiants – milk and white chocolate discs topped with nuts and dried cranberries
White chocolate covered chocolate crispy cereal
Grignotines – milk, dark and white chocolate clusters of almond, puffed rice cereal and orange peels
Christian Vautier Le Concept is located at 254 Broome Street on the LES and is open daily from 11 AM to 11 PM. Call 212-473-3200.
Copyright 2012 By Punchin International. All Rights Reserved.
If You Missed Easter . . . .
Acclaimed Parisian Chocolatier Christian Vautier Launches US Debut on the Lower East Side
Those with a sweet tooth and a penchant for the delightfully French officially have a new reason to find themselves on Broome Street: Christian Vautier Le Concept. A gem box chocolate boutique with an underground chocolate factory, seats for twenty, French pastries, and extensive coffee program, the store takes its name from the acclaimed Parisian chocolatier whose confections will take the spotlight, and marks the chef’s first venture in the United States after successful forays in the French and Japanese markets. With chef/co-owner Aditi Malhotra, an FCI-graduate whose pastry mentors range from Pichet Ong to Vautier himself, the debut of Christian Vautier Le Concept marks an important milestone in the re-emergence of traditional French pastry arts in New York City, and is poised to become a must-stop attraction on any sweetly inclined Manhattan itinerary.
Tradition and authenticity are at the core of Malhotra and Vautier’s shared goals, and these tenets inform every aspect of the customer experience, from the artisan chocolate production on view behind the register to the freshly made pots of pate de tartinier and fruit preserves displayed on tidy shelves.
That’s not to say that the pair takes a simple approach. Vautier, a so-called “sweet genius” whose multiple decades of experience as the ambassador chef for Domori and head of pastry at the Grand Intercontinental Hotel in Paris inform a technically refined but creatively advanced point of view, designs each recipe through relentless testing in his chocolate laboratory. (That’s after he’s sourced his cocoa beans directly from the farms he visits each year.) Ingredients are sourced meticulously, from Fleur de Sel to Matcha and Passion Fruit, as locally as possible and from similarly minded artisans, yielding delicacies like his Passion fruit Ganache or Earl Gray Tea truffles.
Behind the scenes, top of the line equipment has been shipped in from abroad to ensure that bonbons, truffles, and pralines are sold the same day they’re made, with a team of chocolatiers working under Malhotra’s trained eye to execute finely delineated French standards. And once in their case—a chic glass contraption set against a sleek, white backdrop and pops of lime green—they take company in other French indulgences, ranging from dainty macarons to luscious pate de fruits, also made in-house, or brought daily from Malhotra’s family bakery just across the Hudson.
But Vautier is not the only player with a pedigree: indeed, Malhotra is part of a long line of family restaurateurs, spanning all the way to the 1967 World’s Fair, where her grandfather introduced Indian cuisine to Americans for the first time while promoting his famed restaurant, Gaylords, a respected, decades-old mainstay across from Mumbai’s famous Taj Hotel. Continuing that legacy were her parents—once-owners of the first wildly successful Indian restaurants in New York City, Akbar and Nawab. At Le Concept, Malhotra has parted with the family’s colonial culinary leanings—a product, perhaps, of her American upbringing and European hospitality training at Switzerland’s Glion Hotel Institute—but the standards that have seen her relatives to such success remain as engaged as ever.
Looking to refine your chocolate-tasting skills? Sample a trio of chocolate mousses, each made from differing varietals of fine Domori chocolate, to explore the range and depth of artisan cacao production. Want something completely novel? Order a few slices of freshly baked sourdough bread to serve as a base for luscious chocolate jam, perhaps to be washed down with a mocha or espresso. From pistachio cake topineapple and chocolate soup, the shop’s creative concoctions push the envelope to bring even the most veteran palates a new dose of sweet excitement.
Take some to go, too: chocolate-based spreads, or pate de tartinier, come swirled with flavors like raspberry, apricot, or passion fruit and mango, to be eaten by the spoonful or smeared on, well, anything. And when your chocoholic sensibilities have finally hit their quota, grab a bag of homemade caramels, infused with Fleur de Sel and chocolate, to let the sweetness linger longer.
Unique programming will add to the shop’s around-the-clock appeal, with monthly wine and chocolate pairing classes led by local sommeliers and coffee and chocolate classes taught by Teresa Von Fuchs, from New York’s predominant coffee roasters, Dallis Brothers Coffee (who also supply an espresso, chemex, pourover, and brewed coffee programs for everyday, self-initiated pairings). Special orders will be available upon request, including for events and parties, with the soon-to-come addition of customizable transfer sheets for ultra-personalized assortments. And for the morning indulgence, French breads will be available with homemade chocolate jams, along with other assorted pastries and coffee—an authentic European experience, to match all the rest.
Christian Vautier Le Concept opened on March 14, 2012, on 254 Broome Street in New York’s Lower East Side. The shop will be open daily, from 11AM to 11PM, accommodating everything from wake-up calls to sweet night caps. Call 212-473-3200 and for more information, please visit www.cvleconcept.com
The Walman Report 