Max Brenner serves up chocolate to dazzle and amuse. The chocolate beverages and fun desserts at his cafés are tops. In the Suckao, shown above, guests receive solid chocolate to melt and sip from the “pouch.”

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December 2006
Updated July 2008

Product Reviews / Main Nibbles / Chocolate

Max Brenner, Chocolate By The Bald Man

Part III: Reasons To Visit A Max Brenner Café

This is Part III of a three-part review. Click on the black links below to read the other parts.

• Part I: Overview
• Part II: The Chocolates
• Part II: Hot Chocolate
• Part III: Café Treats
• Part III: Max Brenner Cafés
• Part III: Shopping Information

Café Treats

To work one’s way through the chocolate beverages and fun desserts is a rewarding labor for chocoholics. No adult, no matter how stern or restrained, can fail to take joy at the Popsicle Fondue, for example. Yes, all of this in the photo is for you—although it comes with four small-size popsicles, so you can share with a friend. Even if you think it’s silly at first, you’ll get into it.

Popsicle Fondue.

Then, discuss matters of state or no matters whatsoever, as you dip your pops into the melted milk chocolate and then into the afore-noted crunchy bits and crunchy waffle balls. The chocolate hardens, you take a bite—and it’s truly better than anything in this genre you can imagine (unless you yourself are a patissier). Max Brenner is a master of the conceptual chocolate experience. Every dish—from the Popsicle stand to the Hug Mug in the photo above, which is shaped so you can cradle your cocoa as you drink it, to the Kangaroo sipping vessel at the top of the page, to various other delights, is designed to package the chocolate as an experience. But the recipes are delicious as well—nothing over-the-top, over-sweet, or overdone.

The specialty chocolate beverages and some selected desserts are where Max Brenner shines. There are better-tasting lines of chocolate candies out there, but we would be hard-pressed to find anyplace where we could park ourselves for an hour of simple chocolate eating joy. This isn’t the World Pastry Cup or the the Bocuse d’Or: it’s a great café concept, delivering really good chocolate beverages, ice cream and other simple treats. It’s what America needs. May there be a Max Brenner in every city, soon. Until then, if you are in New York, make a point to take your brood or meet a friend, at Max Brenner’s. Throw calories to the wind and enjoy it all. Whatever the time of year, it’s time for a chocolate holiday, and this is the place. And grab a box of pralines (bonbon) and some nuts to take home.

Max Brenner Cafés In New York City

• Union Square: 841 Broadway (between 13th and 14th Streets), 1.646.467.8801
• East Village: 141 Second Avenue (at 9th Street), 1.212.338.0030

The Union Square location has an upstairs level that can be reserved for large private parties.          

*Prices and product availability are verified at publication but are subject to change. Shipping is additional. These items are offered by a third party and THE NIBBLE has no relationship with them. This link to purchase is provided as a reader convenience.

© Copyright 2005-2013 Lifestyle Direct, Inc. All rights reserved.  Images are the copyright of their respective owners.

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