Ottawa Foodies

Chalouin closed?? Ouinnnnnn!

I noticed on Jan 12 that the store on Dalhousie was gone, and was not too surprised, seeing rarely anyone in it. But that the other place is also gone is sad. I mean, where will I get my hit of their caramel ice cream liberally drizzled (near drowned) in their caramel sauce?? Withdrawal is going to hit this summer.

Izee, thank you for the information that the chocolates can still be ordered for now. I hope he can find his dream place, though zoning for residential and commercial in the same building may not be as easy here as in Provence...

We made it to Maison Chaloin before they closed on January 8th. While we have stopped in to buy chocolates, this time, hubby and I met up with 6 friends for his b-day dinner. I had the duck confit pizza and plated dessert special -- for under 23 bucks, it was really hard to beat. Not only did the pizza have a crispy, thin crust (love a good thin crust), but the duck was so tasty and it was served with a lovely salad (delicious, fresh dressing) and a shot glass filled with piping hot, scrumptious, tomato soup. Wow -- all the flavours were just amazing: really fresh and developed, without being complicated or heavy. I tasted flavours more reminiscent of Italy than of many Canadian restaurants.

The plated desserts were works of art. One of Maison Chaloin's signature small cakes, plated with some home-made ice cream, a chocolate-covered fruit gelee, and some beautiful, edible, tasty garnishes. One couple among us even fought over the architectural chocolate garnish. (Hubby saved his for last -- smart move.)

All in all, the 8 of us left the restaurant raving about the flavours and the freshness. We were all sad to hear the Maison Chaloin would be closing its doors indefinitely.

The owner, with whom I spoke subsequently, mentioned that he wanted to purchase a new house where he could have a shop on the main level, and live upstairs. For now, he will continue to make chocolates (ONLY -- no ice creams or meringues!) out of his home. You can place an order by contacting him directly at Chaloin3@hotmail.fr

I know I will... once our current chocolate stock gets too low...

I have heard that this fantastic chocolaterie is CLOSING on January 8th. (Call to confirm...) I am
thinking of heading over soon before they're gone.

Update: www.maisonchaloin.com
"Maison Chaloin ferme ses portes dans quelques jours.
40% de réduction sur tous les chocolats (bonbons, sachets,...) et sur les dernières bûches de Noël.
Hâtez vous il n'y en aura pas pour tout le monde!.
Envoyez un courriel à Mr Chaloin: chaloin3@hotmail.fr pour être informé(e) sur la date et le lieu de réouverture (non définis aujourd'hui)."

A rough translation:
"Chaloin House closes in a few days.
40% discount on all chocolates (candies, bags ,...) and on the latest Christmas logs.
Hurry up you there will not be for everyone!
Send an email to Mr Chaloin: chaloin3@hotmail.fr to be informed (e) the date and place of re-opening (not defined today)."

Really the best mille feuille.

One of the nice surprises was seeing that they do home-made fruit pastes, definitely a weakness of mine. (Over a decade ago, I was known to bring back from US supermarkets a 2-pound bag of Sunkist Fruit Gems. Little of it usually survived the train trip back from DC.)

I had found good fruit pastes from France in Montreal but they were prohibively expensive. Laura Secord's JelliFruits is usually the best quality/price ratio that I can afford, but only comes in 400g boxes. But these? I could spend a fortune on these. ($9.74/100g, approximately 12 pieces, similar to Laura Secord's pieces in size)

Definitely made with real fruits, the flavour is intense but well-balanced with the sugar, so it never overpowers, which would be bad with lemon for example. It's a recipe from Provence, from which the chocolatiers come.

The photo shows the three flavours left just before Valentine's, but there's usually at least five available. These are Strawberry, Lemon and Griotte (Morello cherry as per Robert&Collins); I remember blackcurrant as well, though the last flavour escapes my memory.

Maybe not worth a trip in and of themselves (though close), but I don't think I'll often leave without picking up a dozen.

This relatively recent chocolatier arrival (started last September or so) must not remain unknown any longer. The Chalouin family are Maîtres Chocolatiers for four generations from Provence; father and son are the ones serving you here.

They are easy to get to; three STO busses direct from Ottawa pass by in front (36, 37 and 38), and they're quick to get to by car: follow the 5 North to the Casino/St-Raymond exit, turn left, then right at St-Joseph; they're about 100m later on the right; look for the orange "chocolaterie" sign facing traffic.

They do more than chocolates: they have a section for pâtisseries (made with bisuits, creams and mousses along with almond/nut/fruit fillings), some bakery (croissants, baguettes), nougat in the Provence tradition (moist and pliable), authentic French macarons, wonderful Pâtes de Fruits, and divine Glaces and sorbets that rival Pure Gelato - or surpass them in the case of the caramel. All are made on the premises.

Then there are the chocolates. Currently over 30 types of ganaches and truffles are offered, and that's on the day before Valentine's; only one was sold out. They have a good variety, including flowers and spices (rose, jasmine, violet, lavender, cardamom, verbena/vervain), some spicy offerings (honey and Espelette pepper, Jamaican pepper, ginger), plus anis, arabica, chestnuts, apricot slice, mint, and others. Sugarless (maltitol) offered currently only in bar slices, though they assured me they'll get them in ganache chocolates as well.

There are ample parking spaces off the street (the first chocolatier able to offer this in Ottawa/Montreal), and tables inside to sample offerings or have breakfast (salty or savoury crêpes, French-style breakfast) or special evening meals. Espresso, other coffees and teas are available to savor. They're open late most days, closed on Mondays.

Service is attentive, and they really believe and do their best to make sure each client is treated properly. They are still learning particularities of the local French dialect (being occasionally perplexed by Québec colourful expressions), and they are learning English as fast as they can. You can just point to what you want in the worst case.

Good point: about three quarter of their ganaches have wording on them indicating what they are, making it much less confusing once home to figure out what is what, as they do not have a handout. Many of the rest are almost self-explanatory (wedge shape for the apricot slice, chestnut shape with a bit of milk coating for the chestnut, a bean on the arabica, etc).

Bad point: the boxes are somewhat more expensive than the pure per-weight prices, and that per-weight is only available in tall bags like ones used for coffee at the supermarket. It is similar to the mini plastic bags used by other chocolatiers when buying only a few (less than 12) chocolates. Only one Montreal chocolatier (Chocobel) will use small rigid plastic boxes for as little as 6 chocolates, keeping them well protected for transport.

This is a minor, personal quibble anyway, and does not detract in the least from the wonderful array of tentalising temptations for the senses. Give them a try; you won't regret it.

I received a box of these for Christmas. I thought they were wonderful. I especially loved the nougat ones and the ones that had fruit paste in them.

They also have a variety of homemade chocolate bars. Their "Chocolat Tendresse" is to die for. Dark chocolate with a filling of salted caramel. Absolute heaven in a bar. When I crave caramel, this is what I buy.

Chalouin has currently over 30 varieties to choose from, with the exact amount varying by season and slowly expanding. The photo shows one of three sections dedicated to the chocolates. A lot is identified, both in front of the chocolate and on the chocolate itself.

A sample of the varieties when I was there on February 13: ganaches with rose, jasmine, violet, lavender, cardamom or vervein essence; jamaican pepper, honey & Espelette pepper, ginger, anis, chestnut, arabica, cinnamon caramel, Provence apricot, nougatine, mint.

Currently, the only one with alcohol is marc of champagne. He finds his current clientele not quite big on alcohol-filled ganaches; back home, it was the Scots and the Brits who asked for it mainly, not the French. He may expand, but getting the liqueurs he wants imported is difficult.

Price is $9.74/100g, which is 7 or 8 pieces. (I had 7, but the apricot slice may weigh as much as 2 squares.) Quite in line with other places. Warning, it is far, far too easy to get up to $40 or more... :)

There are pre-prepared boxes for assortments, or you can choose a nice box in which to put the chocolates, but those cost somewhat more than just the chocolates, which come loose in those paper bags with roll-down tops, like for coffee at the supermarket.

These truffles and ganaches are, to me, able to go against anything else in this city without feeling outclassed. I have sampled many offerings last autumn, and somehow managed to restrict myself to these few portrayed this time to get re-acquainted. (It took me 20 minutes to decide on so few.)

While the flavours can be just slightly bold at times, they aren't aggressive, and the texture of the ganaches always seems appropiate to the savoring.

The honey and Espelette pepper, for example, is wonderfull unctuous, due to the honey more than likely, and melts around your tongue as you suckle it, the honey saying hello as it passes by, the pepper only making itself known several seconds later, and overly so. (I have to take pauses between bites to let the flavour linger and soothe off...)

I guess you could say that the flavours are epxressive, not aggressive. They tend to be one major flavour per ganache; not many blends of two or more flavours.

The cassis here has the consistency of a fruit paste, but it's still a chocolate ganache. You can see the grains on the inside. Mmmm.

There's more than one type of truffle; the one picture is the basic one (truffle moëlleuse). As I pointed out in the chocolates section, there's over 30 varieties of ganaches and truffles. For anyone who likes chocolate, there's bound to be at least three to like.

Bought a box of 6 to try them out, abit disapointing because the macaron cracked as I was holding it, too "airy", not chewey enough.

the lemon one was too sweet ! aside of tasting "sweet", couldn't taste a strong flavor of lemon...

Macarons were too soggy and broke very easily, even in the box. They were melty, the meringues not crispy and it was very watered down.

I liked the mango and maple ones the best, the lavender one was okay, and I did not really like the rum one due to the strong rum taste and the banana one because it seemed too synthetic.

Pricy macarons, I wouldn't buy them here anytime soon. :(

Hmm, that doesn't seem to be the experience I had, but the ones I tried were back in November. Did they say how fresh they were? It could be the ones you had weren't freshly made, but it's still not good to leave them there if they're not at peak freshness. (They did tell me it's been a slow climb to sell them since so few of their clients even know of what macarons are.) Perhaps if you return, you can ask when the current macarons were made. I'll try to return soon and get some again and compare with my previous experience. It would be a shame that so many other of their products would be of excellent quality and these fall by the wayside.

I bought eight of those when I first visited Maison Chalouin. I was pretty excited to try them, since I have been trying out every macaron I can find in Ottawa and Montreal.

Sadly, these were beyond disappointing. The meringue was stale, it was also severely cracked, and the flavors were pretty bad. I tried raspberry, lemon, tiramisu and mango. Mango was somewhat better. The lemon one tasted like I had bitten into a lime, far too acidic. And tiramisu didn't taste anything like tiramisu, but like the ganache had been forgotten in booze. For 8, the total came us to almost 15$. La Maison du Macaron in Montreal is still the unbeatable place in my book. For a quick fix, I like the French Baker.

Similar to some of the modern French macarons, using their own recipe and made in-store. They gave me a few samples since I had never had a macaron before. Yeah, definitely made a few sales from that.

Very light mousse in the middle, definitely melt-in-your-mouth. The meringue seemed of excellent consistency, but it's not something I get very often. While they may not be the best ever, there seems absolutely nothing wrong with these!

Flavours vary depending on what they can have the time to do; some seen are mango, lavender and tiramisu.

Price: $9.74/100g, though they don't say how many that can make. I think it's around 8-10.

(Also shown is their creamy and very bendable nougat bars.)

Hubby and I stopped here today while in the area. We picked up a selection of truffles and pastries to try. The truffles were all good, especially liked the Chandon and Chandon bleu as well as the passion fruit.

But what was really outstanding was the hot chocolate. It was quite amazing. Intensely chocolatey but not overpowering and seem to have a hint of nuttiness to the chocolate. It was made with steamed milk and perhaps that is what made the flavours taste so good. We had it to take out but next time we'll stay in the cosy cafe area. We'll have it in with some "sugar buns" (not sure of the exact translation) to dip in the chocolate that are according to the owner typically french.

We also bought some chocolatines which we'll try tomorrow morning.

This place is not just chocolate ganaches and truffles, but branches out in other directions for a full-tongue experience; a late evening in summer might well take a while to sample the many delicious delicacies offered.

For example, while they don't have many gelatos, their quality is definitely high and worthy of investigation. This is good for the Hull people who now have an alternative to going all the way to the Market or Elgin for good gelato. The photo shows how briskly they sell it for the home market, putting them in half-litre containers for faster sell ($9.75). Remember that they have little staff and need to serve customers quickly if possible. It's also available by the scoop (1 to 5). Prices _are_ more expensive than Pure or Grande though.

I would need to make a full taste-test with the other two gelato places, but I daresay it can hold its own. The caramel, however, manages to surpass them: rich and sugary without being cloying; I literally got weak-kneed with the taster spoonful and had eyes moist with tears of joy at the pleasure my tongue was receiving. (But then, I like Caramel. A lot.)

Other flavours, in order left to right, top to bottom: Lemon, passionfruit, raspberry, coffee, chocolate and vanilla.

Being a small variety, they don't try the unique combinations that others can afford; but there is something to be said for doing the basics very, very, very well. I believe they're at least worth a try!

They serve cheese crêpes for lunch too, and they're quite good.

This one is called 'Séductrice' and is stuffed with Roquefort, Camembert and goat cheese; extremely tasty.