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Thursday, June 6, 2024

Thursday Sips & Nibbles

I'm back again with a new edition of Sips & Nibbles, my regular column where I highlight some interesting, upcoming food and drink events. I hope everyone dines out safely, tips well and are nice to their servers.
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1) Perla Rosario and Leo Baez, owners of Cacao in Newton, are expanding to the South End. Cacao—a chocolate shop and cafe—is opening at 570 Columbus Avenue, on the corner of Massachusetts and Columbus Avenues in the South End. The store will offer a panoply of handmade chocolate candies, pastries, snacks, and hot and cold beverages to take out or dine in.

Rosario’s family owns a cacao farm in the Dominican Republic, where Perla spent her childhood summers, while Baez grew up around cashew farms in the Dominican Republic.  The Dominican Republic plays an important role in Cacao. Rosario and Baez are inspired by their country every time they visit, often coming back to the United States with new ideas to incorporate into the business. They aren’t just inspired by their country, Rosario and Baez are also committed to giving back to the Dominican Republic and send toys to the country every Three Kings Day- a popular holiday in Latina America and Spain. 

At Cacao, Perla’s chocolates are meticulously handcrafted in-house at the Newton location, using high-quality couverture chocolate. This includes Cacao’s truffles, bonbons, barks and chocolate-covered nuts, orange peels, apricots and ginger. Rosario and Baez hope to someday import cacao from their family's farm and make their own bean to bar chocolate. Cacao also offers a selection of bean-to-bar chocolate from chocolatiers from the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Colombia, Venezuela, Mexico and more, with a focus on those that use single origin Dominican cacao beans.

Their signature 'classic hot chocolate' is inspired by Perla and Leo’s Dominican roots. Made with 53% dark chocolate and infused with warm spices, it is the perfect cup of hot chocolate. The menu also features several twists on the classic hot chocolate including extra dark, a bittersweet, deep hot chocolate; spicy, a hot chocolate with cayenne pepper; dulce de leche, a sweet iteration with a rich caramel base; fleur de sel, a classic hot chocolate with French sea salt; an iced hot chocolate and a frozen peanut butter hot chocolate.

Cacao’s cafe menu also features a variety of classic espresso drinks including lattes, cappuccinos, cortados, americanos, espresso shots, cold brew and drip coffee. Cacao only uses the freshest single origin Colombian coffee. The coffee is roasted a mere 10 days after leaving origin and Cacao typically receives the coffee 2 days after roasting. In addition, Cacao offers a wide selection of teas including; dragonwell, Earl Grey, english breakfast, ginger lemon, mediterranean mint, crimson berry, blood orange hibiscus, black tea, matcha, red chili, chai, dirty chai, spicy turmeric tonic and london fog.

Cacao partners with Pain D'Avignon, based in Hyannis, to provide customers with butter, chocolate and almond croissants. Pain D'Avignon delivers a batch of fresh croissants to Cacao every morning. 

Cacao is located on a site that was once home to the historic Harriet Tubman House, a settlement house named after the famous abolitionist. The new South End location offers customers a smaller selection of chocolate confections than the Newton location with a greater emphasis on the cafe. 

2) Tomorrow, Friday, June 7, is National Donut Day! WNDR Museum Boston, an immersive art and technology experience located in Downtown Crossing is offering the first 50 guests a free donut from Kane’s Donuts in honor of the sweet day. 

The Boston Museum is WNDR’s largest location to date, part of a nationwide expansion stemming from its flagship in Chicago. Located at 500 Washington Street in Boston’s Downtown Crossing, the more than 17,000 square-foot museum disrupts and redefines the traditional museum experience by inviting guests to fully engage with artworks and multi-sensory installations created by cutting edge artists, collectives, technologists, designers, and makers. WNDR was designed to ignite the joy and inner child within each of us, similar to the effect of indulging in a delicious donut. 

An assortment of Kane’s Donuts’s classic flavors will be available including Honey Dip, Chocolate Frosted, Jelly, and Strawberry Frosted. 

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