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Not Afraid Of The Dark

CANDACE C. MUNDY/TAMPA TRIBUNE

Karen Huggins, a customer at Choxotica, a one-of-a-kind Carrollwood business specializing in chocolate drinks and exotic chocolate bars, savors the flavor of one of a bite from one of the businesses vast selection of chocolate bars. The newly opened business is located at 3802 Ehrlich Road.

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By HAROLD VALENTINE, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 14, 2007

Additonal Photos

NORTHDALE - Just in time for the holidays, a newly opened business takes chocolate back to its roots.

Choxotica opened in October at the North Village Professional Center, 3802 Ehrlich Road, and suggests customers consume chocolate in a new way: drinking it.

Owner Eric Green said that when chocolate was discovered about 2,000 years ago, cultures in Mexico and Central America used cacao as a spicy, frothy beverage.

He explained the process at Choxotica.

"The way it works is you come in and we offer you different tastes of chocolates," he said. "What you do is taste up to three of them and decide whichever kind you want in your drink."

Customers walk into the chocolate drinking bar, chilled to about 63 degrees to keep the chocolate fresh, and may pick from a variety of chocolates from around the world with different amounts of cacao. The chocolate is labeled in many ways, such as vegan, organic, with milk or from a fair trade part of the world.

Perhaps the most important label, however, is the percentage of cacao in the chocolate, which determines how dark it is.

Green said the darker the chocolate the more healthful it may be. He said dark chocolate can work as a hunger suppressant and, if consumed in moderation, may help people lose weight.

"I got into chocolate when my wife went on a diet," Green said. "I joined her last December, and I couldn't take medication prescribed to me after a week. I was looking for a way to suppress my appetite, so I found a little piece of 80 percent dark chocolate could suppress my appetite. I lost 70 pounds."

Green explained that dark chocolate has less milk and sugar, and emphasized it's the cacao that suppresses appetite. He suggested first-timers begin with four-ounce drinks to get used to drinking chocolate.

Chocolate drinks come in a variety of tastes, including spicy and sweet, and range in price from $3 to $5.50. The two most popular so far have been Choxotica Orange, with dark chocolate and real orange extract, and Choxotica White Chai, featuring chai spice to cut the sweetness of white chocolate.

"I don't drink coffee, so this is a great alternative," said Carrollwood resident Lori Anderson. She and her friend Lillian Tambace sampled Choxotica Orange. Both said they will come back to the bar.

"We drove by a few weeks ago, and I was like, 'We've got to go,'" Tambace said.

Green, a real estate agent, said he doesn't foresee a large profit with Choxotica because the chocolate product is so expensive. Although he wasn't a big chocolate lover before the dark chocolate drinks helped him lose 70 pounds, Green said pioneering a chocolate drinking bar was too good an idea to pass up.

"There's not anything like this in the world," he said. "I mean, I've looked around, and there isn't anything like this anywhere."

Green said that in Spain there are "chocolaterias," which serve chocolate drinks that are more milk- and sugar-based, and more fattening.

Choxotica's drinks have only chocolate that is melted by what Green called "perfect water." He said the water is medical grade, zero TDS - total dissolved solids - water. The filtration system is located at the business.

He encourages customers to taste the water, and he is willing to let them fill their water bottles with this water for free because "I'm so annoyed by all the petroleum wasted on water bottles."

Choxotica employee Jean Ann Cardwell said there has been a good mix of customers, including plenty of women, and men who buy chocolate for their wives. She said she also has lost some weight by drinking the dark chocolate.

"I've lost weight working here because I've eaten healthy food as well as a little chocolate," Cardwell said. "You can have that junk food you thought you wanted and not feel gross."

Throughout the store are televisions to teach customers the health benefits of dark chocolate and global issues such as fair trade.

Fair trade is a social movement seeking to appropriate fair payment to workers in other countries who may not have decent living standards.

"These are really poor people in really poor countries that are growing this stuff," Green said. "Just give them enough to survive, at least that."

Because drinking chocolate is not popular in most places, Green hopes the holiday season will kick-start local interest. Though he would not encourage those looking to lose weight to drink his chocolate concoctions throughout the day, he said a little can go a long way in helping folks lose unwanted pounds.

"Everything in moderation," he said.

CHOXOTICA

ADDRESS: 3802 Ehrlich Road, Suite 103

HOURS: 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday; 10 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and Saturday; closed Sunday

PRICES: $3 to $5.50 for drinks

CONTACT: (813) 264-8000 or www.choxotica.com

Reporter Harold Valentine can be reached at (813) 865-1526 or hvalentine@tampatrib.com.

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