Festival Review: ChocolateFest 2009 of Burlington, Wisconsin

Burlington, Wisconsin is home to ChocolateFest, an annual Memorial weekend event that has been around since 1987. Because of the ChocolateFest, the town decided to name itself "Chocolate City, USA", which led to a lawsuit by Hershey, Pennsylvania. Eventually, the suit was dismissed, allowing the town to keep its nickname. In case you're wondering about the reason for ChocolateFest (as I was), Burlington is the home of Nestle USA, which built its manufacturing plant there in 1965, and currently employs about 500 people.

For 2009, the ChocolateFest carried the theme of "Alice in Chocolateland". The Fest ran from Friday, May 22^nd until Monday, May 25th, of 2009. Tickets to enter the grounds, which contain the Chocolate Experience Tent, the Chocolate Indulgence event, a carnival, a music stage, and some family venues (like a puppet show), were $7 for adults, $6 for seniors, $3 for children 5-12, and free for children under 5.

I showed up to the Fest on Memorial Day. There were places all around the grounds advertising parking spots for $5, but I preferred to save my cash and do a little bit of light walking. Sure enough, I found ample parking along a residential side street, not at all far away from the festival grounds.

After paying my $7 to get in the place, and getting a single snack-size Nestle chocolate bar at the entrance gate, I found the typical trappings of any regular carnival. There was a rather nice puppet theater going on for the kids, which I actually found quite amusing. Nearby, another site was showing off tigers.

I kept meandering through the carnival, wondering where in the world this supposed ChocolateFest was located. After getting through Part I of the carnival, there was a small respite where one had to pass through a wooden gate that had the sign "ChocolateFest" written on it. Then it was time for Part II of the same, never-ending carnival, this half more focused on carnival food than on rides.

At long last, I saw a big white tent that I assumed would feature chocolate inside. However, upon entering it, I found only various merchandise vendors. There were items like pillows, hand lotions and creams, and cell phones (or at least cell phone plans). This was definitely NOT what I came to see.

I exited out of that tent and immediately found another tent that looked promising (it actually said Chocolate Experience on it). Here at last was the famous ChocolateFest.

What drew me almost immediately was the centerpiece of the festivities, the Alice in Wonderland animated chocolate exhibit. There was a tea pot pouring out chocolate into a tea cup below, and below that sat Alice and her friends drinking tea/chocolate. There was also a beautifully decorated six-layer cake in the theme of (you guessed it) Alice in ChocolateLand.

I then started checking out the surrounding chocolate vendors. There were merchants such as The Cholive Company, Chocolate Expressions, Dove Chocolate Discoveries, Ultimate Confections, and others. I thought that maybe some of these merchants would have samples of their chocolates, but no such luck. Pretty much everything was available by purchase only. However, one could purchase a $2 Taster-Ticket and then go to five of these merchants for specific samples.

I bought the $2 ticket and proceeded to get samples from various vendors. The best samples came from The Cholive Company, which gave a kind of chocolate olive on a martini stick, and Delights, which gave a small pecan caramel covered in chocolate.

Once my Taster Ticket was completed and turned in for a raffle, there wasn't much left to do, unless one wanted to buy various chocolates and other confections. I couldn't really purchase anything to go because the weather outside would immediately melt my items. However, I also didn't feel like spending my cash on overpriced chocolate items ($2.50 for a pretzel stick dipped in chocolate? No thanks). There was the Chocolate Indulgence event, which started at 8PM and included a series of chocolate and wine pairings. However, the timing was just a bit too late for me, and the event was an additional $12.

I did stay for one of the cooking demonstrations, which featured Executive Chef Robert Ash of Kil@wat Restaurant at Milwaukee's Intercontinental Hotel. He prepared the Soft Centered Chocolate Cake with Brandied Chantilly, and Strawberry Sauce. Unfortunately, I had wandered away by the time the product samplings began.

I had meanwhile scoped out another cooking demonstration, this one hosted by Fabulous Foods, a vendor for pressure-cooker style pots and pans. The pots looked beautiful, with screw top lids and interior water jackets insulted by double layers of stainless steel. The demonstrator was quite keen on giving out food samples and even free measuring spoons. And then came the time to reveal the pricing on these lovely pots and pans: for a set of five, the price came to just under $1600. I moved on.

After exiting the Chocolate Experience tent, I had my hand stamped and decided to take a walk around town. I found a wonderful frozen custard shop along the way, which arguably was the best part of my "chocolate experience" (and the subject of another article for AC). After having my fill of chocolate-flavored frozen custard, I walked back to my car and took off for home.

While I will probably not be returning to the ChocolateFest next year, it was a good festival to see. Here is some additional information about ChocolateFest:

Address: 864 Maryland Avenue
Burlington, WI 53105
Web: www.chocolatefest.com