Who said that a museum can’t be completely devoted to chocolate? Not chocolatier Jacques Torres.
Creator of his own line of exceptionally indulgent chocolate, Torres has just opened the doors to his very own chocolate museum, Choco – Story New York: The Chocolate Museum and Experience with Jacques Torres, located next to his 350 Hudson St. in lower Manhattan. For $15 General Admission, visitors enter and encounter the strong whiff of melted cacao.  From there, proceed through exhibits that explain the history of cacao and the development of the process for creating chocolate. Torres has made sure that visitors get every chance to try a variety of chocolate, differentiating from your normal blends of beans, all the way to cacao from Vietnam.

Visitors of all ages and backgrounds were eagerly moving around, drifting towards all the samples of chocolates available. While the children were playing in the sand pit designed for their entertainment, parents were attentively listening to videos and presentations about the history of cacao.

At a section called the Mayan kitchen, a chocolatier showed visitors the process of grinding cacao into the original hot chocolate, before sugar and other spices were discovered. Our presenter said this original drink was called the “drink of the warriors”.

Towards the end of the museum, visitors also have the pleasure of watching a chocolatier demo the process of creating one of Torres’s famous chocolate filled ganache. From the initial steps of creating the outer chocolate shell, to boiling the creamer to prepare the ganache, visitors get to see the art and tools that are used to create the beautiful end product of this delectable sweet.

Before the opening of the museum, the Choco – Story New York has already had hundreds of visitors at their opening party. A museum dedicated to a sweet that satisfies all ages, Torres museum is expected to be visited by thousands of chocolate lovers. After the presentation, I spent a few minutes speaking to chocolatier Mike, who shared his experience working at the museum since its opening.

“Weekends here are hectic. There are hundreds of visitors of all ages and backgrounds coming to visit and indulge on our chocolate. The hype of chocolate has definitely attracted everyones attention.”

Being the first museum in NYC to be completely devoted to chocolate, its opening has had people reminiscing the pop-up Museum of Ice Cream that had been open over the summer. With this fresh food trend occurring in museums, I interviewed a few millennials and asked them what kind of food museum they would like to see.

Here are some foodie ideas that other millennials are considering to make a museum out of!