When I was in San Diego for the Rock n’ Roll Half Marathon, Pete & I had seen an ad for Eclipse Chocolate in the San Diego Dining magazine and it looked amazing, so after looking at the website we decided to hit it up. I went a second time over Labor Day weekend and this review shares a bit of both visits. Seeing as I’m addicted to dessert this is so totally like Willy Wonka’s for a sweets loving foodie like myself.
From their website: Our Mission- To craft premium artisan foods & confections with a unique culinary perspective while maintaining sustainable & ethical operations that support our local community.
It’s very unique in the fact that the founder was originally a sculptor before starting to hand make exotic chocolates, not a traditional chef background.
They are a Silver Fork winner for 2013 from San Diego Home/Garden Lifestyles.
The unique thing about all their food is that everything is infused with chocolate, vanilla and/or caramel. All food is made from scratch with all natural ingredients. They have vegan & gluten free options. They have a good selection of alcoholic beverages as well, but I rarely drink, and would much rather a drinking chocolate at a place like this :).
Both times I’ve visited have been on Sundays and they have an awesome brunch so I always go with the tasting trio, for $20, which allows you to choose one entree and then 2 options from the sides, soup & salad & dessert options. There are a lot of different options to choose from.
Both times, I started off with a Soy Salted Dulce de Leche drinking chocolate (31% white) which came with home made marshmallows. My dining companion tried a Soy Double Dark Cocoa (61% dark). Both were AMAZING!!
For my entree on my first visit I selected the farm house eggs & bacon, which was 2 eggs, brown sugar glazed bacon and buttermilk toast with orange peel, vanilla bean butter and for one of my sides, sea salted fried red potato wedges with a chile burnt caramel hollandaise with serrano sea salt & chives (I had the hollandaise on the side). The potatoes are Vegan & Gluten Free.
On my second visit, I chose the Avocado Benedict, which was the best benedict I’ve ever had. I will clarify though, I’m not a huge fan of hollandaise sauce so I did get it on the side. From the menu: buttermilk toast+hickory salted avocado+soft poach egg+chile burnt caramel hollandaise.
My dining companion chose the Buttermilk Pancakes in Blueberry Maple Bacon flavor, OMG!!! AMAZING!! There were blueberries & pieces of bacon all thru the vanilla buttermilk pancakes with roasted white chocolate as well. There was an amazing maple topping a little bit of orange peel butter.
For my second side, I had the Bleu Cheese Pecan salad, baby greens, dried cranberry, point reyes bleu cheese, chile spiced pecans & a vanilla vinaigrette. I love a good salad and this was definitely a good one. The vanilla vinaigrette really complimented the other flavors.
The other salad was Beet & Green Apple. Again, I’m not a huge fan of beets but the flavors all mixed together were really complimentary. My only complaint on this one would be that there was way too much cheese. From the menu: baby greens+roasted beet+herbed chevre+candied cocoa nib+vanilla vinaigrette
On my second visit, we decided to make sure we had room for dessert, my favorite, and since I hadn’t just raced, it wasn’t all about having food as fuel like the previous visit after the race.
I love Peanut Butter and decided to try the Frozen Peanut Butter Mousse, milk chocolate peanut butter mousse+brownie crust+vanilla creme fraiche+serrano sea salt. This is not for the faint of heart, it’s super super rich and oh so peanut buttery. We both took a bite of this and thought that nothing could beat it, however, the churros, where freaking amazing. Warm, buttery and covered in cinnamon sugar, they literally melted in your mouth. I tried them with the 2 sauces, one was chocolate and the other was maybe strawberry rhubarb? I can’t remember exactly. But really, I’m a purist and the churros were absolutely amazing on their own.
Eclipse wasn’t that close to downtown, from what I could tell, but I’m not super familiar with San Diego, but the website says it is in the South Park area of the city. It wasn’t overly crowded either time I went and we didn’t make it there until at least 11am, so unlike some of the other areas of town.
If you like unique food & local venues, I totally recommend Eclipse and I can’t wait to go back and try something new next time I’m in San Diego.
Question: Have you ever tried incorporating sweet flavors into more savory dishes?
