We knew we'd rope you in with the use of the word porn! "I didn't know there are so many chocolate places," our husband said as we collectively eyed The Chocolate Guide Western Edition, billed by some as "chocolate porn". Learning can be sooo much fun. This guide easily earns a spot on our lifestyle and travel bookshelves because it covers chocolate based info that Lonely Planet, Zagat, Rick Steves, and other guides miss.......

Saturday--the sun was shining, Dolores Park was full to the brim, and evidently everyone else had the same idea we did: "let's get some ice cream." Bi-Rite Creamery, which opened only a few months ago, is not quite half a block from the park (3692 18th St.). The line was out the door. We'd tried coming here a few weeks back, the last time San Franciscans were blessed with such nice weekend weather, but the line had been even longer then. Surely we're not unique in this regard, but we hate hate hate standing in lines. We won't for movies, we won't for restaurants, we'll only rarely, and reluctantly do it for coffee....

For today's Holiday Gift Guide, we're going a little deja vu and returning to Charles Chocolates for our gift. Our giveaway is the Tea Collection-- Clear Gift Box. What is it? Well, it's basically chocolate truffles made from actual tea leaves. This gives each piece of chocolate the taste of the tea it's infused with. Each chocolate also features a Chinese character which indicates the flavor inside. And what flavors would they be? Glad you asked. The flavors included are: lichee, jasmine, baochong, osmanthus, and charcoal fired oolong. And once again, we can vouch for how good it is. ...

This holiday gift we're sure will be a big hit. Why? Because it's chocolate. And who doesn't love chocolate. Even better, it's Charles Chocolate's Holiday Gift Box. We can pretty much vouch for their chocolate-y goodness as we sampled some ourselves. Hell, if our MUNI buses smelled even half as good as the chocolate we ate, we're pretty sure MUNIs problems would all go away. Although riding a bus fill of people on chocolate highs might not be such a good thing. ...

Let's get this right out of the way first-- we are not sweet snacks people. We are salty snack people-- cool ranch Doritos is our crack. But thrown together with tea, now that's something else. SFist braved a visit to Emeryville to check out the happenings at Charles Chocolates. There we learned a bit about tea, a bit about chocolate, and a whole lot about how the two combined can be pretty darn tasty. ...

Welcome, children, to a very special Halloween episode of the Trimethyldioxypurist. We have an update, an experiment, and a couple reviews of some coffee beans....

There are few things as beloved as chocolate--it can change moods, please crowds, make an otherwise forgettable event suddenly memorable. It's magical. And it can concern us sometimes, as with recent local chocolatiers selling operations to the big boys. Among the folks still doing it locally--and well--is Chuck Siegel of Charles Chocolates. An interview follows:...

We'd like to take an opportunity to spotlight a local chocolatier. While chocolate in and of itself is not usually fodder for the Trimethyldioxypurist, one of Charles Chocolates' offerings--the Mocha Java Bar--fits squarely into our subject realm....