Sticks of Fire: a Tampa blog

It’s hard to write a post about Choxotica, a new chocolate store on Dale Mabry and Ehrlich, without it turning into a love letter. The small store sells exotic chocolate bars from all over the world and offers a small cafe setting to enjoy the above mentioned bars with chocolate drinks so strong they should carry a warning.

I’m not too proud to mention my chocolate addiction. Out of all the addictions to have, chocolate’s one of the most tame. I’ve been known to hide Mounds bars in my office at work and buy a Hershey’s bar on the way home. But, these are mass produced chocolates diluted with wax and milk. The chocolate offered at Choxotica is pure chocolate art.

The truth is, Choxotica isn’t for the casual chocolate consumer. At $5 or more for drinks and bars, it’s a store made for real chocoholics. The kind who look at percentages and prefer their chocolate imported from obscure countries with hard to pronounce names. Sure, there are white (blasphemy) and milk chocolate bars on sale next to the rest. But, the real draw is the store’s selection of real, dark chocolates from all over the world.

Have you ever wondered what chocolate would taste like with curry and coconut? They have a bar for you. (In fact, it’s my favorite and always out of stock.)

Has the organic craze hit you yet? You can buy an organic stone ground bar in a plain brown wrapper. There are chocolates with pepper, chocolates with ginger, chocolates with nuts. Basically anything you can imagine dipped in chocolate is offered, even in the drinks, which are created by melting chocolate in a saucepan and pouring fresh milk or filtered water over the hot liquid bliss.

Curry and coconut doesn’t translate as well in their iced drink, but hazelnut and coconut is a winner when added to iced chocolate milk. And, their Mud Shake tastes just like an ice cream bar. They even offer a Wasabi Ginger hot chocolate for the brave of heart.

They also offer an email list with coupons they send out for special promotions, which makes the price a little easier to bear.

In short, Choxotica is an oasis for chocolate lovers who are tired of the fare offered in drugstores and supermarkets. But, if you don’t get the urge to bite into a few ounces of a high quality, bittersweet confection every once in a while, Choxotica isn’t for you.

A caveat first. Mary Jordan, who co-stars in the New Tampa Players production of Same Time Next Year for the next couple of weekends at the Carrollwood Cultural Center is my niece. So I’m biased.

That said, the two-act play, which also stars Marc Sanders, is a hoot.

Sander and Jordan reprise the rolls played by Ellen Burstyn and Alan Alda in the 1978 movie, based on the play by Bernard Slade.

The pair - Doris and George - meet in a country inn in northern California in 1951.

That initial extramarital tryst is repeated the same weekend year after year until 1975 with hilarious - and bittersweet - results.

Both Jordan and Sanders (whom I am not related to) give extremely strong performances.

Is the play - which runs July 18, 19, 20 and 25, 26, 27 - as good as I think it is?

I’m not a theater critic, so I don’t know what an educated “critic” would say. My standard of excellence about entertainment, whether on stage, television or movies, is: Does it make me laugh or touch me in some way? Same Time Next Year does both.

Tickets are $15 for adults and $10 for seniors and children and groups of 10 or more.

The play does include some racy language, so if you are easily offended or worried about tender ears, don’t go.

The Carrollwood Cultural Center is at 4537 Lowell Rd. Call (813) 386-6687 for reservations.