Saturdays

First, there is the smell.Familiar. Intoxicating. Some say ED-preventing.Then, just when you can barely take anymore, a smiling head pops through the door - “Anybody want some chocolate?”
 
Welcome to two-and-a-half hours of educational heaven, aka the Taste of Chocolate Workshop.
 
Run by the folks who have been bringing the legendary Mystery Café to Boston and beyond for years and hosted in the Elephant and Castle Pub in Downtown Boston (the same site as one of the most popular Mystery Café dinners), the Workshop tells you perhaps more than you ever wanted to know about chocolate (pretty much right down to the molecular level) and then lets you get into it up to your wrists (at least) through a hands-on truffle-making party.
 
From the story Cortez and the true meaning of “Montezuma’s Revenge” to the difference between milk and dark chocolate, the Workshop uses maps, recipes, tasting samples, and about $2000 of cocoa-mixing machinery to help you make a wonderful, ribbon-tied gift box of hand-dipped truffles. It is a particular and painstaking process, but wit the guidance and support of the Workshop’s friendly and experienced staff, most of the hard work is done for you, leaving you to enjoy the fruits (fruit? ugh! too healthy!) of your labors.

Tips: Eat a light breakfast, grab a special person and a box of Lactaid pills and head down to the Pub for a new kind of liquefied lunch that will surely keep you smiling all the way home (and then some!).
 
Taste of Chocolate Workshops are held every Saturday at 1 p.m. at the Elephant & Castle Restaurant. Price: $88. Reservations necessary.

(contributed by Matt Robinson) 

161 Devonshire St., 617-600-4460 www.TasteofChocolate.com