The weather was beautiful on Saturday and I felt like spending the day somewhere I hadn't been before. I was thinking about Rhinebeck or Red Hook, but my husband got on the computer and googled vegan foods or stores (or something in that vain) and stumbled upon Lagusta's Lucious in New Paltz. This decadent charm of a find was founded in 2003 by a passionate vegan looking to combine a love of artisinal chocolates with her passion for animal rights and environmentalism ~ the result is simply divine!
All of the chocolates are fair-trade and 95% of the other ingredients are organic. I don't know the breakdown in the toffee rocky road ice cream I dared to enjoy a bowl of...it tasted too sinful to be so good! Not only is everything we tried tasty, but they use "fresh and often local produce and fruit, organic toasted nuts, fresh-ground spices and homegrown herbs. [They] work closely with small farmers and producers...and across the country to source everything" including Maui vanilla beans and candy-striped beets.
I could not drive all that way and not try the chocolates, so I bought a small box of samples (thankfully packaged with a cold pack since it was such a hot day) to bring to visiting day at my son's camp the next day.
I bought a pecan turtle (I've missed a good caramel during these last four years) and then a series of chocolates the likes of which I could never have imagined: a truffle with pumpkin seed oil, a chocolate cone with sweet pea, green tea and white chocolate, a rosemary sea salt caramel, and a lemon thyme caramel. To say they were fabulous (yes, I took a tiny sample of each one) seems to easy. So clever, delightful and carefully crafted ~ my waistline is thankful the store is over an hour from my home.If you live anywhere nearby (within a couple of hours or so), take a ride. We stumbled upon a number of cute shops, other vegan friendly restaurants, a vinegar and oil shop where I bought an amazing lemon oil (and almost walked out with a jalapeno oil, vanilla vinegar and fig vinegar too) and a beautiful sidewalk chalk arts festival blanketed by the sounds of a 3 piece bluegrass band. What a fun day!
