The Plaid Pladd

So, last week I was picking out some grapes at Food Lion and happened to glance at the wine shelf next to me, near the floor where they shelve their Chocovine (where it belongs). I gave it the wary yet familiar look I reserve for my seasoned foes since we have fought valiantly against each other on more than one occasion. I was about to go on with my shopping when I stopped to wonder why Food Lion thought there should be TWO bottles of Chocovine on display next to Raspberry Chocovine. No way is that right! And then… I saw it. A NEW CHOCOVINE FLAVOR!!!!! Espresso! But it doesn’t even really matter WHAT it was, what matters is that inevitably a new Chocovine Challenge must follow! I never try to fathom the looks Food Lion cashiers give me, but this one was probably because he’d never seen someone SO EXCITED to be buying Chocovine of any flavor.

You probably remember how this goes. Now that Servery Challenges no longer take place in the Servery, entrants have 10 minutes to complete their entry, this time utilizing at least three shots of Chocovine! Then entries are presented, tasted, and voted on. Supplementary awards are then handed out at the entrants’ discretion.

The Entries
First-time competitor and my preschool BFF, Megan was about as quick as me to complete her entry. She also unprecedentedly brought her OWN fancy, monogrammed glassware and decorated it with a gingham ribbon! I am legitimately impressed.

Drink Name: Cinnamon Surprise
Creator: Megan
Ingredients: Espresso Chocovine, cinnamon, honey, floating stale marshmallows, milk, I think maybe some sprinkles that melted?
Taste: Megan’s drink was pretty delicious! It tasted a lot like something fancy you’d get at Starbucks, and the cinnamon flavor was pretty strong, giving it a little more kick. You couldn’t really taste the awfulness that is Chocovine, just the espresso flavor. Good job successfully masking the vileness of Chocovine, Megan! That has always been the chocovine challenge’s one goal. Well, unless you’re Rachel. Then it’s to traumatize our taste buds.

Once again, my strategy was to be lightning fast and not taste anything beforehand. Gotta believe in yourself.

Drink Name: Sunday Morning Sundae
Creator: Patricia
Ingredients: Espresso Chocovine, milk, French vanilla flavored cool whip, chocolate sauce, chocolate chips, nuts, sprinkles, maraschino cherry
Taste: Unless you were using a straw, it was pretty difficult to get to the actual chocovine drink at the bottom of my cool whip sundae creation. But, once you did, it had been sufficiently diluted by the milk, chocolate sauce, and cool whip to be almost indistinguishable from something edible.

Steven, as usual, went for presentation and concept over actual taste, the only one of us to add MORE chocovine. Also as usual, he took longer than the rest of us.

Drink name: Tiramisuck
Creator: Steven
Ingredients: Espresso Chocovine, shaved chocolate, cinnamon, cream, cherry and biscotti garnish, probably some other things I’m forgetting
Taste: Surprisingly, this tasted a lot like tiramisu, without the cakey parts. So, pretty much the only parts of tiramisu I like. We all (including Steven!) agreed that none of us really like tiramisu so this may have been a poor concept. Overall, it was kind of weak and tasteless compared to the other drinks. Not that that’s a bad thing, since now we come to…

Thomas! Clearly trying to show Rachel that they are still BFFs! In spirit! Gross Chocovine spirit!

Drink Name: Rob
Creator: Thomas
Ingredients: Espresso Chocovine, Lemon Cherry Sun Drop
Taste: Not as bad as you would think. But that’s not really saying much since I thought I was about to drink something that tasted like vomit. It just tasted kind of fruity… but also slimy? I don’t know if it was something about the carbonation in the soda but these two liquids did not mix well, making the drink full of weird congealed bits of chocolatey grossness. Also, if you stopped stirring it constantly, this happened:

Anyway, after a fierce voting process, it came down to Megan and me! The actual drink parts of our drink tasted fairly similar, but I won a narrow victory, I assume thanks to my shameless attempt to cash in on Harry Potter. Megan and “Cinnamon Surprise” won best appearance, Thomas won “The New Rachel” award and possibly most creative, and Steven won best name! Yay winning!!! Then we watched Thomas’ drink for awhile like a science experiment.

Previously: Chocovine Challenge and Raspberry Chocovine Challenge