Holy Cacao Balls!

The best part of any journey, in my opinion, is the surprise of discovery. My strongest memories usually involve food, and more often than not, a food related discovery. Like the rainy afternoon in Italy when I ducked into a little trattoria to wait out the storm. It was here that I discovered black ravioli in truffle cream sauce and came as close to tasting nirvana as I’m ever going to get. Of course, not every discovery turns out so well. (I’ll save the chicken head story for another post.)

I suspect that the appeal of Holy Cacao stems from this same kind of discovery. The first customers probably came upon the cute, hand-painted food trailer as they were riding their vintage cruisers down South First on their way to the Torchy’s Tacos. They were probably so delighted by the unique concept of bite sized cake balls on a stick followed by a cold cup of frozen drinking chocolate that they rushed home to post their discovery on Urban Spoon, Yelp, Facebook, Twitter, or what have you.

That’s how I learned about Holy Cacao and developed a craving for some thick, creamy frozen chocolate and cake ball goodness. So, on Sunday, we made our way over to the South First Trailer Park to satisfy my craving.

I bought a frozen hot chocolate, and five cake balls: The Wedding ball, a white cake ball w/cream cheese frosting; the Chocolate ball with chocolate frosting; the Red Velvet ball with cream cheese frosting; the Rabbit ball which is carrot cake and cream cheese frosting; and the Diablo, chocolate with ancho chilis, topped with cayenne and cocoa. (They were sold out of the peanut butter and chocolate flavored Brass balls.)

I wanted to be delighted. I really did. But, much like the Star Wars movies, it just didn’t live up to the hype. The drinking chocolate tasted like frozen chocolate milk. The Wedding ball tasted like sugar cookie dough, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And, I think a more appropriate name for the Diablo ball would have been Scary Spice ball.

I’m not saying I will never eat another cake ball. If owners, Ellen Kinsey and John Spillyards want to open a location in my neighborhood, I would definitely pop in from time to time for a treat. But, I don’t imagine I’ll be making a special trip across town for the same purpose.