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One frozen dessert craze is making room for another, more recent frozen dessert craze at 4092 18th Street in the Castro as Chocolate Chair, which sells liquid nitrogen infused sweets, reportedly moves into the recently closed Easy Breezy Frozen Yogurt space. It’s the circle of life, and it moves us all.
Chocolate Chair was founded in Santa Clara as Café Milan in 2009 and rebranded in 2013 with a focus on liquid nitrogen ice cream, expanding to Southern California locations. In 2016, Chocolate Chair launched its popular, trademarked novelty treat called “Dragon’s Breath:” Puffed grain cereal bites soaked in liquid nitrogen. Customers pop the cereal in their mouths and breathe out the nitrogen like smoke — just like a dragon, or at least a vape lord.
The forthcoming Chocolate Chair location is the chain’s latest — not its first — seat in San Francisco. It operates counters in the Japantown mall, the Westfield SF Centre mall, and stores near Union Square at 211 O’Farrell and in Chinatown at 730 Grant. Besides Dragon’s Breath, Chocolate Chair serves liquid nitrogen rolled ice cream made with Strauss dairy, plus other sweets like macarons.
As for the newest location, it could be a risky one: When Easy Breezy recently departed the space on 18th Street (near Castro), owner Ariel Ford explained to Hoodline that an uptick in area street crime made doing business extremely difficult.
“Street crime has made things simply untenable for us, and I don’t feel confident that I can keep my employees safe,” Ford told the blog. Maybe would-be street criminals will fear the dragon’s breath more than they did the froyo.
