Chocolate by the bowlful

Remember fruit soup? It was all sweetness and light. Now comes its bolder and darker cousin: chocolate soup, which is showing up on menus of serious restaurants around town.

At Sona in Los Angeles, pastry chef Michelle Myers’ version combines the dark notes of El Rey chocolate from Venezuela with a medley of flavors to make “hot chocolate-coffee-cardamom soup with Tahitian ice cream and Sicilian pistachio madeleines,” as it’s described on the menu.

The soup is poured tableside from a Japanese iron teapot, but the inspiration for the dish is pure Italian: affogato, the classic marriage of hot espresso and vanilla ice cream or gelato.

There’s also a dark chocolate soup at Minibar on Cahuenga Boulevard. Listed on the menu as “Don’t Harsh My Mellow Stew,” it is accented with homemade marshmallows and almond biscotti.

Owner Ravel Centeno-Rodriguez says it is based on a recipe his mother often made for him when he was a child, “like a deconstructed version of a s’more.” Also poured from a teapot, it is Minibar’s bestselling finale.

At Firefly Bistro in South Pasadena, pastry chef Kristin Ferguson has been doing a special of bittersweet chocolate soup with homemade coconut sorbet, bruleed bananas and, for a little crunch, coconut cake “croutons.”

Valentino’s Davide Giova regularly offers a cinnamon-spiced Valrhona soup served with candied-citrus-flecked ice cream.

And at Naya in Pasadena, there’s a rich and creamy chocolate soup gently spiced with saffron and nutmeg and topped with a pair of crisp, monkey-shaped shortbread cookies.

White chocolate is also showing up as a soup base. At both Chloe in Playa del Rey and Avenue in Manhattan Beach, chef Christian Shaffer is serving a room-temperature white chocolate soup with a chilled espresso flan.

And guests at Belvedere at the Peninsula Beverly Hills are treated to tiny cups of chilled, minted, white chocolate soup along with a selection of miniature cookies after dinner, “instead of the typical mignardise,” says executive chef Sean Hardy. (Former executive chef Bill Bracken was recently promoted to director of food and beverage.)

The surprising thing about this recipe: The mint flavor comes courtesy of Italian hard mint Perugina candies, which are melted into the white chocolate. “It has a more pure flavor than fresh mint or extract,” says Hardy. Who would have thought?

Leslee Komaiko

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Small bites

* There have been a couple of notable closures in recent weeks. Central, the Cal-Med looker with the dramatic city views in the Sunset Millennium Plaza (also home to Norman’s and Rika) is no longer. According to chef Jamie DeRosa, he and his staff showed up for work March 28 to find the doors shut and the locks changed. Also gone? Cafe Capo, Bruce Marder and company’s Italian eatery in the former Opaline space. Although the answering machine has indicated the restaurant is “temporarily closed for business,” restaurant partner Steve Wallace confirmed that the closure is final.

* Opus Bar & Grill has opened in the old Atlas space in the mid-city area. Sarah Levine, formerly of Zax in Brentwood, is heading up the kitchen. On the menu: seasonal California cuisine along with wood-grilled steaks. The restaurant is open every night for dinner.

Opus Bar & Grill, 3760 Wilshire Blvd., L.A. (213) 738-1600.

* Pastry chef Wonyee Tom, who left Water Grill in December, is running the Beach Cabana, a concession stand at the Hilton Waterfront Beach Resort in Orange County. The beachfront kitchen is also home base for Tomgirl Baking Co. “Right now I’m doing custom wedding cakes, birthdays and bridal showers,” says Tom.

The Beach Cabana, 21351 Pacific Coast Highway, Huntington Beach, (714) 969-1597. Tomgirl Baking Co. (714) 969-8556.