Only 13,000 units will be made, which is a good sign that even the Japanese know this thing is too crazy to be put into full production. [Akihabara News]

The LG Chocolate Touch is the latest iteration of the Chocolate line, and brings with it some new music features: FM radio, dedicated key for favorites, Dolby Mobile sound enhancements, and an unexpected and downright weird "Join the Band" feature. Join the Band features a virtual drum kit and scrolling 88-key keyboard so you can tap along with your music. Of course, it also offers Twitter, Facebook and MySpace integration, a 3.2MP camera and one-touch uploading. It's not a super exciting phone like the BL40, but at least it's odd enough to be sort of interesting. It's available today and costs $80 after a $50 mail-in rebate.

On the BlackBerry side of things, we have yet another 'Berry with the Curve moniker (if you're confused about the multitude of identically-named but different-numbered Curves, check out this handy chart). The Curve 8530 is the followup to Verizon's Curve 8330, and has features more in line with the GSM Curve 8520 than the Curve 8900. If you're still following me, great, because this is one of the best Curves out there: It's got Wi-Fi, 3G and GPS. It's the only Curve with 3G, and improves on its GSM brother by offering GPS. Other than that, it's the same 85xx Curve that Matt already reviewed. It'll cost $100 after a $100 mail-in rebate when it's released on November 20th.

And bringing up the rear, we've got the Samsung Convoy, a burly push-to-talk flip-phone that meets military specification, unlike me. It's got a 1300 mAh battery, which is bigger than some smartphones, and is built to withstand shock, dust, vibration, salt fog, humidity, and solar radiation. It'll probably survive until the end of the Iraq War. The Samsung Convoy will be available November 15th for $50 after a $50 mail-in rebate.

[Verizon]

The gum would be used to test, painlessly, for malaria in children while the chocolate would serve as a way of getting some of the disease-feeding fat out of a patient's body. There's already some promise in these methods and the Gates contribution should certainly keep research going. [Telegraph]

If you're listed, well I guess you have the golden ticket (Willy Wonka, chocolate, see what I did there?) Anyway, you have until tomorrow to let LG know. It all seems quite cryptic and strange. What does LG want with my 5-megapixel DIY porn, anyway? We could find out about a week after the hunt closes. But what do you think? [LG via Klik.tv]

According to Phone Arena the LG VX8575 will have a 3.2MP camera and 3.5mm headset jack. I am still drooling over the longer BL40, the Chocolate Touch, eh not so much. [Phone Arena]

It's missing some of the more advanced features the BL40 boasts, notably an accelerometer, but should be a cheaper and smaller alternative to the BL40 if and when it's eventually released. We've got no info on price or release date, but we'll update when we do. [Engadget]

According to an LG press release, the lucky folks in Europe will see the BL40 mid-September while other markets will be covered in the month after.

This means that I'll definitely be looking forward to October for reasons other than Halloween this year, but until then I'll be content drooling over the BL40's tasty official shots. [LGE via Boy Genius Report]

Many, many thanks to Michelle Palisi of Chocolates by Michelle in Port Richey, Florida for making this project possible and for being my personal Willy Wonka.

In the Beginning, There Was Jesus

There's no hiding the fact that our own Jesus Diaz is a bit of a daydreamer. A little while ago he went as far as to share one of his favorite dreams with us in all its high-definition glory: The Apple Tablet (also known as the iTablet), shown here meticulously rendered next to Jesus' iMac and iPhone.

I'll be honest: I drooled when I saw the concept. Not because I'm an Apple fangirl (the only Apple products I own are iPhones and iPods), not because I spotted a Dorothy Parker book in the background, but because I had chocolate on my mind. To me, the iTablet looked like it was one great big chocolate bar straight out of a wacky Willy Wonka fantasy.

And despite all the perks of working for Gizmodo (such as [REDACTED] and [REDACTED]), I didn't have a Golden Ticket that would let me find out if good ol' Willy really did make something like this iTablet. But I had something better.

Then There Was Michelle

I had Michelle Palisi, chocolatier extraordinaire, the bane of my waistline, and the person who turned my daydream into reality.

Michelle didn't even bat an eyelash when I came to her with my request. Instead she looked at the pictures I gave her, studied my iPhone, and handed me a brownie pan. Not one of those odd all-edges brownie pans, but just a simple, basic, plain ol' brownie pan. For a moment I thought that she had been inhaling too many sprinkles, but then she explained that making a precise mold would cut it too close time-wise, so she would improvise a bit.

Touchscreen? How About Lickscreen?

In my mind, the biggest challenge with the chocolate Apple Tablet was the screen. I've seen some cool things done with fondant and frosting, but the screen I wanted had far too much detail for that.

Michelle on the other hand, already had a solution in mind before I even mentioned my concerns: The screen would be printed (with edible ink) on edible paper.

Is This Really Going to Work?

Through some crazy combination of improvised brownie pans, my iPhone and Jesus' concept as models, edible paper, piping gel, edible paint, frosting and who knows what else—is that a melon baller Michelle is holding?—the dream chocolate iTablet looked like it was moving closer to reality.

Time to Wake Up

When Michelle called me to come see the final products, I was on edge. What if my dream melted into a nightmare? Would the silver bezel drip right off? Would there be dead pixels on the screen?

My fears were for naught. Michelle, who had never even heard of the rumored iTablet before I approached her, did a rather good job creating a chocolate model. The bezel did turn out to be the main issue as the paint smeared with even the lightest touch, leaving my hands looking as if I'd been groping the Silver Surfer.

Lickable But Not Clickable

For a moment I'd let myself imagine that maybe I would be able to switch that damned song with a flick of my finger, but sadly my chocolate gadget is stuck on an infinite replay.

Mmmm....Yes, It's Definitely Edible

So, how edible is this tablet? The entire thing can be eaten. From the painted bezel to the screen. (Though I must admit that while it melted in my mouth, I wasn't a fan of the screen taste.)

And Yes, I Ate the Whole Thing

Yummy screen or not, for the sake of proper taste testing I gradually nibbled my way through the entire tablet. Yes, that's a lot of chocolate and thank goodness that rumor about an XL version didn't come out yet, because I don't think I would've made it through a tablet that size.

Verdict? Choco-Tablet Beats iPhone Across the Board in Taste Test

It would be a travesty to not truly live up to our theme and conduct a proper comparison test. So I made sure to try out the edibility of another Apple product, my iPhone. Let's just assume that it doesn't taste all that great because I gave up on taking a bite after nearly chipping a tooth.

The Morning After

Messy hands, slight tummy ache and a broken chocolate addiction later, I'm satisfied with how this journey from dream to chocolate reality ended. But I definitely hope that the next dream concept isn't a 30 incher. There is such a thing as too much chocolate.

This taste bud tempting, 2100-pound behemoth circulates around 120 quarts of chocolate per minute. Just take a look at the videos and see if you can resist visiting the nearest vending machine for something sweet. [Bellagio and TechEBlog]

Taste Test is our weeklong tribute to the leaps that occur when technology meets cuisine, spanning everything from the historic breakthroughs that made food tastier and safer to the Earl-Grey-friendly replicators we impatiently await in the future.

Here's the thing: It's been clear since the earliest teases that the BL40 is a streeeeeetched phone, to the point that LG had to design a few special interface elements to take advantage of—or to work around—the screen's odd proportions. But in promo videos, the BL40 just looked a little, I don't know, bigger. Here, cradled in a young Englishman's hands, this 21:9 chunk of hardware looks more like a compact remote than a cellphone.

That said, the software still looks impressive and runs very smoothly, aside from a little choppiness during multitouch zooming. It's hard to judge such an unexpectedly different device without laying hands on one—it may look a mite silly, but usability is still a total wildcard. [Mobiles.co.uk—Thanks, Daniel!]

Some of these features and interface ideas will be familiar from the earlier ad, but they're explained in more depth here. I particularly like the adjustable panes, which turn a single widescreen into two virtual screens, creating something akin to multiple workspaces. It's clever, but without laying hands on the phone it's hard to tell if the various other wide-optimized UI elements are features or compromises. [LG—Thanks, Tim!]

Shock and mystery, I suppose, are at the core of the BL40's appeal, at least until someone actually gets to try one. For everything we do know, and can see reconfirmed here—the featurephone OS, the 5-megapixel camera, the 21:9 screen, the forward-facing videocalling sensor—there's a less observable thing that we don't: How does it feel in your pocket? Your hand? How well does browsing work? How does this phone deal with video that's not encoded for silly-wide displays? And until we find out that LG hasn't discovered clever and/or magical solutions to these potential issues, ogling is the order of the day. [LG]

The alleged specs aren't much to get excited about, but make no mistake: This will be a popular phone. It's a proud grandson of the line's earliest models—with a slightly touchier front panel and (barely) tweaked styling—which sold about 10 million handsets worldwide, and continue to do well, despite being, well, old. Its beanpole brother can take care of the innovating; lil' 42 can take care of the money. No price or availability yet. [AllAboutPhones via Slashgear]

With the photos comes a spec list, which is only new in the sense that it comes from someone who has the device; it confirms more or less everything we already knew:

- UMTS / HSDPA
- 800x345 screen
- Position sensor
- 5-megapixel camera with a Schneider-Kreuznach lens and flash
- Wi-Fi
- FM transmitter
- About 335 MB of internal memory, expandable via SD card.

On top of that, the Dutch tipster says that the interface is a variant on LG's S-Class UI—which was also widely-anticipated—and to show us a second, smaller, and less oblong phone, which looks a bit more like the Chocolate features phones of yore, and less like something any of us will really care about.

Disregarding obvious TBDs like price, release date and carrier options, there isn't a whole lot we don't know about this device now, except how it will be to use. That's be anyone's guess, so here's mine: it will be novel for about three days, after which you'll start to wish your phone wasn't shaped like your DVD remote. That, or it'll be a totally transcendent experience that leaves you unable to pick up a regularly-ratioed handset ever again. Commenters: Speculate! [Telefon via Engadget]

Supposedly, the info was gleaned from a UA profile for the phone, technically the BL40, though we couldn't find any reference to any of those specs inside of it. Other info possibly revealed by the UA profile is that it's running LG's own OS and Obigo Q7.3 browser, and maybe a 5-megapixel camera.

It also almost seems too weird, even given the funky specs that the Korean phonemakers often resort to in their blood feud—I mean, hello LG watch phone. But at the same time, I could see an LG exec totally think that this is the best idea ever. Which would be dandy, just don't make it suck to use, okay? [Tweakers.net via Unwired View]

We will have to wait till August to see if the complete cellphone looks as sexy as the teasers. And hopefully, they won't use a dumb cellphone inoperative system. [Electric Pig]

Sadly, it is Photoshopped, as you can tell from a variety of tells and mistakes. Says resident PS guru Jesus Diaz, "the chocolate and marsmallow keys are poorly cloned (clearly seen in the chocolate keys, but also on the marshmallows), the perspectives are fucked up, and everything else is made with Photoshop embossing and shadows."

Indeed. Even with its embellished fakery, I am nevertheless hungry. [Geek Pad via Foolish Gadgets]

The Price: About $2 per three puff inhaler.

The Verdict: The size of a container of Chapstick, you pull the telescoping Le Whif out to coat your entire tongue and mouth with a tiny amount of chocolate. The "essence" of chocolate, as it was described to me.

Words cannot capture the humiliation of inhaling a chocolate/raspberry Le Whif, then coughing the sugar out of my lungs, like a first time cigar smoker but even more pansy. (Supposedly the 80 to 300 micron chocolate pieces are too big to enter the lungs, so it's possible that I just sucked down a nasty coat of chocolate into my trachea.)

My second and third puffs, however, were more successful. The sensation is akin to sucking a tiny bit of cocoa powder through a straw. And while not necessarily enjoyable in any way, it was admittedly a lot of chocolate flavor for only .8 calories a stick.

A spokesman explained to me that just as Man had evolved from eating one meal a day, He's gone on to eat 2, 3 and then even a recommended 5. And under this logic, Man would eventually breathe food at all times. So Le Whif is working with a variety of French chefs to capture the essence of their dishes. If and when Le Whif releases inhalable foie gras, I might try again. Until then, I'll stick to good old fashioned overeating. [Le Whif]

It could happen on a deserted island, or it could happen on a particularly long wait in the subway. Either way, it's only a matter of time before, in a moment of extreme hunger, you eye your MP3 player for snacking. As your teeth penetrate the tasteless silicon shell, you'll find the aluminum center to be ever so harder on tooth enamel than nougat—a point to which your dentist will concur.

Plus you'll still be hungry. [SwitchEasy]