Debra Pickett

Though frustrated by her morning's work, Markoff seems delighted to have escaped her test kitchen for a relaxing hour at Tiffin, a favorite Devon Avenue Indian restaurant with a bustling buffet line.

"I've always been fascinated with the Indian culture," says Markoff, who grew up the child of a committedly bohemian mother in Fort Wayne, Ind., "and that Naga truffle [a blend of milk chocolate with coconut and sweet Indian curry powder Markoff first cooked up in her North Side apartment nine years ago] really sparked the whole idea of Vosges."

'Rebelled against Cool Whip'

Since Markoff opened her first small chocolate shop at 2105 W. Armitage in 1998, her company has grown from that single store, where she and a partner staffed the counter, to a multimillion-dollar enterprise with stores in Chicago, New York and Las Vegas, plus a catalog and online business. It has consistently earned a spot on Inc. magazine's list of the 500 fastest-growing companies in the country.

In some ways, Markoff says, it all seems meant-to-be.

As a kid, she recalls, "at our garage sale every year, I'd always bake the Easy-Bake oven cakes and sell them with lemonade." Those early sales led to a small business, opened as a high schooler, with friend and early partner in Vosges, Julie Ruedebusch. Selling "strawberry delight cake" to teachers, her parents' friends and a local country club, Markoff was a young gourmet who "rebelled against Cool Whip."

After college at Vanderbilt University, where her course of study -- psychology and chemistry -- seemed perfectly suited for a budding chocolatier, Markoff headed to Le Cordon Bleu in Paris and then traveled the world for a year, checking out exotic spice markets and other culinary adventures.

'A storytelling thing'

Markoff retains that spirit of adventure, sampling from nearly every dish on the buffet, and regularly concocting highly original flavor pairings, like bacon-and-chocolate or chocolate-and-yam, each of which feature in her latest collection of truffles.

"We're calling it 'Groove,'" she says, "and the idea is tracing different genres of music, specifically African-American music. So you begin with the oldest field songs, represented by more traditional African flavors like yams and spices, and make your way to hip-hop, with Krug champagne and gold leaf. The collection comes with a CD that has a song for each genre, along with an explanatory booklet."

As she sips a mango lassi, Markoff nearly bubbles over with enthusiasm for this "multi-sensory, multi-media chocolate collection," which represents the latest extension of the super-high-end Vosges brand.

"The brand isn't just about really good chocolate," Markoff says, "it's almost a lifestyle."

For Markoff, who seems to blend an artsy, yoga-influenced hippie-chick persona with serious entrepreneurial savvy, the incredible growth of her business has come as something of a surprise. Her attitude in the early days, she says now, was "there's nothing to lose."

She soon decided to buy out her partner Ruedebusch, since "she felt like there was actually a lot to lose."

"These things are hard," Markoff says now, "because we were friends since grade school."

But Markoff says she just had to see where this idea -- "traveling the world through chocolate" -- would lead.

"It is huge," she says now, with a Valley Girl-esque lilt. "It's unbelievable. And everyone is doing the exotic thing now. ... For me, I never really did it as a trend. I did it as a storytelling thing."

In keeping with her vision, Markoff hasn't taken on any more partners or accepted any private equity investment, though she says, "A lot of people are wanting to invest. They think chocolate is the next big Starbucks thing."

In fact, Markoff, who was married in September 2005, first met her husband, a real estate developer, when he proposed a business partnership. She turned that offer down, but accepted his next proposal, which came several years later.

Now he's helping plan some future retail sites for Vosges, while Markoff focuses on streamlining their manufacturing operations and exploring the possibility of building a highly efficient and environmentally friendly "green" factory somewhere in Chicago.

First, though, she's got to get these new truffles right. Pushing her slightly tousled hair back into a tiny clip, Markoff declares that she has got to run.

"At this point," she says, "I feel like I could work forever and not get done."

Then she smiles and takes a deep breath, inhaling the heady aroma of spices that hangs in the restaurant. The idea of never being done seems to have some real appeal.