When someone mentions “Sonoma Valley,” most people will think wine tasting. Which is great, but what can be even better than wine tasting? Wine infused chocolate tasting! As we were walking through Sonoma Plaza when we spotted a lovely sign that said “Chocolate Tasting.” We got very excited and walked straight over to the store. By the entrance, there was a cute and funny chalkboard sign that said “forget Love, I’d rather fall in Chocolate!” I know, genius, right?
The inside was bright and roomy enough for several customers to walk around without bumping into each other. The use of old wine barrels as display tables were very nice and artistic. They had all sorts of gift items from chocolate (of course), books, funny napkins, bags, etc.. It is fun to just look around the store, if you can fight against the temptation of chocolates.
They had a counter set up for the chocolate tasting to the left side of the store, and they had Port Ganache and also chocolate with different cacao contents in a jar for customers to taste. Port Ganache is one of their truffle filling, and without the chocolate coating, you can really taste the port wine in the chocolate. It was rich, creamy and decadent. And the ones with different cacao percentage was really interesting. The number indicates the cacao contents, for example, “61%” means that 61% cacao and the remaining 39% is mainly sugar and vanilla. It was good to try all three kinds to see the difference in the taste. Naturally, the less cacao the chocolate has, the sweeter the chocolate. The 72% cacao one was pretty bitter. All the chocolate was still very good and tasty.
After looking around the store and finished tasting their chocolate, you can move over the the window showcase with lots and lots of different and pretty chocolates to buy. They have so many kinds of interesting and yummy looking chocolates, it will be hard to resist. We ended up buying 7 of our choice ($14), and we were super excited to try them out.
Each chocolate was created with care, and very pretty! We chose: Peanut Butter & Jelly, The Elvis (Peanut Butter & Banana), Dulce de Leche ganache topped with Caramel, Mint Chocolate, Kahlua-Irish Creme, Cappuccino Tiramisu, and of course, Port. The filling of the Port Truffle was the ones we tried with Chocolate Tasting. The port flavor was a bit more mild with the chocolate coating, and was really nice. The Peanut Butter and Banana had 2 layers in the inside, which was great. Having a 2 distinct flavor with the chocolate coating, instead of everything mixed up brought out the individual taste of the flavors.
We were happy with every one of the 7 chocolates we picked. They were high quality, rich, and tasty. If you like wine and chocolate, this would be the place for you to visit in Sonoma. The staff there were kind and helpful, and the store was clean and organized. We had a fun time with chocolate tasting in between our wine tasting!
Wine Country Chocolate – 414 East 1st Street, Sonoma, California, 95476